When I saw "Divergent" a year ago, I thought it was an unoriginal and corny disappointment. I had never read any of the books, but had heard great things about them. Insurgent is a nice step up from Divergent and it achieves this by raising the stakes, leaving out the boring informational crap, and upping the action so it is actually exciting. It is nearly impossible to watch this series and NOT compare it to the "Hunger Games" series. "The Hunger Games" was lightyears ahead of "Divergent," and every film in the "Hunger Games" series to date is still better than "Insurgent," but it seems like this Shailene Woodley led series is heading in the right direction. Speaking of Woodley, she has got some chops. She makes the most of a somewhat lackluster script by showing some true emotion and displaying some true, well-done acting. She could definitely have a great future in film and may even have a couple dates with Oscar one day as she seeks out more films like The Descendants and The Fault in Our Stars. Another fine performance in the film comes from the always-great Kate Winslet, who provides us with an interesting and hate-able villain. Miles Teller is also fun to watch in this one, which I found to be a pleasant surprise, not because he isn't a good actor but because I hated his character in the first film. The camera work in the film is interesting. There are definitely some risks; sometimes they pay off and sometimes they don't. At times, the cinematography seems surprisingly good for this type of film, but at other times it seems as if the filmmakers were trying a little too hard. The main problems with the film are in the plot, which could be huge. Luckily, the plot holes and strange ending don't take too much away from the overall effect. The biggest issue I had was that after all was said and done, the film did not excite me for the next installment in the franchise and I'm really not to eager to see where this story goes. Still, if the next film makes the types of improvements this one made from "Divergent," this could go down as a fairly good franchise. But I'm not gonna put money on it...
