The Hunger Games

I liked the style, but I think it was just bit overdone/too shaky at points. Still, I think it was effective. It made the first 10 minutes feel like an Indie movie.

Mar 26 - 08:19 AM

Mark Radziak

exactly my thought. the only shakiness i didn't like was the first few minutes of the bloodshed. it was hard to see what was going on

Mar 26 - 03:09 PM

Stephen Polson

This was intentional to downplay the violence of children killing each other... helped the movie maintain its PG-13 rating.

Jul 8 - 12:17 AM

Tom Lowery

...because independent film makers can't afford tripods?

Mar 26 - 11:54 PM

Cheyne Legris

LOL

Mar 28 - 03:05 PM

Seth Hoskins

hahaha

Aug 12 - 10:20 PM

Mario Zamora

Told status

[x] Told
[ ] Not told

Aug 15 - 08:53 PM

Katherine Padyash

I'm totally agree with you. For me it was exellent work but i strongly wanted to stop that shaking camera in a few moments. Especially in a final fight with Cato.

Mar 27 - 03:11 PM

TJ Westhaver

yeah it was like the camera man had turrets or something, with the technology we got today there's no excuse for such poor quality filming. i wouldn't have minded if it was only during the first few mins of the opening battle but the whole movie was shaky and just poorly done

Apr 15 - 09:12 AM

Cole Jaeger

It's part of the style. It suits the movie because it shows confusion. Clearly it was the directors choice and the cinematographer isn't just a dumbass,

Sep 4 - 08:11 PM

Brian Staruk

Thanks for the spoiler (that Cato is the final tribute).

May 10 - 09:48 AM

David Klein

if you had read the book, you would've known.

May 30 - 05:18 AM

Ken Rinaman

It was obvious from the second they showed Cato

Aug 21 - 09:28 PM

Shann Maddox

The point was to feel as if you were in a reality game show - except that your life is at stake. When your adrenaline is rushing like that - you're going to be a bit shaky.

Mar 26 - 08:37 AM

Brenton Reeder

agreed. It was Katniss's point of view and we didn't need to see everything. It's not about violence, which I was so happy they downplayed.

Loved the books too.

Mar 26 - 10:14 AM

Matthew Dugan

thats not the point.we are the audience-not the contestants!terrible camera work!

Apr 17 - 12:44 PM

Bruce Smith

couldn't agree more...finally got around to seeing this...total garbage

May 13 - 05:04 AM

Isaac Reyes

Yea but the book is in Katniss point of view. Gary ross wanted you to be the audience yet feel what Katniss was feeling

Aug 8 - 11:53 AM

tim campbell

The movie and story have many weak spots, not just the drunk cameraman.

I see countless movies on IFC that I have never heard of or seen advertized that are much better than this one.

Check out Winter's Bone. That's a good movie and you've probably never seen a commercial for it.

Mar 26 - 09:14 AM

Vasilij Petrov

Sure, bring an Academy Award level movie into the discussion.

Mar 26 - 01:56 PM

James Gaudioso

PLEEEEEEEEEEEEEESE not even close dude -
Nothing academy award worthy about this film-
Other than the budget man

Apr 8 - 05:15 PM

David Tetzlaff

The shaky cam really annoyed me too at first, but Denby's dead wrong about 'nothing to build'. I have not read the book, and not knowing how things would go, I thought the movie was very well paced, deliberate and thoughtful where it needed to be instead of just rushing off into action sequences. And Denby complains that the violence is too sanitized, too much grit is sacrificed. Considering the endless spew of mindless violence Hollywood cranks out, I'll take a PG-13 movie that gets millions of viewers out to see something that actually has an idea or two ins head without demanding that it be another Clockwork Orange.

Mar 26 - 10:39 AM

Jean Bryan

I totally agree! I have only recently read the book, but came to the same conclusion.

Apr 1 - 09:41 AM

Dictator Fred

The camerawork was terrible, but I love this movie so much.

Mar 26 - 11:57 AM

James Gaudioso

agreed the camera work was very poor -
Any film student could tell you that -
Its not an insult just honesty

Apr 8 - 05:17 PM

Cole Jaeger

Camera work was not bad, it's for stylistic purposes and it was the directors choice and the cinematographer is not a dumbass. They didn't accidentally shake the camera and it's insane that you would think that.

