Movie Review Monday

The Maze Runner (2014)

I never had a burning desire to see this film. I saw the previews and knew they were based on a series of books, but that was where my knowledge ended—and where I was happy to let it end. My oldest mentioned a few times he was interested in watching it, but we always found other movies to watch instead.

One night, we went to a banquet with my spouse’s coworkers, and one of them mentioned that he absolutely loved The Maze Runner movie series. He went on about how amazing it was, so we decided to give it a watch.

The movie isn’t terrible. It has the expected elements of a young adult dystopian film: lack of adult figures, with the ones present being untrustworthy; teens who have to rely on themselves and each other to get out of dangerous situations; discontent within the ranks of the teens; creatures that have to be defeated; and an evil entity controlling everything.

I write dystopian stories, so I totally expected all of these elements to be there. I wasn’t surprised, but I wanted to be surprised. I wanted something new to happen that would completely blow me away, but it didn’t. In fact, I thought the film was a bit slow. I didn’t understand why it needed to be almost 2 hours long—and it felt every minute of being almost 2 hours long. Perhaps the goal was to build up the characters and make the audience connect with them, but I didn’t feel connected to them at all.

My kids enjoyed the film. They totally got caught up in the action, and there were moments where they covered their eyes to protect themselves from the scariness that was the Grievers. I’m a huge fan of creatures, but I wouldn’t say these would be in my list of top 10.

The film did make me slightly curious to know what happens in the books. After all, we all know that books and movies are completely different, so what happens in the books that they weren’t able to show on screen? How does the narrative in the story build up the characters and the tension that wasn’t accomplished in the film? I have a long list of books that I want to read, and if I ever get around to reading this series, I’ll let you know.

The Maze Runner was a good movie to entertain us for a night, and I didn’t feel like I completely wasted my time watching it. It was at least intriguing enough to watch the second film (review coming next week), so it had that going for it.

Has anyone else watched this movie? What were your thoughts?

Pembroke Sinclair's books on Goodreads
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Dealing with Devils Dealing with Devils (The Road to Salvation, #2)
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ratings: 32 (avg rating 4.00)