The second installment to "The Hunger Games" is hot and fast but also pensive — not what you'd expect from an adaptation of a Young Adult novel series. I reckon author Suzanne Collins' work and the first "Hunger Games" should be on the syllabus for high schools everywhere, and the latest adaptation does not disappoint. Anything that could be done to improve what has become a teen cult classic sans vampires has been done. Prepare for another round of the survival of the gutsiest.

The series has had a switch in directors (from Gary Ross to Francis Lawrence, of "I am Legend") with redux results. This is enhanced by protagonist Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) shedding some of her baby-pink, childlike ambience and vamping herself as a cross between Joan of Arc and Cleopatra, with sizzling jet-black hair, mean dark eyeliner and an ensemble that looks positively metallic. Just what you'd expect of a young woman who survived the kill-or-be-killed "games" of the first movie and is now forced to live with the trauma.

Actually, Katniss hates the getup, the spotlight afforded by her "success" and the hilarious but relentless presence of escort Effie Trinket (Elizabeth Banks), whose job it is to bring Katniss and her supposed lover, Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson), in front of the cameras to be exploited for propaganda. This is part of the plan hatched by the sneering despot President Snow (Donald Sutherland) of the futuristic city-state Capitol, to keep the masses distracted from mounting political dissatisfaction.