Video review: "The Divergent Series: Insurgent"

"The Divergent Series" may just be a cut-rate rip-off of "The Hunger Games," but I still prefer it to the original YA dystopian future where photogenic teens hold the key to salvation.

The Divergent movies seems less self-serious, throwing you winks that it understands how goofy this all is -- contrasted with the unrelentingly grim "Games."

In this second installment, Tris (Shailene Woodley) has emerged as the face of the rebellion against the Erudite faction that rules a post-apocalyptic society centered around the remnants of Chicago. She's divergent, meaning she contains more than one of the attributes of the five different factions.

For the crime of being different, Tris and her friends are being hunted down, on the lam and hiding out with the pacifist Amity clan. Needless to say, trouble soon catches up with them. Tris is forced to undergo a series of trials designed to break her will. It's essentially a series of technology-induced nightmares in which she must overcome impossible odds.

Very Matrix-y.

Four (Theo James), Tris' fellow divergent and dreamy boyfriend, is along for the ride again. Kate Winslet huffs and puffs as the evil Erudite leader.

"Insurgent" won't win any awards for originality, but it's fun and fast-moving.

Bonus features are good, though you'll have to go for the Blu-ray combo pack to get most of them. The DVD comes with a feature-length audio commentary track by two of the producers -- producers? who cares? -- a making-of featurette and photo gallery.

With the combo pack you add four more featurettes, concentrating on things like the fight choreography and training, casting, etc. You also get "Insurgent Unclocked," a feature-length documentary on the making of the film.

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Review: "The Divergent Series: Insurgent"

I liked "Divergent" more than the first movie in the "Hunger Games" trilogy, and its sequel is a step up from that other franchise's sequel, too.

(This despite the goofy, long-winded title. What, did they really think if they just released it as "Insurgent" that people wouldn't know what it's about?)

Based on the YA books by Veronica Roth, "The Divergent Series: Insurgent" continues the story of young rebel Tris Prior (Shailene Woodley), the "chosen one" seemingly destined to overthrow the tyrannical regime that rules a post-apocalyptic dystopia. Set hundreds of years in the future in a dilapidated Chicago, where remnants of skyscrapers rise like great eroded sand castles, the people have been divided up into five factions based on their personality and attributes.

Tris was revealed to be divergent, meaning she carries traits of several factions, and thus is marked for death by Jeanine (Kate Winselt), chief of the intellectuals, Erudite. Tris had chosen the Dauntless clan, attracted by the soldier caste's embrace of adventure. She was assisted in her journey from wallflower to warrior by Four (Theo James), her trainer-cum-lover, who turned out to be divergent, too.

When last we left things, the rebels had uncovered a scheme by Erudite to wipe out the ruling faction, Abnegation, after Tris and her crew stormed their HQ. Now they're hiding out with the peace-loving Amity (led by Octavia Spencer).

Tris, now sporting a chic short haircut and a guilty conscience, is obsessed with killing Jeanine and ending the war before it's gone too far.

(Of course, she had an opportunity to do that in the last movie and settled for just impaling Winslet's hand with a knife. Shoulda coulda.)

Anyway, things continue apace with an effort to unite the other factions against the oppressors. Tris becomes a reluctant symbol of that movement -- much like Katniss does in HG.

Director Robert Schwentke and screenwriting trio Brian Duffield, Akiva Goldsman and Mark Bomback keep things moving along at an agreeable pace, never making the mistake of letting the talkie character scenes slow the proceedings down for long.

Things get a little trippy in the second half, with more simulated missions designed to break Tris' will, and a mysterious box which purportedly contains all of life's answers. This results in some very Matrix-y moments, such as Tris chasing a building containing her imperiled mother that's both flying and on fire.

Also turning up are Naomi Watts as Four's long-lost, and not particularly loved, mother; Peter (Miles Teller), a former Dauntless comrade who takes special delight in tormenting Tris over her failings; and Caleb (Ansel Elgort), Tris' prevaricating brother, who previously trained with the Erudites and still holds some affinity for their Machiavellian ethos.

(Woodley and Elgort have since starred as a star-crossed couple in "The Fault in Our Stars," so it's a little weird now to watch them as sibling antagonists.)

This isn't the most original material in the world -- at times the movie feels like "Hunger Games" spliced with "Inception" and "The Matrix," with a little "X-Men" xenophobia tossed in, too. But "The Divergent Series: Insurgent" is both a bit of fun and a little bit dangerous. It's like a cute, surly boy from the suburbs.