Surely polarizing to fans of the book, The Hunger Games does a respectable job at adapting the source material despite several missteps that keep it from being truly great.

Based on the massively popular book of the same name by Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games gives us a horrifying future in which the country is divided into Districts which are forced to send one boy and one girl between the ages of 12 and 18 to fight to the death with the other contestants or Tributes. The games are broadcast like a reality show and serve to remind the districts that their war against what is now the capitol was a really bad idea. Enter Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence), a 16 year old from the mining District 12 in the former Appalachia, a girl who, following the loss of her father in a mine explosion, has been feeding her mother and younger sister by illegally hunting in the forest outside of their district with best friend Gale (Liam Hemsworth). When the day of the Reaping comes, when the children are chosen for the games, Katniss finds her 12 year old sister Prim (Willow Shields) selected and she volunteers to take her place. From then it is off to the capital to train with Haymitch (Woody Harrelson), District 12’s only previous winner and fellow tribute Peeta (Josh Hutcherson) who claims to be in love with Katniss in what may be genuine affection or a clever ruse to gain more sponsors to help him during the games.

The Hunger Games and its two following novels, have become a cultural phenomenon. Fans are very rabid and have a very particular idea of what things and people look like and how they should be represented. Because of this, there is an inherent danger when making the film that you will alienate audience members by not delivering ‘their’ Hunger Games experience. For his part, and to his credit, Director and screenwriter Gary Ross delivers HIS Hunger Games and unlike, say, Chris Columbus’s Harry Potter missteps,  he gets it mostly right.

The problem with an adaptation like this, especially when the book is told 1st person and as such is afforded a generous helping of exposition without feeling like exposition, there is a lot more information than you have time to deliver in a movie. Even at 2 hours and 22 minutes there are a lot of things left out that enrich the overall experience of the story and leave the movie feeling a little heartless and that does damage to the overall effectiveness of the film.

Another problem with an adaptation of material like this is that you can get away with more by way of graphic violence in a young adult novel than you can a PG-13 movie ( for some reason) and this leads to a softening of the violence and some of the death scenes that make the drama and overall horror of the situation feel a bit flat and less desperate. This is felt a a couple of key moments that should have had a lot more emotional resonance than they did but ended up feeling a little bit limp.

That being said, Ross does deliver some very effective moments and what is on the screen is generally pretty good. Key moments are filmed in a quality reminiscent of 70’s horror films with jagged musical cues and sound dropped out to really highlight how terrified the kids are by what is happening to them and how horrible their eventual fates end up being. The use of quick cuts, while somewhat irritating and possibly motion sickness inducing for the wrong audience member, are necessary to suggest the killings without showing graphic details of them.

The pre-arena moments go a bit more quickly than I would have liked but the emotion there is solid. Scenes between Katniss and Prim before Katniss goes off to the games are heartbreaking and very effective. Later scenes between Katniss and District 11 tribute Rue (Amandla Stenberg) do not manage to rise to this level and that is too bad because that relationship grounds the story throughout the middle. When the film goes outside the source material to flesh out details not given in the book, I feel like important scenes are given the short shrift and absent scenes become sorely missed.

Despite that, Ross generally does a good job letting the audience know what is going on without Katniss’s ongoing narration. Color commentary moments explain to the audience what a Tracker Jacker is, for instance, and that technique works well with this visual medium. Ross distills the essence of what is going on for the film and that gives the audience unfamiliar with the source material enough to go on to follow and enjoy the story.

Audience members who have not read the book are at a distinct advantage here because presented as is, the movie works fine as its own film. Knowing that the story is deeper and richer in the book clouds that and forces comparison. You shouldn’t have to have read the book to enjoy the film though and movies are just fundamentally different than books so taken from the standpoint of The Hunger Games as a movie, it works very well and succeeds in delivering the major beats of the story.

Performances are key here, particularly when the people of the Capitol look completely ridiculous. Stanley Tucci as Hunger Games host Ceasar Flickerman is pitch perfect and just nails the character. Likewise, Woody Harrelson is an excellent Haymitch, even if the film underplays the characters early drunken buffoon behavior way too much. Jennifer Lawrence is excellent as Katniss, capturing the character’s stoic detachment while still giving enough room for love for her sister and concern for Gale, Rue and eventually Peeta. For his part, Hutcherson gives us a fine Peeta. Donald Sutherland, who I am increasingly convinced is a vampire as he seems to have been this same age for last 30 years or so, can do more with a look than most actors manage in their whole careers and his President Snow uses looks to convey a lot of information, most of it ominous. Wes Bently is very good as Gamemaker Seneca Crane but I have to admit that his sculptured beard was so crazy looking I think it was actually trying to talk to me directly and stepping all over Bently’s lines to boot.

Conclusion [8.0 out of 10]

I liked the Hunger Games despite the differences from the source material because I approached it as much as I could as a movie separate from the book. We can’t have it all but what we do have is generally effective and conveys the themes and ideas well enough to entertain and sometimes disturb. I have yet to read the other books in the series and I may wait until I see the next two movies in hopes to enjoy both experiences to as much a degree as I can. Either way, The Hunger games is worth checking out regardless of if you are a fan of the books or not. If you are a fan, it helps to go in expecting a visual cliff notes version and set your expectations on that level as opposed to BEST ADAPTATION EVER. If you don’t think you can do that, then this movie might be one best avoided.