Hunger (2008)
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Directed by: Steve McQueen
Starring: Michael Fassbender, Liam Cunningham, Liam McMahon Studio: IFC Films IMDB Rating: 8 |
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Watching Steve McQueen’s 2008 film Hunger is a visceral & emotional experience. Aside from one long scene between IRA hunger striker Bobby Sands (Michael Fassbender) and his priest, there is very little dialogue of any kind. Sound is so precious that when the prison guards line up behind shields in their riot gear, the abrasive & rhythmic bang of their batons momentarily shatters the mundane nature of the prisoners’ lives living in filth. That the ritualistic beatings & abuse that follows seem inevitable & routine only heightens the despair in watching it. Hunger is the story of the 1981 Irish Republican Army protest for prison of war status in a Northern Ireland jail (Long Kesh). The hunger strike at the center of the film evolved out of a 4-year long ‘dirty protest’ where nearly 400 prisoners first refused to wear prison clothing, using only blankets for cover, then refused to use chamber pots, smearing their excrement on their cell walls & dumping urine into the hallway floors. Bobby Sands, the leader of the prisoners, was the first to begin (Mar 1, 1981) his hunger strike & eventually died on the 66th day of his strike, the first of 10 strikers to die. McQueen’s camera does not shy away from depicting the outrageous conditions the prisoners lived in, including maggots, feces-stained walls & urine squeegeed up along endless corridors. Small victories are visually recorded like the creative passing of notes & small radios with visitors or the prisoners’ use of their weekly mass to socially engage, while ignoring the priest.
McQueen divides his film into 3 parts & aside from 2 scenes, captures the story within the walls of the prison. The first third sets up the conditions of the prisoners in their cells during the dirty protest, as well as their horrific treatment by the guards. The middle third is the long scene between Sands & his priest (Lima Cunningham) where they banter about the value of a life. McQueen likened the scene to a tennis match with Sands the aggressor & Father Dominic volleying back to dissuade the risk of life. Shot with just a few cuts, the scene is a tour deforce of resolute beliefs on both sides & grounds the 3rd section of the film in both the reality of Sands’ undertaking, the confidence in his beliefs & the understanding that he knows he will die. Finally, the third section chronicles Sands’ decline as he moves through the strike, complete with dreamlike hallucinations, the painful reality of starvation & the emotional impact of a life slowly ebbing away. Fassbender’s performance is unforgettable & McQueen’s images perhaps capture the reality of death better than anything I’ve ever seen on film.
McQueen divides his film into 3 parts & aside from 2 scenes, captures the story within the walls of the prison. The first third sets up the conditions of the prisoners in their cells during the dirty protest, as well as their horrific treatment by the guards. The middle third is the long scene between Sands & his priest (Lima Cunningham) where they banter about the value of a life. McQueen likened the scene to a tennis match with Sands the aggressor & Father Dominic volleying back to dissuade the risk of life. Shot with just a few cuts, the scene is a tour deforce of resolute beliefs on both sides & grounds the 3rd section of the film in both the reality of Sands’ undertaking, the confidence in his beliefs & the understanding that he knows he will die. Finally, the third section chronicles Sands’ decline as he moves through the strike, complete with dreamlike hallucinations, the painful reality of starvation & the emotional impact of a life slowly ebbing away. Fassbender’s performance is unforgettable & McQueen’s images perhaps capture the reality of death better than anything I’ve ever seen on film.
