Review of The Hunger (1983) by Roger R — 08 Jun 2010

Tony Scott has always been a visual director. He's very much about style over substance (although sometimes he picks scripts that force him to direct substance like "True Romance" and "Man on Fire"), and here it's no different.

I will say that he incorporates a very different style here, and it works. It's dark and gothic, and it was great how he spliced various scenes together, and got these brief uncomfortable close ups of blood squirting out.

The make-up effects were also brilliant. It was captivating to watch David Bowie get older and older. Visually, "The Hunger" is great stuff. But dang it, I wanted to understand the characters more.

And like a lot of Scott's films, we don't get too cozy with any of them. David Bowie is only in the first half and right from the get-go, he's dying. So we never see his character's relationship with Miriam (the sexy Catherine Deneuve) too much.

We get the tail-end of it, but I would have liked to see their relationship beforehand just a little more. Then after Bowie dies, she seduces Susan Sarandon, and they engage in some hot lesbian sex (which is nice.

.. I'm not complaining), then Sarandon gets hunger pains, and then there's a twist and "The End". I felt like Scott chose to focus on the wrong period of time in these characters' lives, or maybe the window he focused on was too brief.

I just thought that the visual style was so unique and twisted that I was hoping it would end up in a better developed movie.