Don't believe the hype! A pale comparison to the book.

Rating: 3/10 (31 March 2012)

SPOILER ALERT: Don't read this unless you've read the book or seen the movie already!
This movie lost just about every single emotion of the trilogy. The only one that they got right was the "I volunteer" part. Haymitch was a filthy drunk who vomited at their first dinner, they never ate like ravenous beasts at any time even though in the book they were starving to death (thus the HUNGER part of the games) and thus the need to take additional lots in the Reaping for additional food rations (Katniss and Gale's name was in that basket several dozen times in order to feed their families and also the reason why they hunted). I can understand cutting out some things in the interest of time but when you sacrifice the entire feeling of the book and leave out major plot points at some point you have to ask yourself if it was worth it.
Here are several things that went terribly wrong: She didn't buy the Mockingjay pin it was given to her by the Mayor's daughter which basically said that they supported the rebellion against the Capitols tyranny. Haymitch as I mentioned earlier was a intolerable drunk who only became helpful to them during the actual training part. When they were on the roof they though about jumping off and it was not revealed in the movie but there was a forcefield that prevented such action. This is a MAJOR part of the plot because it comes up in the next movie/book in a big way. There was a love triangle between Gale, Katniss, and Peta, that was not played out in this book. She loved Gale, and was so awkward she didn't know what to do about it, and entirely faked her love for Peta in order to gain aid in the arena. This was only shown in a barebones fashion but it was a major part of the series. Her "fire dress" was actually two dresses and as she stood and did a twist the first one burned off revealing a smaller dress underneath. They refer to her as the Mockingjay but that was not done until later in the series. She was just the girl on fire for a while (thus the name of the second book Catching Fire). The book was written in first person, we never saw the control room and using it in this movie only took away from the fear and suspense of what would happen next was disastrous to the movie. At one point she had a flashback to her father's death and they show their cabin blowing up. This is the cabin that she most often lived in to escape her mother who was crazy and shut down after her father's death (and also the reason she had to take care of Primrose, and have to hunt so much and add her name in the Reaping so much to get food for their family). Peta's injury was so grave that he barely made it out and as a result he lost his leg and was forced to walk with a limp for the rest of his life. He did not receive magic ointment that miraculously fixed everything. Katniss herself was majorly busted up and barely made it out herself. She spent a number of days in recovery after the games. It was understood in the book that the dogs that they fought in the end were twisted muttations (as they are called) made from the dead contenders in the Hunger Games (thus showing the gruesome evil mind of the capitol) The main part of this book was the Games but it felt incredibly rushed. They did NOT see the grid in the sky letting them know the boundaries of the arena or that there were even boundaries at all, that added to the mystery and danger and it was all thrown away.
Also I thought that the style of the capitol was toned down to the point that it was almost a punchline. They had colored skin and their hair and wardrobe was described as something otherworldly. This was just a bad interpretation of that as it seemed everyone was dressed for a bad idea of a futuristic Prom.
This movie was so rushed to get out that it went from a very good book to a tween movie in the same category as Twilight. I am an adult and I enjoyed the books very much, at times finding them hard to put down, but this adaptation was lost in translation.
Overall as a book to movie translation I give this a grade of D. If you have trouble reading then it's better to see it than to not experience any of it, but know that the author's artistic hand was largely lost on the big screen, while other movies, such as John Carter, proved that you can take an idea and actually make it BETTER by moving it to the big screen. Go see that instead if you read the books. Ignore the hype of The Hunger Games movie and go read the trilogy. Being a big fan of the books I found sitting through this pathetic effort to be painful to the point of utter boredom. This was made worse by the relative immaturity of the audience.