Sep 4 - 08:13 PM

Kedric Scherle

Yes, Cole has a VERY good point. I saw some interviews, the shakiness was for a reason.

Sep 11 - 04:14 PM

Paul Reiter

I think you all are really missing the point of the camera work. To me the whole point of the shakiness was so that the movie would be a bit less realistic for teenagers and hence more marketable. Notice how the blurriness/shakiness occurs mostly during the death scenes. It would be a bit harder to stomach watching kids kill kids without the blurriness.

Mar 26 - 01:45 PM

Patrick Gres

But then the emotional impact that came from the book isn't worth crap in the movie. The thing that made the hunger games so horrifying was the brutality of the games. Personally, I had a hard time feeling much suspense at all, much less an emotional connection with the exception of Rue's death. Even that was toned down. In the book, the spear went halfway through her and Katniss did not pull it out until she was dead. I was fairly frustrated with the killing and action sequences.

Mar 26 - 01:49 PM

Paul Reiter

Then blame the rating system because if they had stayed true to the book this movie would have surely been rated R. Since this was primarily a teen book that simply was not an option.

Mar 26 - 01:57 PM

Evan Martin

Is this book a teen book? People keep saying that but when I read it nothing seemed teeny about it except for the fact that the characters were under the age of 18. This movie needed to make you hate the Capitol and feel the raw emotions of death, pain and LOVE. It failed to do all of them for me.

Mar 26 - 09:16 PM

Patricia Ufferman

Yes, Evan it is a teen/young adult book. There are many differences between The Hunger Games and a novel marketed toward adults. And the large majority of it's fan base are teens, so Ross had to keep the film PG-13 to reach the widest audience.

Apr 1 - 01:24 PM

Q T

I don't think the ratings can be blamed for bad storytelling. There are ways of showing brutality without getting too graphic-- Lord of the Rings comes to mind. I also think the Hunger Game books did a good job talking about the violence without getting too obscene so there's no reason the filmmakers couldn't have done the same.

However, for me that's not even the problem-- it's the lack of emotional depth that got to me-- when the movie has such complex emotions which is what makes the story really interesting.

Aug 26 - 08:39 PM

Nathan B

You need clear, close up gore to care about people dying? Really?

Like other people have said. Blame the ratings board. They are the ones who won't let kids easily see actual violence unless it's crazy superhero bullshit, or any sexuality hardly at all, unless it is veiled in something else. It ridiculous, and part of the problem that makes so many movies less than they could be, including this one.

Mar 27 - 03:26 PM

Nathan B

You can't say it isn't a kids' book and therefore shouldn't be a kids' movie. It is. Everyone knows it is. It was marketed to kids, it is popular among kids, hell, they even teach in schools to kids already. It's a kids book. And the fact that you can have them read things you can't show on movies or TV is a problem to my mind.

And you keep saying "level of violence" if you aren't talking about showing the actual killings in more detail or more graphically, what do you mean? You want more death scenes? More time spent fighting? What? What is "level of violence" if not what I have described?

Mar 30 - 12:31 AM

Kasey Cooke

Clearly they did it on purpose and I loved it. It added a sense of panic and that adrenaline feeling, and confusion. The movie would have been lame without it.

Mar 26 - 01:55 PM

Chris Cox

Are you sure about that? your a expert in movies so you know it would totally kill the movie right? smh

Mar 26 - 02:24 PM

Tallulah Robinson

I really liked the effect of the camera work, I thought it was very appropriate and effective, beyond its use as a tool to keep the rating down.

However, this bloke has a point - sometimes it was a bit too much; sometimes I was lie okay, why can that not be a still camera there. And I can see how it made people sick, though I wasn't at all affected.

But overall, I think it worked.

Mar 26 - 03:35 PM

Daniel Gray

The shaky camera adds tension and remind us that yes, while they still are two people talking, they are also in a high-stakes gladiator game as well. I noticed this when the camera shook only in the arena.

