'Hunger Games': birth of a franchise

The first movie version of Suzanne Collins' 'Hunger Games' book trilogy set records with the third-best opening weekend ever.

|
Murray Close/HONS/Lionsgate/AP
'The Hunger Games' received mainly positive reviews from critics as well as setting box office records.

Movie of the moment “The Hunger Games” raked in a massive opening weekend gross of $155 million, making its opening weekend the third best ever and winning the title of best opening of all time for a non-sequel movie.

The only two movies to have had better opening weekends are the 2011 movie “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2,” which grossed $169.2 million, and the 2008 Batman film “The Dark Knight,” which earned $158.4 million. But because “Harry” and “Knight” are both sequels, “Hunger Games” now holds the record for best opening weekend for any film that is not a sequel. 

The movie also earned $68 million on its opening day, which gives it the fifth-best opening day ever for a movie. The movie was also well-received by critics.

“This is the birth of a franchise,” Lionsgate head of distribution David Spitz told the Seattle Times. “To launch in this fashion is mindboggling.”

“Catching Fire,” the next installment in the planned movie quartet, is due in 2013.

Molly Driscoll is a Monitor contributor.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to 'Hunger Games': birth of a franchise
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Books/chapter-and-verse/2012/0326/Hunger-Games-birth-of-a-franchise
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe