Hunger (2008)

Directed by Steve McQueen. Starring Michael Fassbender, Liam Cunningham, Brian Milligan, Liam McMahon, Stuart Graham.

Raw, unflinching drama set inside a Northern Ireland prison at the tail end of the five-year “dirty protest” (where prisoners refused to bathe, wear prisoner garb, empty their waste receptacles, etc.), events that led to imprisoned IRA member Bobby Sands (Fassbender) embarking upon a hunger strike in the early-80s. Debuting feature director McQueen’s confidence in how to present the grueling material as stark realism smooths out the ragged edges of its unconventional storytelling and its refusal to give depth to its narrow character sheet. We see prisoners in inhumane conditions, we hear an extended debate between Sands and a priest (Cunningham), and we witness in grisly detail what happens to Sands’ starving body; little else in detail or lingering effect is left, and what effect Sands’ martyrdom had and whether or not it was worth it (to him most of all) is left for the viewer to decide. A political movie where the politics are presented as an indistinct universal, an Us vs. Them blanket to cover all bases of oppression and protest, and the filmmakers refreshingly never take sides. Not for the squeamish, particularly the final act.

78/100