It was OK, but could have been a better adaptation.

Rating: 7/10 (23 March 2012)

I just came from a midnight screening, and as someone who very well understands the need to make changes from books to movies (a college professor of mine gave a class using PBS' "American Short Story" series where we read the story, the screenplay adaptation, watched the PBS TV movie -- and with living authors read THEIR take on the differences) -- I'm still a bit dissatisfied with some of the changes made from book to movie for "The Hunger Games" (and I just bought and read the book within the past week, so it's VERY FRESH in my mind).
I bought and read "The Help" AFTER seeing the film, and while it, too, had differences, they sort of balanced out. I liked some changes in the movie better, some of the differences in the book better...
It was pretty obvious, however, reading "The Hunger Games," that even though it's not a very long novel, the exposition in it would require a 4-hour movie to have all the scenes from the book, so I KNEW they'd cut a lot of the superfluous scenes, and they did (and most of the stuff they cut was OK to cut). My biggest issue, perhaps, is the SHEER POLITICS of Hollywood "Blockbuster-Making." There was more brutality in the novel than they showed in the movie, and some of it I felt important to the story, but I'm certain what they cut was to get a PG-13 rating SO the movie would be available to a much wider audience and therefore SELL MORE TICKETS! That said, the changes they made in the FINAL FIGHT SCENE -- particularly with the "wildlife" -- were, to me INEXCUSABLE. Katniss' realization of what was going on there, and the sheer horror of just WHAT this "Capitol" can, and will do, was pivotal, to me. I would recommend you see the movie first, THEN read the book, and see what I mean.
Flip side, they added A LOT of "stuff" in the movie that's NOT in the book -- mostly involving the president, played by Donald Sutherland... Of course a lot of the things he says may reflect things Katniss thought to herself in the novel. At any rate, I actually think what they did with him may have added to the impact of the story, a bit, but NOT at the expense of some of the other changes and a few deletions. I eagerly await (hopefully), an unrated "Director's Cut" of this movie that's 30 minutes or so longer and has more of what's missing.
I might have rated this a bit higher if the final battle scene had been true to the book. Then again, there were some other things after that which weren't that I actually preferred. I'll leave it to folks who've read the book to see for themselves.
I'd still recommend seeing this film to those who've read the novel. Just don't expect quite everything you may have hoped for. If you haven't read the novel, you'll probably LOVE IT. By itself, with no other context, it's a pretty great movie.
Jeff Hayes