10 and out, but 10 and I'll try again

Rating: Null/10 (3 September 2013)

What's with the unsteady cam? Heck, I can hold any camera steadier than the camera work in The Hunger Games, without image stabilization. Is the cinematographer drunk?
There's a place for hand-held cameras, and for the hand-held look, such as those faux crime scene TV shows. But at least they go for a Steadicam partially stabilized look. The scenes in The Hunger Games are deliberately jerked around.
It looks gimmicky, and I get real suspicious of gimmicky pictures. Plus, the wobbly image gave me a headache, along with the too loud piercing music score. The combined effect is that while you are trying to figure out what the heck is going on, you can't hear yourself think.
I figure the director needs to give me some reason to watch the movie within 10 minutes. I don't need to know everything, but I would at least like to see something interesting, and have the feeling the odds are better than 50-50 that I'm not going to be wasting my time. Is this too much to ask? Heck, most movies do this in five minutes.
I was looking at another movie recently, The King of Marvin Gardens. It might be a good movie, but the beginning turned me off so much that I probably will never find out. And I'm a Jack Nicholson fan. I like artsy movies. But I don't like pretentious ones.
I think the reviews also play a role. I can ignore a smattering of negative reviews and the usual stupid reviews. But there are also the glowing subsidized reviews, and the naive fawning reviews by people who have never seen a truly great picture, to discount. When what's left are people who say the movie is a waste of time, and the beginning is, indeed, a waste of time, not to mention highly unpleasant, why would I stay?
I generally avoid the latest hit movie, When I haven't, when I've gotten dragged in, all too often I've been miserable, and then you have to pretend you liked the movie to avoid hurting someone's feelings, even if the movie made no sense. Heck, I've sat through movies in theaters by myself, wanting to get up and walk out, but I spent my money, and surely it is going to get better, I kept telling myself every 10 minutes, but it never did get better, and when I finally walk back into the sunlight I feel like I've just spent two hours in a Dumpster. So it is a great joy, with the wonders of modern technology, to be able to just press a button and put an end to movie misery.
Gary Ross, you've made some truly great movies. I am all for experimentation, directors trying something new. I'm not going to write you off. But what I did see was awful.
Maybe I wasn't the target audience for this movie. When I was the age of this target audience, I saw some great movies -- A Clockwork Orange, Barbarella, Easy Rider, 2001, Blow Up, Zabriskie Point -- movies that squares and old folks just didn't understand. There was a certain perspective that viewers brought to movies back then.
Perhaps young people bring a certain perspective with them to movies these days. If they do, I wouldn't even know where to get it. But I still think those old movies are classics, viewed from the perspective of cold sober reality.
Another thought: Is this movie some indication of the deep seated fears of young people these days of the world to come? If so, I feel sad. I am very afraid we are headed toward a dystopian future, due to human-caused global warming. But these real fears seem here to be displaced into some weird dystopian teen-centered fantasy world.
And one last thought: This is the first time I have encountered a formal FAQ explainer of a movie on IMDb covering such questions as, "What is 'Hunger Games' about?" and "What are 'Hunger Games'?" If you need someone to explain these questions, apparently even after you've watched the movie, there is something wrong with the movie. I read the answers, and I still don't understand. Perhaps it is me.
I tell you what, though. If in 10 years the reviews of The Hunger Games have improved significantly, I will give another try making it past the first 10 minutes, if in the meantime global warming hasn't destroyed the environment, producing wildfires, droughts, floods, plagues of locusts and other insects, disease, famine, extreme weather, political insurrection, world war and the collapse of what we laughingly call civilization. I promise.