Quentin Tarantino, the two-time Oscar-winning filmmaker, has expressed his fiery opinions on the billion-dollar-grossing Hunger Games franchise during a recent interview on The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast. He accused The Hunger Games of plagiarizing the 2000 Japanese film Battle Royale, which was based on the 1999 novel of the same name by author Koushun Takami.
"I cannot fathom how the Japanese writer didn't sue Suzanne Collins for every penny she owns," he exclaimed. "They simply ripped off the book, and the clueless book critics didn't even bother to watch a Japanese film called Battle Royale, so they never called her out on it. They raved about how it was the most original thing they'd ever read. But as soon as the film critics saw The Hunger Games, they were left scratching their heads, muttering 'What the fuck? This is just Battle Royale, but with a PG rating!'"
The similarities between the two stories have been compared since the first Hunger Games installment, starring Jennifer Lawrence, was released in 2012. Battle Royale takes place in a dystopian future Japan where a group of junior high students are forced by a totalitarian government to fight to the death in a competition until only one remains. The Hunger Games is also a dystopian series centered on a televised competition in which two teens from each of the twelve districts in the fictional nation of Panem are chosen at random to fight to the death.
Suzanne Collins, who wrote the Hunger Games books, has previously denied that her series was based on Battle Royale. "I had never heard of that book or that author until my book was turned in," she told The New York Times in 2011. "When it was mentioned to me, I asked my editor if I should read it. He said, 'No, I don't want that world in your head. Just continue with what you're doing.'"
Since the release of Battle Royale in 2000, a sequel followed in 2003 called Battle Royale II: Requiem. As for The Hunger Games franchise, five films have been released since the first installment in 2012, with a sixth one, Sunrise on the Reaping, set to hit theaters in 2026.
