Divergent: Blu-ray Review
The Movie:
Divergent is set in a future world where society has been divided into five distinct factions. But Tris (Shailene Woodley) will never fit into any one group-she is Divergent, and what makes her different makes her dangerous. Targeted by a faction leader determined to eliminate all Divergents, Tris turns to the one person she believes she can trust: Four (Theo James), an instructor for the militant Dauntless faction, and a man full of dark secrets. Together, Tris and Four uncover a mind-bending conspiracy that will put their courage to the ultimate test and forever link their destinies.
I never read the book so I went into the film completely blind and not really knowing what to expect which is something I actually like doing. If there was a slightest bit of expectation on my part it was that I figured this would be another teen kind of film. Just for the simple fact that Summit Entertainment has had success with The Twilight Saga and The Hunger Games franchise and the audience that sees these films consist of teens (typically teen girls) but I was pleasantly surprised that it wasn’t what I thought it was going to be in the least. The story is very well thought out and original with a social undertone that actually makes you think. You have a world where it’s main goal is peace and in order to keep it that way the government divided the people into groups where the people within all are fairly similar. The way that people are matched up to those groups are through an aptitude test and that was the thing that grabbed me and made me keep thinking “what if”. Seriously, what if the way you live your adult life depended on a test result or choice you make to join a group of people that you don’t know at all. It’s a crazy concept to think about and that is exactly why this film worked so well. It had me creating scenarios in my head and wondering what group would I fit in with or join. When a film makes your mind wander after watching it like that then you know that there was a great story there. Woodley was fantastic in her performance. She’s grown a lot as an actress and even though I’ve had my issues with some of her past performances I thought what she did with her character was proof of her acting maturity. Theo James did great as well. He has this presence about him that I can only describe as an intimidating calmness and that in turn has him commanding the scenes that he’s in. After watching this movie it really has me anticipating the sequels and seeing where the overall story goes. I don’t think I’ll be reading the books just because I would much rather keep my opinions about the source material and the film adaptation separate. Either way I’ll be waiting for the next film in the series and I suggest you pick this up if you haven’t seen it at all.
Special Features:
Bringing Divergent To Life – A very awesome and in depth feature that is separated into four parts. It runs around 50 minutes and has interviews with the cast and crew (including the author of the novels).
Faction Before Blood – A look at the faction system and how it essentially works.
Deleted Scenes – Only a few scenes here that aren’t that big of a deal. I can understand why they were cut.
Beating Heart Music Video
Don’t forget to download the Divergent app for iOS from the iTunes App Store for FREE! The app will give Divergent fans access to over 150 minutes of bonus features and interactive content not to mention continuous updates on the next installments in the series.