Mar 26 - 06:42 PM

Terri Coop

The camera shook everywhere. It was mounted on springs the entire time. It made my physically ill. I don't need the camera insinuating itself into every second of the film. OMG! Action! Shaky Cam! Shaky Cam! OMG! Eating Dinner! Shaky Cam! Shaky Cam! Standing alone, doing nothing! Shaky Cam! Shaky Cam!

Cheap artsy tired worn-out old news last year's gimmick.

A $100 million flick looked like it was filmed with a $100 flip phone. I've seen better camera work that was less precious and self-conscious on youtube.

Apr 6 - 06:21 PM

Cole Jaeger

Jesus if you went to see a Lars Von Trier movie you probably would throw up all over the theater.

Sep 4 - 08:14 PM

Ben Herring

Totally agree about the camera work.

Mar 26 - 06:52 PM

Steven Smith

I thought the cinematography was fantastic. In watering down some of the deaths (to keep the PG-13 rating, and not exclude a big part of the fan-base), Ross needed to mix elements like the shaky-camera to add tension and suspense.It's all a matter of taste, I guess, but I felt like the stylistic choices in the movie were impressively realized, and I've rarely been so satisfied with an adaptation of a book told in a first-person narrative.

Mar 26 - 06:56 PM

Jorge Guevara

You thought the cinematography was fantastic??? Do you even know what that word means?

A competent director does not need shaky cam to add tension, it might have its place in cinema with moderation, here though it was atrocious.

Mar 27 - 01:58 AM

Steven Smith

Haha, calm yourself dude. What I was expressing was a perfectly valid opinion, and you can disagree with it all you'd like -- but there's no need to troll. The thing I took away from the arena in the Hunger Games when I read the book is: suspense didn't come in moderation. Every moment was filled with heart-racing, mind-numbing fear, and so Ross sought to capture this sense of apprehension and uncertainty by shooting many of the frames in a shaky-camera effect. Perhaps the monotony of they effect -- for some -- made any escalation or rising action hard to notice but, to me, it created an atmosphere that fostered constant thrills; something I'm glad wasn't forsaken in the transition from R to PG-13. And, geez, who are you to say what constitutes a competent director? Who are you to say his choice in shooting has no place in cinema? If people on RT were more open-minded, and a little less arrogant, this site would be much better off.

Mar 27 - 12:48 PM

Aaron Robinson

Cinematography comes from the word "movement" in Greek. That's what cinematography means.

Mar 27 - 09:25 PM

Sean DeLauder

To capture movement, not to be in movement. This does not mean it is necessary for the film crew to be riddled with cerebral palsy in order to add tension or to understand the perspective of the character. This nauseating film style is symptomatic of the disappointing and contrived reality t.v. trend. Reality television doesn't make people seem more real, it makes real people seem fake. The story was intriguing; the cinematography was a failure.

Apr 6 - 06:18 PM

Ramandeep Dhillon

its the lamest excuse anyone can give that they used a shaky cam to avoid R rating. there are millions of other violent films that don't use shaky cam, still find ways to **hide** the bloodshed. the state of mind of the contestants? then we need as many as cameras, put one camera on every actors head, let them loose, and put it on 50 big screens across, and enjoy. one word - Stupid for shaky cam

May 15 - 11:02 AM

Carsa Penner

I agree. I know that was probably one of the easiest ways to keep it PG-13, but it was terribly annoying. I'm sure there are better ways to accomplish that without shaking the camera around like crazy. I still enjoyed the film but I found myself savouring the few moments when the shaking stopped.

Mar 26 - 07:51 PM

Krista Miller

agreed, it drove me nuts trying to watch it. to much jerking, blurriness, and most of the scenes of fighting were way to close and made it hard to visualize completly what was going on .

Mar 26 - 11:00 PM

Sethliopod Lustwig

Yes, it worked for NYPD Blue on a 19" tv.

Yes, it saves one from having to get shots right and cinematically thoughtful.

But here, on an XD screen it gave me nausea & a headache.

Mar 26 - 11:14 PM

Terri Coop

It was just announced that Ross will NOT be directing Catching Fire. Now, no guarantees that the new director won't be as precious and arrogant, but we can hope!

Apr 6 - 06:35 PM