Name : Peter Debruge / Alias : Variety
A fable so simple, so pure, it feels as if it has existed for hundreds of years, like a brilliant shard of sea glass rendered smooth and elegant through generations of retelling.

Name : Jordan Mintzer / Alias : Hollywood Reporter
Like The Red Turtle's shipwrecked protagonist, you have to simply stop fighting the current and go with the flow.

Name : Eric Kohn / Alias : indieWIRE
This is a quiet little masterpiece of images, each one rich with meaning, that collectively speak to a universal process.

Name : Richard Roeper / Alias : Richard Roeper.com
A solid lead-up to the finale.

Name : Liam Lacey / Alias : Globe and Mail
The effect of so many Oscar-calibre actors speaking the generic dialogue is like watching pro ballplayers play T-ball.

Name : Michael Phillips / Alias : Chicago Tribune
Even though Mockingjay contains scenes of mass graves and mass slaughter on the battlefield, this isn't a movie, or a set of characters, built on bloodlust or the enjoyment of anonymous kills.

Name : Joe Morgenstern / Alias : Wall Street Journal
"Mockingjay" is a rare bird in its genre, an action adventure with an interesting mind and a resonant spirit.

Name : Ben Sachs / Alias : Chicago Reader
The impressive supporting cast (which features Philip Seymour Hoffman, Julianne Moore, Jeffrey Wright, and Woody Harrelson) keeps this highly watchable.

Name : Wesley Morris / Alias : Grantland
Mockingjay has more exposition than a TED Talk, more rubble than a decade of The Flintstones, and absolutely no nonmonetary reason to be Part 1 of anything. It isn't storytelling. It's a filibuster.

Name : Stephen Whitty / Alias : Newark Star-Ledger
If you want drama, and action - and, most especially, Katniss in charge - well, buy another ticket, next year.

Name : David Edelstein / Alias : New York Magazine/Vulture
Lawrence's instincts are so smart that she never goes even a shade overboard. She's a hell of an actress.

Name : Kenneth Turan / Alias : Los Angeles Times
Lawrence delivers on what dramatic beats half a novel affords him. You just wish there were more of them and that they provided a more complete, more satisfying story arc.

Name : Chris Nashawaty / Alias : Entertainment Weekly
When the story finally does manage to get interesting toward the end, it just screeches to a halt and cuts off, leaving fans wriggling on the hook for a finale they won't get to see for another 12 months. That's not a cliff-hanger, that's just a tease.

Name : Cary Darling / Alias : Fort Worth Star-Telegram/DFW.com
If it's more talky and less satisfying than its predecessor, the propulsive The Hunger Games: Catching Fire - largely because the conclusion won't come until next year with Part 2 - it's still a sporadically involving adventure.

Name : Moira MacDonald / Alias : Seattle Times
You leave this well-acted, impeccably designed movie as you entered it: still waiting.

Name : Rene Rodriguez / Alias : Miami Herald
A dark, grim and exciting entertainment.

Name : Lou Lumenick / Alias : New York Post
Thinly spreads a half-hour's worth of plot over two plodding hours.

Name : Randy Myers / Alias : San Jose Mercury News
The least satisfying "Hunger Games" entry yet.

Name : Tom Long / Alias : Detroit News
"Mockingjay - Part 1," however well done, can't compete with the first two films, although it sets up what should be its stunning ending well enough.

Name : Alonso Duralde / Alias : TheWrap
Still very much a Hunger Games movie, yes, but it calls to mind smart political comedies like Wag the Dog and Tanner '88 as well.

Name : Steven Rea / Alias : Philadelphia Inquirer
If Mockingjay - Part 1 is quieter and less flashy than its predecessors, that doesn't make it less satisfying.

Name : Rafer Guzman / Alias : Newsday
In this chapter, Katniss Everdeen, the working-class rebel played by Jennifer Lawrence, mostly holsters her weapons and plays dress-up, just as the movie itself gives up any higher aspirations of offering social commentary or insight.

Name : Amy Nicholson / Alias : L.A. Weekly
Turns out when Collins wrote Mockingjay in 2010, she was predicting not only America in two centuries but also the accidental, overnight Internet instafame just four years away.

Name : Ann Hornaday / Alias : Washington Post
It's a joyless, surpassingly dour enterprise, but one that fulfills its mission with Katniss's own eagle-eyed efficiency and unsentimental somberness. "Mockingjay" sets up the end Game with a grim sense of purpose.

Name : A.A. Dowd / Alias : AV Club
The stealth highlight of this franchise has always been the flavorful cultural satire, which takes center stage throughout much of Mockingjay's fleet runtime.

