The Hunger Games prequel director reveals the film got an R-rating for its first cut and justifies its lengthy runtime

The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

(Image credit: Lionsgate)

Just as in the original films, The Hunger Games prequel features a whole lot of brutality. That might seem like a given for a story that revolves around teenagers fighting to the death, but it doesn’t make it any less harrowing when we return to Panem in The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes.

Set some 64 years prior to Katniss’ story, this time around, future president Coriolanus Snow (Tom Blyth) is brought in as a mentor to a young tribute from District 12 called Lucy Gray Baird (Rachel Zegler) for the 10th annual Hunger Games. In a much more rudimentary version of the games, which take place in a crumbling sports arena, the tributes fight to the death in a chilling spectacle.

Speaking to GamesRadar+, director Francis Lawrence, who also helmed films two to four of the original Hunger Games movies, says that navigating the brutality of the story was something they were constantly steering during the adaptation process.

"What I've always tried to do with these movies is try to focus on the emotional impact of the violence, not the act of it itself – not the blood, not the gore – and not try to make the violence entertaining in a way," he explains. "To not be fetishizing the violence itself, but feeling the emotional impact of it."

However, this doesn’t always make it easy to stick to a teenage-friendly rating, he reveals. "What I will say is that every one of these that I've done, the first time I show it to a rating board, I get an R-rating," Lawrence continues. "And then I have to like to start to inch things back, whether that is sound, or some little edits, or things like taking out a little blood that may have been added in. But luckily, I didn't have to change too much with this one."

And for the director, it’s also hugely important to strike the right tone when portraying something so horrendous. "The thing that we have to be careful of, and especially when it becomes more brutal and grounded, is you want to feel the impact and how horrible it is," he adds. "The movie as a whole needs to be entertaining, but you don't want to make the violence within as entertaining or else, you know, we sort of become the Capitol."

At the heart of The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes too is a villain origin story, as audiences find out how and why Snow becomes the tyrannical president we know so well. Based on the book by Suzanne Collins, the film charts the character’s story over three stages, from his impoverished school years to time spent in the Districts. And as a result, it’s a pretty hefty novel, totaling over 500 pages.

But Lawrence was keen not to break up the story at all, even though that means the film adaptation's runtime lasts almost three hours. "I did not want to split them into two, we got too much heat splitting Mockingjay into two previously," he explains to GR+. "So I was like, 'I don't care if this movie is long, we're going to do one satisfying movie that has a clear beginning, middle, and an end.'"

The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes arrives in theaters on Friday, November 17. For more exclusive insight, check out what Lawrence had to say about his upcoming BioShock movie and keep an eye on our website and the Inside Total Film podcast this week.

For more upcoming movies, check out our list of the remaining 2023 movie release dates.

I’m the Deputy Entertainment Editor here at GamesRadar+, covering TV and film for the Total Film and SFX sections online. I previously worked as a Senior Showbiz Reporter and SEO TV reporter at Express Online for three years. I've also written for The Resident magazines and Amateur Photographer, before specializing in entertainment.