di Carolina Lawless
Who are human beings? What is their true nature? What dictates the choices we make? These are the questions that will plague your mind after seeing The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, the movie based on the homonymous book by Suzanne Collins.
The tale – a prequel to the renowned Hunger Games saga – is set in the same dystopian world as the rest of the series, a world where rich people live splendidly in the Capitol, whereas the poor ones get exploited in the Districts, in the fictional state of Panem. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes takes place several years before the adventures narrated in the original saga, recounting the events that shaped the personality of an eighteen-year-old Coriolanus Snow, the future tyrannical president of Panem.
Despite the power and influence his family held in the past, Coriolanus practically lives in squalor after his deceased father lost everything during the war against the rebellious districts. Come the tenth annual Hunger Games, a yearly occurrence in which a boy and a girl are randomly chosen from each district and sent to compete and kill each other until there is only one left, Coriolanus is assigned the task of mentoring Lucy Gray, a tribute from the most degraded district, in order to win a scholarship. This is when he begins to struggle with his emotions, his feelings, his beliefs. He must decide where his loyalty lies, how much he is willing to risk and whether or not to re-evaluate everything he has believed all his life: to choose a path of love and empathy, or to keep being driven by power, pride and ambition.
While the film perfectly brings to life a large part of the book, it lacks the introspection that only a written inner dialogue can provide. The book is told from the protagonist’s perspective, so the reader knows exactly what he is thinking at any given moment. We therefore understand his experience and his struggles, but we also get a glimpse of his darker, twisted streak.
This depraved side of the protagonist appears throughout the entirety of the novel, while in the film it becomes apparent only towards the end. As a consequence, book and film show different aspects of Coriolanus, both equally interesting. This duality encapsulates perfectly one of the main themes of the story – the true nature of mankind and, above all, what it is due to.
It is the age-old question of nature vs nurture, of whether there is such a thing as innate evil or if personality is entirely due to external factors, such as family situation, economic status, potential traumas. The novel portrays a boy coming to terms with his inner demons, while the on-screen representation shows a teenager who struggles with the circumstances he finds himself in. Without changing the story in the slightest, these two representations show both sides of the nature vs nurture debate, sending out very different messages starting from the same events.
The book seems to allude to the fact that the protagonist was always somewhat evil deep down and that the choices he made were entirely driven by greed and self preservation. On the other hand, the film gives a more positive and hopeful view of humanity, showing the viewer the error of Coriolanus’ ways without condemning humanity as a whole, underlining the single personal responsibility.
MINGOMagazine 