I remember when the first Hunger Games was about to be released. I was so excited. I felt a deep connection to the book series, so I was extremely excited to see a story so close to my heart being brought to the bring screen.
The run up to the movie was huge. The supporting cast were charming during interviews and the film's leading lady, Jennifer Lawrence, was winning hearts with her authenticity. But with all the anticipation came controversy.
People started to murmur and moan once the studio had casted Amandla Sternberg, Lenny Kravitz and Dayo Okyeni to play three characters in the book whose ethnicity was ambiguous. The greatest outcry came from the casting of Amandla as Rue, a young 12-year-old girl that befriends Jennifer Lawrence’s character in the film - some argued that they had pictured Rue as a blonde white girl, and some even suggested that her death was not as impactful as it was in the book because she was black. This was a 12-year old-girl that in the movie had been put into a traumatic situation and had faced an unfortunate end, but because she was black, it was almost disregarded.