onebyone

I haven't read the books (although I will now), but I really thought this was great. It's a long movie but it never dragged. Jennifer Lawrence was just fantastic as Katniss, I really loved that character. Bravo to Woody and Elizabeth Banks for bringing some disturbing dark comedy to the mix too. I had rolled my eyes when Lenny Kravitz was cast in the movie, but thought he was pretty good too.

I hope the rest are as good as this. I have been a bit lost without Harry Potter. Although there will never be a series quite like that one, I could really use a new book/movie series to throw myself into.

The teenagers in the theater I saw it with were all very well behaved, not at all the usual texting chatty crowd I was expecting. However, the family who brought along their very young very fussy baby, well... I wanted to volunteer the whole family for tribute.

Matthew Chmiel

Or Apocalypse Now.

What I'm trying to say is that maybe 1970s Francis Ford Coppola should've directed The Hunger Games.

dsa_shea

We did have one person in our theater that let their phone ring through its entirety without making an attempt to silence it. And it was loud as hell and an annoying ringtone to boot. They were a good 4-5 rows away from us and the theater was at capacity and not one person close to them told them a damn thing.

Dr. DVD

Best example of a movie transcending the source material. The book was a good read, but quite sensationalistic compared to the movie. If the studio had their way, it would have been an all out gangster shoot-em-up with Ryan O'Neal as Michael and Ernest Borgnine as Don Vito.

EDIT: oh, and Jaws

Dr. DVD

Or late 60s/early 70s Sam Peckinpah?


I'm not bashing you for not reading the books beforehand, but I just disagree with refusing to read them in order to perhaps better understand what you viewed. It seems kind of closed minded IMO, and FWIW, I have gotten into several book series because of the movies, such as the early Dune works, some early Tom Clancy, and the Game of Thrones series. I also refuse to watch Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy until after I have read the book because it is apparently very hard to get into otherwise, but I have heard it is a fabulous movie if you have the patience. I love movies, and do whatever it takes to enhance my enjoyment. If that means doing some homework, so be it.

Solid Snake

You should never need the book to understand the movie. It's not close minded. It's reality. What you get in the book...is irrelevant in terms of needing to understand what you just saw. If the film doesn't give it to you and you need to the book to make sense of it? The film failed in adapting the source's world/culture/whatever. I haven't seen teh film yet so I can't say anything about it's inability to handle whatever info it needs to but...you should never need to book to understand the movie. That's kind of like a cop out or cheating, i guess.

That's great that a movie gets into a book. That still happens to me. Thank you, TGWTDT (Swedish version). Also...TTSS wasn't hard for me to understand what was going on. It's just a lot of info coming at ya and you need to be on top of that shit at the most. Have never read the book, am thinking about reading about everything George Smiley has been involved in...so that's cool.

Dr. DVD

I'm not saying one should read the book to understand the movie, merely to enhance the enjoyment. Hunger Games doesn't need to be read to understand the movie, or enjoy it, it just makes the viewing experience more meaningful IMO.

Supermallet

Apocalypse Now is an amazing movie, but Heart of Darkness is an amazing book. I would not say that AP is drastically better than the source material.

Dr. DVD

It's actually very much like the book, the movie's events are just more spread out.

Shannon Nutt

You don't need to read the book to follow this film...reading the book will ENHANCE your viewing, however.

Having read the books and knowing the story, Gary Ross did an excellent job with this film. He didn't beat us over the head with the political/social issues, but he touched on them just enough to set up the two sequels that will follow. The cast was excellent. Not all the performances are "great", but there's nobody that does a bad job either. I have to say Jennifer Lawrence was a great choice...and I didn't think that when I heard about her casting. Woody Harrelson, though, is the best part of the movie. That's TWO great performances I've seen him give this month (the other being HBO's GAME CHANGE).

As for the user who posted about the in the finale:

In the novel

Dr. DVD

I rest my case.

Agree about the finale.

FantasticVSDoom

Agree 100% with pretty much all of this.... Only thing I would add is I think the thing I can say was a surprise is that its a 2+ hour movie and never feels like it. For me anyways

Goldberg74

After seeing the Hunger Games movie... I wanna read the book again. It's not that I didn't like the movie (I'd give it a solid B), they just didn't go deep enough into some parts. I do recommend the movie as a good adaptation, but I pictured a very different world.

There was one simple thing that I believe that Gary Ross should have kept in the film...



I can't wait for the sequels.

Matthew Chmiel

It's been years since I've read Heart of Darkness as a high school senior, but I remember preferring Apocalypse Now more.

Now that I own the three-disc Blu-ray, maybe I'll give it a re-read before I pop that in one day.

Abob Teff

I find it interesting that most of the criticisms I've read of the movie were pretty similar to my reactions to the book. The other tributes were touched upon, but not really fleshed out; the were horribly out-of-left-field in the book (I really felt they almost ruined it); and the story itself lacked any real antagonist beyond "the games" (this does change throughout the series as the direction becomes more focused and explains the antagonists).

All in all, it would not be very hard for the movies (this and future ones) to exceed the books. The books have great concepts behind them, but the execution falls short.

I haven't seen the movie yet, but I can see how the could be taken out without too much impact on the story. If done properly, they could have added levity to the scene Goldberg mentions; more likely it would have come off as being silly though.

Supermallet

Heart of Darkness is incredibly dense, but also wonderfully rich. I'd wager most of it goes over the heads of high schoolers. Definitely give it another read.

DJariya

I saw it today and honestly I think I need to watch it again. I was so tired from working an early morning shift that I had trouble staying focused during the movie. I really only remember the last 30-45 minutes.

candyrocket786

This was (a very very tame) Battle Royale meets The Truman Show for me. Also the fight scenes, especially the start of the games were difficult to follow. It was like watching the bot fights from TF1 all over again


Finally, maybe i'm a heartless bastard but i felt absolutely nothing during .

superdeluxe

Liked the movie, liked some of the background/political issues. Part running man part Truman show.

Kind of sucks for younger tributes, they don't really have a shot

shadowhawk2020

xfilekr

Saw it last night (read the books) and thought it was pretty good and about as faithful as it could have been. I have to remind myself I'm far outside the target audience. My fiance spent the evening sick cause of shaky cam and had a decent amount of questions. Lawrence was great. Going to check out Battle Royale.

Pizza

I was bored with the movie. I felt the pacing was clumsy and many scenes went on too long while other parts of the story were poorly detailed. Certainly, I can see if you read the books (I didn't) that you would get more from the film as you have a core understanding and connection with the characters that the film failed to deliver for me. Also, the tone of the film felt Twilight-ish which didn't help me like it much.

edstein

I haven't seen this yet but were the audiences filled will teenage girls wetting themselves?

Dr. DVD

Mine was full of teenage girls, but they weren't wetting themselves so to say. FWIW, this is more sci-fi with a love subplot as opposed to Twilight , which was a love story with lame attempts at horror subplots.

Nickee

I enjoyed it. Having read (and re-read the book prior to seeing the movie) it's hard for me to decide how it would be from the point of view of someone who hadn't read the book.

But one thing that stood out to me that as a something that I'm not sure people who didn't read the book would get were the flashbacks with Peeta and Katniss.