Name : James Berardinelli / Alias : ReelViews
This is as grim as PG-13 can get; the darkness is comparable to that of The Empire Strikes Back.

Name : Cath Clarke / Alias : Time Out
The politics of Mockingjay are as intensely gripping as the games in the earlier films - and more deadly.

Name : Ty Burr / Alias : Boston Globe
Mockingjay - Part 1 does get a mid-film lift when Katniss and Gale go up against Snow's air force with a few bows and arrows; the scene is ridiculous, and it works. But the rest is a muddy, underlit slog, a movie that searches in vain for its own pulse.

Name : Andrew Lapin / Alias : NPR
Collins and the Lawrences have crossed the uncanny valley separating imagined dystopia from actual horrors, but they're also delivering a life lesson in cinema to teens: Things are stronger when they look real.

Name : Andrew O'Hehir / Alias : Salon.com
"Mockingjay - Part 1" is a penultimate chapter without a real ending, but it's also a thrilling ride full of potent emotions, new characters and major twists of fate, built around another commanding star performance.

Name : Bill Goodykoontz / Alias : Arizona Republic
Director Francis Lawrence does a nice job capturing the claustrophobic environment of District 13 and has a good eye for action shots. But the actors are what really sell the movie.

Name : Richard Corliss / Alias : TIME Magazine
The two-hour foot-soldier slog through Mockingjay Part 1 forces audiences into mostly wasteful waiting for something special to happen.

Name : Christopher Orr / Alias : The Atlantic
Might it have been better if they'd squeezed the whole book into one movie? Probably. Nonetheless, Mockingjay Part 1 is a fine entertainment, shot through with moments of surprising emotional impact.

Name : Mick LaSalle / Alias : San Francisco Chronicle
A dull, claustrophobic, pallid-looking film about people looking into and talking at screens. When the end finally comes, it's from out of nowhere, except it's not really an ending, more like a work stoppage.

Name : Justin Chang / Alias : Variety
The series' two-part finale gets under way in solid, absorbing if not exactly inspired fashion.

Name : Peter Rainer / Alias : Christian Science Monitor
As an actress, Lawrence has grown beyond this sort of thing, and the entire enterprise, directed by Francis Lawrence, feels like a massive placeholder for the grand finale.

Name : Colin Covert / Alias : Minneapolis Star Tribune
After its first two terrific installments, the newest edition of "The Hunger Games" left me hungry, like a feast that's stunningly prepared but flavorless and non-nutritious.

Name : Joe Neumaier / Alias : New York Daily News
There are moments when "The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1" takes flight, but overall this action-drama flits about, wondering where to land.

Name : Chris Vognar / Alias : Dallas Morning News
Once you accept that the splitting of Mockingjay is a business decision, not a dramatic imperative, Part 1 comes off as a curiously satisfying nonaction movie.

Name : Joe Williams / Alias : St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Although it doesn't make a lick of sense as a stand-alone story, "Mockingjay - Part 1" is the first "Hunger Games" movie with meat on its bones.

Name : Todd McCarthy / Alias : Hollywood Reporter
Like an overgrown and bloated trailer for a film yet to come, Francis Lawrence's The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1 spreads perhaps 45 minutes of dramatic material across two far-too-leisurely hours.

Name : Peter Howell / Alias : Toronto Star
There's enough here to at least keep fans of the series involved and eagerly awaiting the grand finale.

Name : Manohla Dargis / Alias : New York Times
"Mockingjay Part 1" is streamlined, blunt and easy.

Name : Lindsey Bahr / Alias : Associated Press
Mockingjay - Part 1 is a serviceable entry into the conclusion of Katniss's saga. It boasts some imaginative visuals, a few truly thrilling moments, and standout performances from Lawrence, Banks, Harrelson, and Hoffman, to whom the film is dedicated.

Name : Peter Travers / Alias : Rolling Stone
OK, there's less action in Games this time, but what's there is prime. And the acting is aces.

Name : Christy Lemire / Alias : ChristyLemire.com
It's an elaborate game of hurry-up-and-wait. And it's the most shameless example yet of splitting the final book in a hugely popular series into two film adaptations.

Name : Claudia Puig / Alias : USA Today
As an adaptation of part of the third book by Suzanne Collins, it's easily the most political of the three films. It's also the most absorbing and best in the series.

Name : Dana Stevens / Alias : Slate
IMockingjay's placeholder status is a little too evident in its choppy, shapeless structure, this dark third chapter does have stretches of somber beauty.