To me the Hunger Games was sort of like Lord of the Flies meets Mad Max. Has anyone read Lord of the Flies or seen Mad Max with Mel Gibson? There was also a Japanese movie called Battle Royale that came out a few years ago but was never released in the US.

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Having read the books numerous times, the movie is lacking is so many ways. Scenes were redacted which I understand you have to keep the film lengthen under consideration but do not add scenes that have no mention or relevance into the movie. Also, the time lines are important in this film. You are building up to something. When you leave so much out how do you have that reference for later films. You do not get to connect with Katniss and Peeta in the film like you do in the books. I blame the SIGNIFICANT shortening of the cave scenes. The whole last 30 minutes of the film was horrible. Adding the extra fighting in the last scene did not add any value but took away from the film. Had the last Cornucopia scene been left as originally written, it would have made for a much more dramatic conclusion and wrap of the film.… Expand

I haven't read the books yet but I certainly will now that I have had the pleasure of seeing one of the best films in recent memory. The screenplay is tight and fast paced but the story keeps its integrity throughout the film. The acting is first class and Jennifer Lawrence will have a long and prosperous career unless she does something really stupid. (see Lohan, Lindsay). The only criticism I have is that they "dumbed down" the graphic violence to get a PG13 rating. The killings are done so quickly and cleanly that the camera barely gives you time to realize what has happened. The "anti- CSI effect" sanitizes the brutality of the contest and in a way it hides the evil of the adults who have orchestrated these "games." I look forward to the sequels with same anticipation of the Harry Potter movies.… Expand

The premise is excellent. An Orwellian future where children are offered to the state as entertainment. There was so much promise. Not having read the books, it's like being invited to a party but not knowing anyone. There was very little character development. Further, the casting of Peta seemed poorly done. Lenny Kravitz does an excellent job in the background. The "Rue" racial thing, I don't get and can't imagine it makes a difference. But my real question is, in a dystopian future, why are all the children so beautiful? Shouldn't there be some level of emaciation if the outer sectors struggle just to be fed? Despite these problems, the first half of the movie is well pace and knitted together. Something happens in the first "combat" sequence. The combat fog falls and the pacing changes. The whole experience is uninspired. The action sequences themselves are far too close. Take your dramamine if you're in the theater and be prepare to have no idea what's happening. The movie is interesting. But a good premise and interesting plot don't necessarily make a quality movie.… Expand

I don't blame the books. I haven't read them but just looking at wikipedia the overarching story as a lot of rich material to draw from. This movie just will have none of it. It was poorly written. Poorly acted (the lead girl was good but that was pretty much it). None of the backstory was explored. Just a bad movie plane and simple. The movie is really about a 3/10 but I'm giving it a 0 because of others voting it up. Basically the movie is totally overhyped. It really isn't good at all. Characters have no back story besides the 2 leads and they expect us to connect to other characters when something happens to them? Literally characters are introduced for 5 minutes and we are supposed to feel sad when they die? Ha. If the point of the games is to kill everyone else then why would these people form teams? Why would they sleep all at the same time? Why did one not wake up to betray the others silently. Just far far too many plot holes.… Expand

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Based on Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games trilogy, in a futuristic time where a nation had fallen apart after a horrific war two tributes from each district are chosen to fight to the death until one victor remains in what you would call a reality television show that is broad cast live to audiences. To those who are familiar with The Hunger Games trilogy, prepared to be impressed with this sensational adaptation and to those who aren't, prepare to witness an incredible journey filled with suspense and originality.




Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence), a citizen of District 12 volunteers to tribute for The Hunger Games to save her little sister Prim from being tribute. Against a fellow citizen Peeta (Josh Hitcherson) who she develops a relationship with, has to fight to the death and although we don't see much of Gale (Liam Hemsworth), there is a clear understanding of their relationship and how he feels for her. Katniss must fight for her life on this suspenseful and emotional must see journey.




Filled with convincing performances by all the cast, The Hunger Games is a winner! Staying true to the book, director Gary Ross does a flawless job of introducing the first of the trilogy. It's an emotional fight to the victory that instantly captures you. A fearless adaptation where every minute keeps you enthralled. With its inventive story and strong cast, The Hunger Games works on screen and ends on top .… Expand

I do not get the negative reviews? The movie followed the book quite closely which I had hoped for and was not disappointed! Yes some of the richness of the book was left out but still for 2.5 hr long as is. I forgive some trimming. The acting was excellent loved Jennifer in Winters Bone and she did Katniss perfectly! I will rave and recommend friends see it!

