Francis Lawrence Talks Taking On 'The Hunger Games: Catching Fire'

Francis Lawrence spoke with MTV News as part of their preview of the hottest films of 2013. He talked about taking the reigns from Gary Ross, the massive responsibility of casting Finnick, and the challenges of filming in paradise.

From MTV:

On Taking Over For Gary Ross:

"I liked what Gary did a lot, but I have a different style than he does," Lawrence explained. "So it was very easy for me to come in the room and sit down with the people involved in the movie and sort of say, 'Here's what I like about what Gary did that I would latch on to and hold onto and embrace, and here's the way I would do it differently.' The trickier thing, honestly for me, was sort of stepping into a world, and there's crew members that were on the first movie, obviously an entire cast, all the people that are returning that I inherited. I was nervous about what they were going to feel... I think everybody in general was really gracious and worked really hard and ended up being really fun to work with. I think there were a couple of people that were really bummed that Gary wasn't doing it, and it had less to do with the choice of me coming on than just Gary not doing it. They signed on with Gary; they're friends with Gary; they like Gary. And I think there was definitely some sadness there."

On Finding Finnick:

"[Claflin] is very athletic, which is great. He's in great shape. He's very charismatic," Lawrence said. "But I was also looking in the long term. There's kind of a rouge-like quality to him in this book. And long term, he's actually an emotional character and a very loyal character and a character who's in love; a character who experienced quite a lot of sadness. And he was really able to tap into that, as well as being really charming and sexy and handsome as hell."

On Shooting The Arena Scenes:

"The arena stuff is pretty tricky... just because the sort of center of the arena where the cornucopia exists and the water and the spokes. The circular beach with the jungle around it doesn't exist, so we have to sort of piece it all together," he explained. "And you know even though shooting in Hawaii sounds like a lot of fun, it's pretty tricky when you're in the beach and waves and tides. Our set got washed away one day by the tide, and then... shooting in the jungle where there's bugs and mud and rain. The days are short, so you don't have much time, and you're starting to lug around 100-pound IMAX cameras."

Francis also has some great insight into Haymitch's character and talks about the editing process. Read the article in it's entirety HERE.