What am I missing here?

Rating: 6/10 (31 March 2012)

I don't get what's the fuss about this film.
To me it seemed like an excuse for a straightforward action-flick from the very beginning. The basic idea- people killing each other as part of a show- dates back to Antiquity. We've seen it countless times, in all settings and styles imaginable. As far as original ideas are concerned, this film- or the book, for that matter- doesn't even qualify for the competition.
But that's OK. I like a straightforward action-flick. To be fair, it was a decently entertaining movie. But that's about the highest praise I can think of.
The whole idea of a tense, psychological manhunt, with believable scenes and a careful pacing- that I was sort of hoping for- quickly ended up as a B-movie for kids. I just couldn't take any of it seriously. The whole 'world' in which this story takes place is all-too-obviously artificial, built hastily in order to give some supposedly-needed context for the whole 'Hunger Games'. It doesn't have any depth, any identity or personality. I don't know about the books, but I have a feeling I wouldn't like the written background story very much either. It's like... would anyone give a s**t about the whole imagined universe, unless the Hunger Games? It's just a decorum, but one I couldn't care less about.
But that still would be OK. I just wanted a show. A cool manhunt, one where characters have to make tough decisions, where their true strengths and weaknesses come to light. Instead I was treated to the above mentioned kids movie. Genetically modified bees, gigantic dogs and godly f***ing firestorms coming out of nowhere, with no previous hint that they even exist. Rules randomly changed in the middle of the game. Characters eagerly conforming to their assigned unidimensional roles as 'arrogant bad guy' and 'nice kids who actually couldn't hurt a fly'. The nice kids are then conveniently killed off by bad guys or poison themselves only leaving the heroine the task to mourn them. Ridiculous, stupid tactics that no one would use, like placing all your belongings in the middle of a mine-field or sleeping like you're dead while the person you're trying to kill is camping on the tree... wtf was that?? All too often, the heroine was just saved by pure luck and lack of sense; I mean, seriously how far could she have wandered after being bitten by those bees? The others had all the time to arrange stuff around the mine-field, but not to walk like 100 meters further and kill one of their most dangerous opponents (supposedly).
Anyway, I'm not trying to be overparticular, but the originality and the story being clearly not worth for consideration, about the only criterion by which this movie could be worth something is how cool, ingenious and smart they made the manhunt. It seems to me that everyone just took the safe way and piled up a bunch of clichÃ©s and/or ultimately dull scenes. I mean were you once surprised by the turn of events? Do you remember thinking wow, I wouldn't have thought he/she/they would do that? What a surprise?
Ps. In spite of this all, Jennifer Lawrence rocks, I hope to see her in some cool movies over the next years. After she finishes this trilogy, I mean.