Hunger Review

The 1981 IRA hunger strikes have been done on film before. We've had Terry George's Some Mother's Son a powerfully emotive piece featuring standout performances from Helen Mirren and Aiden Gillen. We've also had the lesser seen H3. So why do it again? As always, the answer to this question - whether it be asked about remakes or the rehashing of popular subjects - is simple. There is no reason to do it again unless you are trying something completely different.

And Hunger, directed by first time director and former visual artist Steve McQueen (no, not that one), is certainly something different and some will find that alienating. The standard operating procedure when dealing with a true-life historical story is to explore the world through a character's eyes. Tell their story and allow the audience to connect, empathise and have a cathartic experience as they partake in the character's transformation. This approach works, time and time again but it is by no means easy to achieve. But it's not the only way to tell a story. It is simply the most reliable.

Hunger flips the script and rips up the rule book. It eschews the traditional 3-act structure (though it is still resolutely in 3 acts). It deliberately switches point-of-view, preventing the audience from identifying with any one character and their world view or political point of view. While we feel empathy, we are not encouraged to position ourselves with any of the characters. Dialogue is used sparingly until suddenly we are cast into a 15-minute scene in which two people talk to each other in a simple 2-shot without any cuts. Narrative resolution is deemed unnecessary and character's arcs are dropped mid-stream, again discouraging identification.

Of course, many may find this frustrating because, it is unnatural and not commendable for its own sake. It is only laudable if these choices achieve something else. And they do. They allow a political hot potato of a story to be told relatively objectively, which prevents the movie from being dismissed by critics as an apology for terrorists. It forces the audience to feel the effect of the events for themselves. Rather than identifying with characters you identify with the pure pain, suffering, hardship and human strength, independent of too much context. Again, this would not work if the pain and suffering wasn't so brutally rendered and if it failed to shake the audience to its core.

None of this sounds like an entertaining night at the cinema but it is an expert peice of filmmaking that is engaging in its brutal honesty.
4/5