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Executives at Summit Entertainment are waiting to count their box office profits when Divergent, the next teen-action-fantasy-love story, hits theaters this spring. The adaptation of the first book in a trilogy written by Veronica Roth has been highly anticipated by fans of the series. Will this latest adolescent-romance-adventure film be added to the list of super hits like The Hunger Games, Twilight, and Harry Potter, or will it fizzle when compared to its predecessors?
For those you of you that have not read the books, here is a brief summary of the storyline. The film opens with a futuristic Chicago that has survived an apocalyptic war. To keep the peace, society is divided into five factions. The factions are Abnegation the selfless, Erudite the intelligent, Dauntless the brave, Amity the peaceful, and Candor the telling. Which faction one belongs to is decided when a youngster comes of age (about 16 years old). Each child is given a series of tests to determine what personality, mental and emotional characteristics the person has and which faction best fits that individual. Should the young adult be dissatisfied with the test results, he or she has the right to choose which faction they want to belong to, but once the choice is made there is no turning back.
Our heroine in Divergent is Tris (Shailene Woodley). Her test results come back inconclusive and she is told by her tester that she is someone who does not fit in any faction, making her a “Divergent” and a danger to the order of society. Tris, originally from Abnegation, chooses Dauntless as her faction due to her fascination with their bravery and freedom of spirit. She is sent off for training where she meets future love interest Four (Theo James). During training Tris is a total misfit because she is Divergent and can’t be molded into a square peg, and her defiance leads to a series of incidents that nearly kill her.
As the story unfolds, we discover the evil intention of Jeanie Matthews (Kate Winselt), a member of the Erudite faction that is heading up an initiative to overthrow Abnegation, the current ruling faction. Jeanie is unscrupulous and will stop at nothing to bring Erudite to power, even if it means killing innocent people including any Divergent that she perceives to be a threat to her mission.
Divergent is filled with action sequences that will keep your interested, but the movie grinds to a halt at certain points. The scenes taking place in the training sequences are unnecessarily extended and drawn out making the film about 30 minutes too long. This movie means to draw out emotion from the audiences as a young girl faces life changing decisions and discovers betrayal, love, and loss. Unfortunately, there is a disconnect with some of the characters so it is hard to feel anything at all even when something as tragic as a loved one dying occurs on screen. Shailene Woodley has some good moments in the piece, but lacks the intensity and charisma that Jennifer Lawrence has in The Hunger Games films. One can’t help but compare the two actresses since they are playing almost the same character. The hunky Theo James looks the part of Four, but often fell flat in some of his lines, making him seem more wooden than a passionate freedom fighter watching out for the safety of his new found love. The supporting cast made up of Ashley Judd, Jai Courtney, Zoe Kravitz, and Tony Goldwyn, just to name a few, are not bad but none have any real character development making it hard to connect to any of the roles they are playing.
Divergent is not a bad movie it just doesn’t hold up as a good movie. It will be interesting to see where filmmakers can take the sequels (I am sure those are coming). Hopefully, with a bit of tweaking future films based on the series written by Roth will have the punch and wow factor moviegoers (especially anxious fans of the books) are seeking on the big screen.
