Given the acclaim that has been heaped upon its admittedly superior source material, Divergent was toted to be something of a kindred spirit to The Hunger Games franchise - indeed, the producers who managed to get their mitts on the rights to the books presumably thought they had a gold mine on their hands. Still, despite the fact that the movie made a good amount at the box office, there's no doubting this super stilted adaptation is a fairly lackluster one; in fact, it's biggest problem might be the fact that it feels like we've seen it all before elsewhere. And we have, kind of. Set in a dystopian future world where people are divided into groups according to their abilities, the plot centres on Shailene Woodley's Tris, who - as the go-getting protagonist - obviously doesn't fit into any of those categories (cue a conspiracy led by Kate Winslet that drives a narrative crammed with plot holes). The major pitfall of Divergent, though, is that it spends almost the entirety of its runtime trying to cater to the sequel; by the time the credits are rolling, we're bored, exhausted, and not at all interested in the follow-up.
Sam Hill is an ardent cinephile and has been writing about film professionally since 2008. He harbours a particular fondness for western and sci-fi movies.
