The Divergent Series: Insurgent
Director: Robert Schwentke
Starring: Shailene Woodley, Ansel Elgort, Theo James
119 mins; Class 12;
KRS Releasing Ltd

Previously, on Divergent: in a post-apocalyptic Chicago, its population has been divided in-to factions based on their personality: Abnegation (the selfless, caring ones); Amity (the peaceful ones); Candor (the honest ones); Dauntless (the brave ones) and Erudite (the intelligent ones), led by the power-hungry Jeanine (Kate Winslet).

Those with no faction are known simply, and helpfully, as Factionless.

Tris (Shailene Woodley) and Four (Theo James) are Divergents – people who don’t fit neatly into one of the five factions, yet who display attributes of all.

They and others like them, thwart Jeanine’s attempts to violently seize power from Abnegation and now find themselves on the run.

As this second in the series opens, Jeanine is given an elusive, five-sided locked box picked up from the ruins of Abnegation.

Each side of the box bears the seal of each faction. Jeanine realises it contains a message with the key to the future and it can only be unlocked by a Divergent possessing qualities of all five factions… and so her hunt for Tris and her allies becomes all the more intensive.

The action is entertaining enough and the film boasts some stunning visuals

The proliferation of dystopian young adult fiction onto the big screen continues; yet so far nothing has succeeded in reaching the heady heights reached well-made and critically and commercially acclaimed as the Hunger Games trilogy. I repeat myself, I am aware, yet this second in the Divergent series continues to suffer poor comparisons to it.

While this second instalment has a few things going for it, the film still struggles with the problems that bogged down Part 1.

The storyline is a little muddled. At the end of Part 1, Tris and co had managed to stall the Erudite Jeannine’s plans, yet the latter is now very much in control.

We assume therefore that Abnegation is no more. We also get to meet members of Amity led by Octavia Spencer’s Johanna and members of the Candor faction lead by Daniel Dae Kim’s Jack yet their actual roles and positions within society as a whole are never made clear. The Factionless, led by Naomi Watts’s Evelyn, are given more screen time this time around, yet not enough, for this interesting new nugget of information, like many plotlines surrounding it, is not developed to the full.

It is a great supporting cast and they dauntlessly plod on gamely trying to add gravitas to a story that struggles for depth.

Yet the characters too thinly sketched and few of them have enough screen time to really make an impact. Woodley offers her usual commitment to the role as Tris, undoubtedly a charismatic presence, yet neither character nor actress are given enough space to truly command the screen as the leader Tris is meant to be.

Yet, Woodley tries and it is also thanks to her that the movie is enjoyable, save some shortcomings.

The action is entertaining and the film boasts some stunning visuals – a scene where Tris is desperately trying to rescue a loved one from a floating burning shack is beautifully made and provides a brief heart-in-mouth moment, but at no point does the film reach the emotional depths so vital to allow the audience to enter its world.

Like the Harry Potter, Twilight and Hunger Games franchises before it, the final book in the trilogy by Veronica Roth on which the films are based will be split into two parts.

The film-makers have a daunting task ahead to overcome the problems they have faced so far; but an interesting twist in the final act of Part 2 which may take us out of the claustrophobic society we have witnessed so far; more challenges ahead for Tris and Four and hopefully more screen time for Watts’s Evelyn promises a better conclusion to the story.