By Jenni Kenel ‘14

The film “The Hunger Games” came out in March 2012, and while many fans are anticipating the thrilling sequel that is released on November 22, directors/writers Jason Freidberg and Aaron Seltzer, who teamed together for “Vampires Suck,” “Epic Movie,” “Disaster Movie” and “Meet the Spartans,” have yet again morphed a beloved blockbuster into a spoof. “The Starving Games” offers viewers moments of enjoyment paradoxically because of its stupidity and use of stereotypes.

The movie starts off with Kantmiss Evershot (Maiara Walsh) and Dale (Brant Daugherty) talking about running away from the miserable District 12 where they live. They discuss the Gathering, which is the equivalent to the Reaping in “The Hunger Games,” in which two contestants are chosen to fight to the death against 22 other teenagers.

Petunia Evershot (Kennedy Hermansen) is selected for the Starving Games, and Kantmiss dances in delight at not being chosen. She even chest-bumps and high-fives the guards that are preparing to take her sister. But then Kantmiss is convinced by Petunia’s puppy dog eyes into volunteering for her younger sister.

The contestants are then brought to the Capital and are interviewed by cheesey Stanley Caeserman (Chris Marroy) on their way to the arena where they will fight to the death. The Games begin and Kantmiss meets the musical group LMFAO and gets help from her competitor, Rudy (Eryn L. Davis), who ends up snapping Kantmiss out of a hallucination in she which was imagining that she is one of the Na’vi from the movie “Avatar.”

The rest of the Games continue on with a few twists here and there with spoofs such as the Mocking Jay, the bravest bird, being a chicken and the birds pooping on Kantmiss when she whistles her tune. Also, her mother, who is depressed in “The Hunger Games,” is completely brain dead and unable to function in “The Starving Games.”

The portrayal of some of the events in the spoof film did leave something to be desired. Walsh is very predictable and over exuberant in her acting, even for a movie that is supposed to be unrealistic. For example, her acting is just a distraction in the scene when Kantmiss is trying to save Peter (Cody Christian) from Marco (Ross Wyngaarden) and picks a French baguette instead of an arrow from her sheath.

Daugherty and Christian, on the other hand, gave strong performances. Daugherty was excellent at playing the overprotective type of boy who also has a crush on the heroine, and Christian successfully made a joke of the “baker’s nerdy son” who is also hopelessly in love with her. Christian also gets a shout-out for being able to convincingly scream in a very high-pitched girl voice when depicting how Peter was terrified of everything and everyone as soon as the Games begin.

Friedberg and Seltzer add a dash of cultural relevancy with the references to Harry Potter, “Oz: the Great and Powerful,” “The Avengers,” Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Taylor Swift, “Sherlock Holmes” and even America’s crazy obsession with their sports teams. “The Starving Games” is cheesy, predictable, stupid, stereotypical, insulting and rude—exactly what a spoof should be.