This movie was absolutely horrible. No story, plot, character depth or development. Most of the actors looked as though they already knew the movie was bad and just phoned in their performances. Gary Ross should never be allowed to direct anything ever again. The camera work was so horrible I suffered dizziness and nausea through the entire film. Barely anything was explained in the movie, so if you never read the book, you were kept completely in the dark about what was supposed to be going on. Gary Ross only knows how to do 2 shots. Extreme unfocused closeup, and extreme focused closeup. All of the backdrops and costumes were completely wasted since you could never see a whole person. You were only allowed to see someone's eye here, or mouth there. The most baffling thing about this movie are all of the good reviews I see from the critics. But that just goes to show you that they are never right when it comes to judging a movie. This was the second movie I have ever walked out on (the first being Battlefield Earth) and demanded my money back. As long as teenage girls dominate the box office, we will be forced to see shallow, superficial, emotionless drivel.… Expand

This is a movie about a brutal gladator like event for people who don't like violence and like sparkly vampires. This is book i simply a short story called "the lottery" merged with a far supiorior Movie called battle royale. The lead actor "whos a hunter" does inane things like sit in a sunny clearing and run around in a blue blazer in the forest while shes supposed to be in a life and death game. Totally unrealistic and the combat was poor.… Expand

The Hunger Games = Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome with Teenagers. I'm not saying it is a bad film but much of the premise was clearly borrowed from the Mel Gibson apocalyptic trilogy of Mad Max/ The Road Warrior.

Not worth seeing at all. I only saw it because while planning to see 21 Jump Street (which is rated R) and having already been standing at the ticket booth, I found out my friend was still 16, and The Hunger Games was the only other interesting looking movie playing. I was with 2 friends, and none of us enjoyed it, mostly because it was painfully long, the plot was dull and slow-paced, and the character development was horrible, with useless characters and unnatural character relationships, that would have only made sense if you've read the book. On top of that, the cinematography was awful. The camera was constantly shaking, which made it look very unprofessional as a film. And the fight scenes were painful to watch because they were so poorly done. Bad camera work + bad fight scene choreography = severe motion sickness. And to add to that, the music never fit, especially during the fight scenes. In fact, the music was lazily written, with more focus on ridiculous audio effects rather than the actual musical aspect of it. And one more thing: Editors have no reason to tone the color down throughout the entire movie just to give it a slightly darker feeling. Be more creative. In conclusion, we would have had a much better experience had we seen 21 Jump Street instead of this over-hyped, lazily put together piece of crap.… Expand

This was a very average movie. Too much drawn out story and not enough action. I also kept comparing it in my head to battle royale which made it seem even worse despite the age of battle royale. I was also left in no state of worry for the main character who i didn't care about and i never felt she was in any danger.

The movie was very superficial. Glossed over the backstory and pretty much all of the relationships in a rush to get to the games. Then much of the tension of the games was missing, too. Not sure I would have been able to follow if I hadn't read the book. Add the "Blair Witch" camera work, and the whole experience was disappointing.

This movie sucked. Most overrated film of the year. it is du;; and boring, there is no back story. The games it self its repetitive and dull and the shaky hand filming made me vomit. What a waste of 2.3 hours. I only gave it a one because Stanley Tucci was good in it.

I waited eagerly for this movie to come out for months, bought tickets in advance, and showed up to the midnight premier trembling with excitement, and I was not disappointed. The cinematography at the very beginning was stunning. I was reminded of footage from the Great Depression, with the ragged children and old people, the downtrodden workers. The poverty in the districts was apparent. The movie was very tensely shot, the audience felt physically nervous when the characters did, and several of the key moments were heart-wrenching. (When Gale carries Prim away and Katniss is marched to the stage was just terrible to watch.) Cinna was absolutely masterfully done- he was a quiet, graceful, honest presence. Rue was PERFECT. They way Rue and Katniss' alliance was formed was quite masterful as well, though a bit truncated. Rue was such a lovable character though, that her death was 'toned down', probably because people don't want to see a sweet little curly headed girl be rent in half with a spear. It seemed almost too quick and they cut out most of the song. I enjoyed how they showed the uprising of district 11 ( I like to think the man who started it was Rue's father) but was disappointed that they didn't include District 11's gift. The violence over all was toned down considerably, which I expected since they wanted to keep it PG13. Mostly you saw a lot of scuffling a la "cloverfield" and then a body fell. There were a few exceptions, but mostly we just saw brief ( and I mean, a second) shots of the aftermath.

