I have admired Tony Scott's The Hunger since the day it was released when many others thought it a pretentious bore, not quite horror, not quite thriller and certainly not kitsch. This film came out of the golden age of London/Hollywood films that began in the 1970s and ended at the end of the 1980s. It was a long run a fine, unusual films coming from a studio system that was just coming out of the long period of 1960s technicolor, star-studded movies that were more often than not fake and boring.
The f/x of the day were nothing like the CGI overkill we have to endure now, though The Hunger would have benefited from some computer generated bodily decomposition in the final scenes. People used to the current ultra-realism, that seems to have circled back to the fakeness of the 1960s, will think The Hunger about as believable as an earlier generation found the classic sci-fi flicks from the 1950s to be. But with a little forbearance and tolerance and an open mind and open eyes the viewer will discover a very beautifully filmed, scripted and scored film about vampires which steps out of the usual blood-sucking envelope and tells a sad, tragic story of love betrayed.
The betrayer is Miriam Blaylock, played exquisitely by the unbelievably beautiful Catherine Deneuve. She was always a treat to behold in all of her films, notably Indochine, but here she surpasses herself in elegance and bewitching savoir faire. She is partnered by David Bowie, as John her 300 year old boy toy she picked up in the 18th century. John's time has run out, contrary to what Miriam tells her lovers before she changes them into 'eternal' vampires, which is a lie she tells to get the object of her desire and to keep her company on her long lonely voyage through time.
Susan Sarandon has also never been filmed to more beautiful effect, and she is a brilliant actress and puts Deneuve slightly in the shade because of the latter's more subtle acting style. Sarandon smacks the screen with those Bette Davis eyes of hers where Deneuve caresses and almost disappears before your eyes in a mist of golden beauty.
This is poetic language but The Hunger is a poetic film and, as far as artistic creations on celluloid goes, is one of the most beautiful things to behold I've ever seen.
The supporting cast is excellent, everyone acting in natural and understated manner, none of them being clichéd in any way. And there are some interesting cameos from actors who went on to bigger things, in the case of Willem Dafoe who doesn't speak a single line, and Sophie Ward, the exquisite English rose who went on to do fine work mostly in British television. You will also see Ann Magnusson who was an icon of the 1970/80s alternative theater scene.
There is not much action which eliminates this from the thriller category I think, and the horror is not so much in scary rotting corpses rising from their coffins to wreck revenge upon their duplicitous lover, Miriam, but in the terrible fate of these poor creatures who are not allowed to die but forced to lie in their coffins, slowly rotting but still living, until, that is, their maker dies.
The Hunger, for all its shocking killing, is a classic romantic tragedy, but the lovers are gorgeous bloodsucking vampires. This is a perfect film to watch at home on a rainy autumn afternoon.
The f/x of the day were nothing like the CGI overkill we have to endure now, though The Hunger would have benefited from some computer generated bodily decomposition in the final scenes. People used to the current ultra-realism, that seems to have circled back to the fakeness of the 1960s, will think The Hunger about as believable as an earlier generation found the classic sci-fi flicks from the 1950s to be. But with a little forbearance and tolerance and an open mind and open eyes the viewer will discover a very beautifully filmed, scripted and scored film about vampires which steps out of the usual blood-sucking envelope and tells a sad, tragic story of love betrayed.
The betrayer is Miriam Blaylock, played exquisitely by the unbelievably beautiful Catherine Deneuve. She was always a treat to behold in all of her films, notably Indochine, but here she surpasses herself in elegance and bewitching savoir faire. She is partnered by David Bowie, as John her 300 year old boy toy she picked up in the 18th century. John's time has run out, contrary to what Miriam tells her lovers before she changes them into 'eternal' vampires, which is a lie she tells to get the object of her desire and to keep her company on her long lonely voyage through time.
Susan Sarandon has also never been filmed to more beautiful effect, and she is a brilliant actress and puts Deneuve slightly in the shade because of the latter's more subtle acting style. Sarandon smacks the screen with those Bette Davis eyes of hers where Deneuve caresses and almost disappears before your eyes in a mist of golden beauty.
This is poetic language but The Hunger is a poetic film and, as far as artistic creations on celluloid goes, is one of the most beautiful things to behold I've ever seen.
The supporting cast is excellent, everyone acting in natural and understated manner, none of them being clichéd in any way. And there are some interesting cameos from actors who went on to bigger things, in the case of Willem Dafoe who doesn't speak a single line, and Sophie Ward, the exquisite English rose who went on to do fine work mostly in British television. You will also see Ann Magnusson who was an icon of the 1970/80s alternative theater scene.
There is not much action which eliminates this from the thriller category I think, and the horror is not so much in scary rotting corpses rising from their coffins to wreck revenge upon their duplicitous lover, Miriam, but in the terrible fate of these poor creatures who are not allowed to die but forced to lie in their coffins, slowly rotting but still living, until, that is, their maker dies.
The Hunger, for all its shocking killing, is a classic romantic tragedy, but the lovers are gorgeous bloodsucking vampires. This is a perfect film to watch at home on a rainy autumn afternoon.