Henry Saw: Hunger

Ugh..I feel so dumb...


So last Saturday night I dragged seven people to Gomorrah. You can read my review of that mess here but "long story short" I had heard great things and Gomorrah ended up being a big disappointment. At the very same theater, Hunger was playing. Hunger is a film I had only heard of thanks to my small obsession with the English movie magazine Empire (best movie magazine in existence. You can't like movies and not read Empire. Really. EW, Variety, they're all a joke in comparison. Now, back to the review). I knew Hunger was about Bobby Sands...I had to ask my parents who he was and if he was noteworthy...but I had a small sense of what I was in for.

I still was pretty damn impressed.

The director, an, artist of both canvas and screen, Steve McQueen (I guess it has to be said...no relation to the actor...he's an English black dude), does a hell of a job. The film is very much like a three act play. The first act is about a prison guard...this part plays the most like an art film with its use of sound and images...who is forced to check his car everyday for a possible bomb because he knows he is a target.

The next act, the best scene of the movie, and actually the best scene I've seen in quite a bit, is an 18 minute shot of Michael Fassbender (playing Bobby Sands) talking to Liam Cunningham (playing a priest) explaining why he is going on a hunger strike. His hope was to get all IRA detainees "prisoner of war" status. This would allow them certain treatment and attention that they certainly were not getting.

Just an unbelievably fantastic scene...witty, upsetting, spellbinding...it hits every note. You have to see this movie if just for this scene.

The last bit involves watching Sands wasting away. I've never been that impressed with actors who are willing to gain or lose an immense amount of weight for a movie...it just seems reckless and not all that noble...but the director McQueen more or less pulls it off.

Either way, a really solid, tough, cool movie. Check it out.

Grade: B

Best Scene: The 18 Minute Conversation...it's really cool