The Capitol was fairly well done- attention to detail was excellent. It appeared very ominous, with all the bright colors seeming off, the people looking frightening in their candy-colored costumes. Seneca Crane easily makes himself hated, and President Snow is like an evil Santa Claus. There is a foolish blood lust in the capitol, accentuated by Effie Trinket and her horrible comments like "You're only here for a short time but you get to enjoy yourself!" (Read: we feed you well before we kill you) Effie lacked some dimension in my opinion, though. She seemed to be soley comedic relief. Haymitch did a great job. His drunkenness was minimized, and he displayed genuine caring that wasn't seen originally in the books, but it played out well. This movie inserted lots of excellent sensory techniques to suck in the viewer. There was a high pitched buzzing after an explosion, and the familiar sound of "far away" that most people are familiar with when they are nervous. There was flashes of light and sudden swoops to indicate pain and dizziness. These little additions made the film more believable. You felt like you were there. Overall, the movie met my expectations, though, honestly, they should have just made it rated R and served into the violence like it should have been. This story isn't about violence for violence's sake, its about corruption and moral latitude. You have to see the horror to understand. It is definitely worth seeing, in fact, I saw it twice.… Expand

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. This movie is just awful. There are many terrible aspects and you SHOULD NOT waste your time if you have or have not read the books.

1. Camera work is awful. Everything is shaking so bad in every action scene and every partially moving scene (anything that is not a static conversation) you see random blurs of faces and quickly and poorly cut sections of the movie. 2. Music: Very often, there is no music when there really should be and it just ruins the whole atmosphere. The music at the beginning of the Cornucopia scene is nill and the atmosphere is wrong. You would expect fast paced drumbeats with screams and punches and such... Instead, you get a stupid buzzing noise as the camera shakes to death as you hear no screams and this goes for like 2 minutes... -_-

3. Story: Extremely shallow character development and tons of things completely uncomprehendable by non-book readers.… Expand

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. I saw the movie as two distinct parts - the introduction and every thing leading up to the actual hunger game, and the game itself with the resolution. The first part is very interesting, and the the tension leading up to Katniss's "insertion" into the game is palpable. I was almost jumping out of my seat with anticipation. However, the second part of the film is a complete let-down. Perhaps we've seen too many Survivor & Challenge seasons, but the action is flat and borderline boring. Even though everything is at stake, it doesn't feel that way. The PG-13 rating takes much of the grittiness away from the story. I would have liked to have seen Katniss take part in more than a single killing. She essentially backs into the win.â… Expand

The Hunger Games was really better than what I'd expect. Awesome fast-paced action entertainment laced with moral dilemmas and a satire on the entertainment industry of our generation all wrapped up in a compelling story with a strong emotional core. Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss Everdeen is convincing and is pitch-perfect as a strong independent protagonist with an air of vulnerability. And unlike a certain Ms Swan, she doesn't need a guy to sweep her off her feet. The ensemble cast is perfectly casted, from Woody Harrelson to Stanley Tucci. Don't worry about whether this'll turn out like Twilight because it's not. There's no sappy love story here. When the games begin, her only concern is to stay alive and even when she does show affection it's all part of the game.

Can't speak for the readers who'd want every single detail from the book done right but keep in mind that the screenplay was co-written by Suzanne Collins. If The Hunger Games is just a little taste or preview for what's to come in the cinemas this year than it'll be a good 2012. It's definitely worth the money to watch and will watch it again in another preferred format.… Expand

In the least surprising cash-in in the history of anything ever, The Hunger Games took its already film-ready premise which had already borrowed from Battle Royale, glossed it up pretty, removed any and all significance from the original novels to satisfy the teen crowd, deconstructed every single character and made new ones to fit a film that was supposed to be horrifying more than anything else, naturally made Katniss attractive instead of being the poverty-stricken malnourished slum-girl she was in the novel, made all the guys beefcakes, gave everyone unspeakable combat skills when they should have next-to-none, when the entire point was to throw random kids into an arena and told to kill each other, and basically turned it into exactly what it was supposed to be: A cash-in, without exception. All significance is gone, and respecting the origins of the novel isn't even considered here. Disappointing beyond words? Definitely. But an obvious way to market it as an arena battle to the death involving children? Checkmate. Anyone who read the first novel knew quickly that this was going to be turned into a film, and it was going to be a sure-fire cashflow frenzy with the right style and marketing. Done and done. For anyone who doesn't care for anything the book stood for or even knows to begin with, here you go: A generic action flick with a few twists that are comically predictable, all done in perfect PG-13 format--ironically still being about desperate kids picked out of a raffle murdering each other with sharp objects. But if you've read the novels, you knew exactly what they were doing the instant you saw the official movie poster, and you can at least avoid some of the despair because you knew it had been coming all along.… Collapse

