The violent relaxation and the metastable states of the Hamiltonian Mean-Field model, a paradigmatic system of long-range interactions, is studied using a Hamiltonian formalism. Rigorous results are derived algebraically for the time evolution of selected macroscopic observables, e.g., the global magnetization. The high- and low-energy limits are investigated and the analytical predictions are compared with direct N-body simulations. The method we use enables us to re-interpret the out-of-equilibrium phase transition separating magnetized and (almost) unmagnetized regimes. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.