Will DIVERGENT Test The Movie Fans?

Word on the street has an interesting vibe about the upcoming move, Divergent, opening this Friday.

There are a lot of interesting opinions coming out from early movie reviews from organizations like Variety, Forbes, and THR.

More or less the reviews seem to say that the 143-minute movie spends a lot of time trying to build the the background or groundwork of the fictional world that Divergent takes place in.  Some of the nasty quotes include,

"...director Neil Burger ... neglects to create an engaging standalone movie"

"... takes pains to explicitly set up the rules of its universe ... much of the core story takes place outside the rules and expectations..."

"Neil Burger struggles to fuse philosophy, awkward romance and brutal action"

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At present, Rotten Tomatoes has 8 early reviews and the tomatoe meter is a fat 25%, or average rating of 5.7.  So the "professional" critics are having issues with the movie it seems.

But as we've seen throughout time, that professional critics are held to a different standard than most movie goers or popcorn movie fans might be held to.  So we have to take the negativity with a grain of salt.  Or do we?

Aside from the critics on RT, fans seem to be of a different mind.  Fans have chimed in after 37,000+ votes, with a 97% "want to see."

But there is some concern that non-book fans might get lost being absorbed in how the tapestry of this world gets spelled out too much and bore the crap out of them.

Let's think about this.

I've read and reviewed Divergent over on brusimm.

The teasers and trailers I've seen of the movie seem to be hitting on all cylinders as far as my recognizing every scene in the trailers as being from the book.  But I can't help but wonder if the teaser visuals are too esoteric or confusing for the generic movie-goer, and if you think about it, the studio coffers do need to get padded by the non-book fans.

From this perspective, the movie looks like it will stick to the book and book fans should be good to go.  I presume.

I guess we'll see how it goes.  Right?

Divergent Trailer



Rotten Tomatoes, Variety, Forbes, and THR

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