Severely over rated. Acting was horrible, the heart of the book was not there, emotional aspects were not emotional because they were rushed and forced, and full of really bad acting. They emphasized the people fighting against the government part of the story, but they gave us a sappy ending that had nothing to do with the people or the oppressive government. This film simply had no soul, despite having more than enough inspiration from the book they some how destroyed it for the typical short attention span of American viewers. And for people saying the lead actress did a good job of acting, just ask your self how many facial expressions she actually used. She did them well, but she only had like 4. Just like that actress in the twilight series, once you watch another movie from the series you will see how incredible low her range is. The same 4 expressions over and over again will get pretty boring.… Expand

Not since the Harry Potter franchise has a book been brought to life as a movie as well as this. Just as I imagined. I can't wait for the rest of the franchise to come to the big screen!

I was quite disappointed by the Hunger games. There is nothing wrong with using such a heavily recycled idea, but the entire purpose of the idea of an inescapable death-match scenario is to have incredibly gripping psychological drama that leaves the viewer/reader (in the case of the better form of battle royale) anguished at the tragedy of the event. This did not occur in the slightest, and there are a few reasons why. The acting was bland, the main contenders felt more like human masks than the deep and complex beings that they need to be to make this idea actually work. Their individual deaths or suffering left absolutely no impact on the viewer. Linked to this is the fact that the actual character development was sorely lacking. The pacing of the movie was problematic, the idea seemed interesting at first but it wasn't until around 1hr 30mins that the goal it was building towards actually happened. On a different note, the action itself (an important component of the idea) was limited and confusing, with so much fancy camera work going on it was hard to tell what was actually happening. In saying that though the futuristic element, was a refreshing take and the cinematography re its futuristic nature was very impressive. For me the highlight of the film was Stanley Tucci, he was as fantastic as ever.… Expand

If you are a teenage girl, you will love this movie. Everyone else over 25 you might as well wait for the 3rd installment to see if they make it better. The main actress is great but the plot is so thin and predictabile. I can't believe I was taken in by all the hype. A big disappointment.

I expected a ripoff of Battle Royale to at least be almost slightly 1% as interesting as Battle Royale, but instead I got into the theater and watched this boring piece of crap garbage for two hours. What a waste of time. People who liked this movie are either stupid or lying. Transformers 2 was a better movie because, in spite of horrible writing (which The Hunger Games is 100% full of), there was still a lot of action (which The Hunger Games has 0% of). With a bad plot and bad dialogue and bad everything story-wise and then two hours of boring non-action on top of that, what is even the point of this movie? Do not watch this. Obviously you will anyway and you will pretend you liked it because everyone told you to.… Expand

As a stand alone movie it's fine, as a copy of the book it's terrible- as a loosely based off the book video it's... decent at best. Take the wonderful story from the book, shred it down to the barest parts and turn it into a copy of Twilight- you now have 'The hunger games' "movie"

There's nothing, no survival in the woods, no horrible mental wrestling of survival vs. humanity no insight, the barest of character development, a incredibly shortened timeline and complete disregard for the book's story about half way through the movie.

I'm glad to see The Hunger Games put into a visual medium, I'm dissapointed to see it so gutted, I consider this a failure for the first movie.… Expand

One of the worst movies I have ever seen.. The only reason I watched it was because we got to the movie theater late and it was the only thing playing.. Out-dated special effects, a story that left a lot to be desired and a weak ending.. Don't waste your money on this garbage

They missed a few few key points of the book, but otherwise did O.K. in adapting it. Other than that, The Hunger Games was well acted (especially by Jennifer Lawrence) and just helps create the atmosphere of The Hunger Games universe well.

It was just as I had imagined. There were details left out for time purposes, maybe they will be more detailed oriented in the next two movies. Fast paced, amazing adventure. Capitol was amazing.