This is the first movie from Veronica Roth’s trilogy. If you enjoyed the two Hunger Games movies you will probably like this one too, although this film is not quite as good as ” The Hunger Games”. It is, however, a nice metaphor for adolescents figuring out who they are and developing an identity.
The movie takes place about 100 years into the future in a war ravaged Chicago. Society has decided to forever end war and to that end, society has been divided into five factions. Each faction works in harmony with the others for the good of society as a whole.
The five factions are Amity- mainly farmers; Candor- these folks run the Judicial System; Erudite-the scientists and really smart people; Abnegation-self-sacrificing people who like to help others; and Dauntless-soldiers. Abnegation is the current leader of the five factions.
At the end of adolescence, each citizen takes an aptitude test to determine the faction they should join. One does not have to chose the faction their parents are in and one doesn’t even have to follow the recommendation of the aptitude test. One must however, make a choice. If the choice turns out to be wrong, then one gets kicked out of the faction and is essentially homeless.
Rarely the aptitude test is “inconclusive” because the person has traits of multiple factions and doesn’t really belong anywhere. Society considers these individuals “divergent” and a serious threat to the social order.
Beatrice Prior (aka Tris-Shailene Woodley) takes the test with inconclusive results. She decides to join Dauntless even though her parents (Ashley Judd and Tony Goldwyn) are both in Abnegation. Tris is being trained to be a good soldier after she joins Dauntless by Tobias “Four” Eaton (Theo James).
Janine Matthews, the leader of Erudite isn’t pleased with the way Abnegation has been running things and there are rumors that she is planning some type of military coup.
Tris needs to keep her divergent status a secret or she could be hunted down and killed! She needs someone to help her and likes “Four” but can she trust him?
I enjoyed the movie which has an interesting plot considerable suspense. The lead actors do a nice job too.
Rating-7.0-solid rental
Dave
