The Hunger Games (film) The Hunger Games (film) The Hunger Games is a 2012 American science fiction-adventure film directed by Gary Ross and based on Suzanne Collins’ 2008 novel of the same name. It is the first installment in "The Hunger Games" film series and was produced by Nina Jacobson and Jon Kilik, with a screenplay by Ross, Collins, and Billy Ray. The film stars Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth, Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Lenny Kravitz, Stanley Tucci, and Donald Sutherland. The story takes place in a dystopian post-apocalyptic future in the nation of Panem, where a boy and a girl from each
The Hunger Games (film) pulse-racing entertainment value". Reynolds also spoke highly of Lawrence's performance and director Gary Ross, whose "rough and ready handheld camerawork" meant that viewers were "with Katniss for every blood-flecked moment of her ordeal in the combat arena". However, film critic David Thomson of the magazine "The New Republic" called it a "terrible movie", criticizing it for a lack of character development and unclear presentation of the violence, describing the latter as "un-American". Eric Goldman of IGN awarded the film four out of five stars, stating that director Gary Ross "gets the tone of The Hunger Games right. This is a