Based on a trilogy of books by Veronica Roth, the Divergent movie trilogy is a set of dystopian action-drama thriller movies that mirror certain real-world plans & activities so accurately that it makes you wonder who wrote it and how much inside information they are privy to – given the name & heritage of the author I think it’s clear already.
Plot-wise, Divergent has flavours of The Matrix, mixed in with The Maze Runner, mixed in with some kind of teen drama series.
20 minutes in, there are a couple of things I don’t like. 1: explicit depictions of people cutting themselves with a dagger in order to drip blood in some kind of ritual. 2: the idea that institutional rituals are important enough to instantly & permanently separate close family members. The first, I look away from, repeatedly, until it stops happening. The second, I find even more disgusting, considering how it represents the level of power over family units that real world megalomaniacs have long been working towards obtaining.
Cast members
The movie continues with training scenes and bonding between the two lead characters played by Shailene Woodley and Theo James (full name Theodore Peter James Kinnaird Taptiklis). Both of them are satisfactory in their acting ability, while Shailene seems like a very ordinary butch-ish female, and Theo has massive star power – I can only assume the reason he’s not a much bigger star is because there are certain depraved things he has refused to do, so wasn’t invited into ‘the club’, although maybe the creeps of Hollywood are still trying to lure him in since he starred in a Guy Ritchie led action comedy drama series for Netflix (called The Gentlemen) as recently as 2024.
The chief baddie in this movie is played quite well by Kate Winslet (of Titanic). Aesthetically, she kind of resembles Veronica Roth – the author of the book series that this movie was based on – they could easily be sisters.
Other actors who made an enjoyable contribution to the Divergent movie trilogy include Zoë Kravitz who plays one of the main group of friends in all three movies; Maggie Q who plays a helpful senior figure in all three movies; Daniel Dae Kim who plays a classy advocate of honesty in all three movies; Jeff Daniels who plays the main baddie in the third movie (Allegiant, 2016); and Bill Skarsgård who plays a helpful assistant of the main baddie in the third movie. They all did a good job.
Incidentally, Bill Skarsgård looks like he could be the son of Steve Buscemi even though his official father is Stellan Skarsgård who looks nothing like him. Bill looks much more like a cross between his mother and Steve Buscemi. Typical Hollywood shenanigans! Have you seen how strongly Cameron Diaz looks like a daughter of Dolph Lundgren? Anyway, back to the Divergent trilogy…
Other supporting actors were generally adequate although not always to my taste, and this may have been quite necessary in order to find people properly suited to their roles which all involved a mix of goodness and badness in their own ways.
The Five Factions
The backstory, explained at the start of the first movie, Divergent (2014), says that after a big war, society was divided into five groups called ‘factions’. These factions are Erodite (intellectuals), Amity (farmers; kind, harmonious & happy), Candor (honest to a fault; seeking order), Dauntless (police & soldiers – admired, brave, fearless, free & wild), Abnegation (nicknamed Stiffs; simple-living selfless altruistic politicians). There are also the Factionless (who are homeless, dirty & depressed), and then there are some Divergents (who possess traits of multiple factions – they are feared & hunted by the people in power).
It’s an intriguing catchy concept, isn’t it? Because it resembles the real world, in a way. It resembles Wang FengYi’s analysis of the five types of people in society, which he associated with the five key religions in China in his day, as well as five key professions, etc. But trust Ms Roth and/or Hollywood to make a few changes. Here’s the most glaring inconsistencies with Wang FengYi’s observations…
The Amity faction is inaccurate according to Wang’s model, because he said Farmers tend to be the Daoists, and they tend to be expressionless – not acting happy. Daoists limit their kindness too, so as not to exhaust themselves, so they always have the ability to be a somewhat helpful to anyone who asks. Meanwhile, regular giving is a tenet of Muslims more than anyone, and according to Wang’s model, and they tend to be Scholars rather than Farmers – so the most kind (over-kind) people should be Erudite based on this theory. Plus, Daoists are also the ones most obsessed with Honesty according to Wang, but they reject obsession with Order – they appreciate order has its place but only in the simplest way, and are mostly fond of natural rhythm – so the Candor faction isn’t accurate either.
Don’t get me started on the Dauntless faction – the police & soldiers of today may be admired by some, but they’re no less despised by others. In a corruption-free world, the idea of them being admired may be fitting, but in today’s world that’s a biased perspective to say the least. Being a copper or a soldier also means being extremely disciplined & controlled – hardly the fun free-spirited daredevil vibe pushed by this movie, but of course Hollywood is doing what it can to boost public support and enrolment for these jobs.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, Abnegation is even worse. Since when were politicians ever simple-living selfless altruistic people? In a non corrupt society they would probably be this way, but in the world we live in today, this character description couldn’t be much further from the truth.
In summary
I think Divergent (2014) has a fairly good flow of plot, and a fairly good flow of entertainment value. It’s generally a cool concept albeit a twisted version of the even cooler truth. It’s got a fine balance of action and drama, although any more drama and it would be a problem for those who prefer smooth action hero movies that stay within their genre (like myself).
Overall I rate this movie as Pretty Good, on a par with movies like Wanted and Ghost In The Shell. In fact Wanted is a great comparison because it has a similar ratio of action to drama, and is similarly led by a mediocre primary lead actor (James McAvoy) and a stunning secondary lead actor (Angelina Jolie) just like this movie was with Shailene and Theo.
Sequels
The first sequel to Divergent (2014) is Insurgent (2015). It’s a lot more one dimensional, with more drama and less creative action than the original, but still has a basic level of quality and plenty of good bits throughout, plus it has a great ending. This sequel focuses, from the outset, on tracking down Divergents for the purpose of using them to unlock a message from society’s founders. The same protagonist pair from the original, work to avoid capture, and join forces with the Factionless underworld, but eventually give themselves up to the antagonist – again played by Kate Winslet like in the original. You could easily join these two movies together, and watch them both on the same day, or on subsequent days, and treat them as one very long movie, with a less entertaining second half but a great ending. I would rate the sequel as a couple of levels below the original due to the lack of plot & script compared to the original, but it’s still an OK movie – it’s not bad – it’s more than watchable.
The second sequel – the threequel – the third movie in the trilogy – is called Allegiant (2016) which has even more soap opera style drama than Insurgent, and sees the main crew escape to the civilisation outside the wall and learn what’s really going on. With all its drama, Allegiant still has a fair amount of action, and follows on from the story so far established, so it’s not a bad movie to watch straight after the last two. I would rate Allegiant about equal to Insurgent. It’s just about an OK movie in its own right but isn’t really meant to be watched in isolation – it really ought to be watched straight after the last two for adequate familiarity with the backstory.
All three movies were released from 2014-2016. All based on books by Veronica Roth, and all contain the same pair of lead as actors as well as many of the same supporting actors. Plus each sequel roughly continues from the script of the movie that came before it, so it’s easy to treat this series of movies as one long movie, or a Netflix series, and watch them all sequentially for a solid 6+ hours of mild sci-fi action-drama entertainment.
