Hunger (2008)

Hunger is a movie that I have heard from on the Filmspotting podcast when themselves and various critics have put this movie on there top tens of 2008 and 2009. I have heard scant things about this movie, but I didn’t want it spoiled for me. In retrospect, I thought that this movie was magnificent debut film from Steve McQueen. (No, not that Steve McQueen.)

Taking place in Northern Ireland in 1981, the story deals with a couple of inmates at the Maze Prison that are held there by the government. They think that they are political prisoners, but the government doesn’t seem to think so. The prisoners are under a blanket/no wash protest until they get political prisoners status.

The story follows all side of the controversial moment by looking at the lives of prison officer Raymond Lohan (Stuart Graham), who is afraid of being murdered. He checks under his car for bombs, looking over his shoulders for assassins, etc. He is one of many guards that are taking the prisoners out one by one and beat them up for smuggling contraband into the prison. His knuckles become bloodier as the protests goes on.

Next, the action focus on a new Irish Republican Army prisoner, Davey (Brian Milligan) arrives at the prison refuses to wear the standard uniform. He is asked to take his clothes off, given a single blanket and have the walk of shame to his cell where he meets his cellmate, Gerry (Liam McMahon). Gerry is serving out a twelve year sentence, while Davey has only six. Looking around the room, Davey sees that Gerry has covered the walls of the cell in his own shit, putting his food in a slop corner on the floor and using his urine as a last act of defiance.

About thirty minutes into the film, we meet the main protagonist of the movie, Bobby Sands (Michael Fassbender) who is the mastermind of the protest. The reason why the guards are beating up the prisoners is they get their visitors to smuggle notes to the outside world by being a drug mule of sorts. Gerry gets his girlfriend to smuggle radio transmitter in her vagina.

The prison guards force the inmates out of their cells to beat them into giving up their seemingly lost cause. They perform cavity searches on them, getting them to wash and cut their hair. That breaks some of the inmates.

Regrouping for the cause, Bobby Sands wants to go on a hunger strike to make the point to get the Irish government to name them political prisoners. He calls for a local priest (Liam Cunningham) to come talk to him. It culminates in a riveting seventeen minute unbroken shot with Bobby and the priest discussing the morality of the hunger strike.

The next moments of the movie shows the effects of malnutrition does to the human body.

Today’s filmmakers are so keen on quick cuts and being overly glossy, but McQueen does something that is raw and real and hits you to the core. The movie is tough to watch, because it shows that one person’s sacrifice could mean a lot to others. Michael Fassbender gives a brave performance in this movie.

Not knowing the story of Bobby Sands and this era, I had trouble getting into why the events happened the way they did. Why did we focus on a prison guard? Why do we focus on a riot officer at one point? Being that this is an Irish movie, I had trouble understanding of what the people were saying, even though there is very little dialogue in the movie.

Judgment: I would suggest reading up this subject before seeing the movie.

Rating: ****

Blood: The Last Vampire (2009)

Blood: The Last Vampire was not on my radar when it premièred this summer in limited release. Now that I am in full swing of my “Creep-A-Thon”, I decided to check out this recent DVD release. In retrospect, this movie is not that good.

This movie is based on the anime series of the same name, the story revolves around a lone vampire hunter named Saya (Gianna) in 1970 Tokyo. Her only goal is to kill Onigen (Koyuki), a powerful vampire leader that killed her father when she was a child.

Her handler, Michael (Liam Cunningham) provides intel to her where vampire nests are at in the city, trying to flush Onigen out of hiding. Michael and his right hand man, Luke (JJ Feild) work with a secret organization called “The Council” to save humanity from the vampires.

Saya’s latest assignment is to infiltrate a military base, Kanto and enroll in the high school there. Gen. McKee (Larry Lamb) and Frank Nielsen (Andrew Plavin) meet the trio with resistance. They wanted to know there presence. They lied and said that they were with the CIA.

Saya sits in class with the general daughter, Alice (Allison Miller) where she is picked on for being a daddy’s little girl. During a kata class, two classmates, Sharon and Linda (Masiela Lusha, Ailish O’Connor) try to attack Alice. Saya comes in and saves her life when it is revealed that they were both vampires. Alice witnesses the girls being killed.

She goes to her father and there is a big commotion over the presence of the new people on the base. Alice follows her teacher, Mr. Powell (Colin Salmon) that almost set her up for her demise to a local bar where she finds out that it is filled with vampires. Once again, Saya comes to save the damsel in distress.

From that moment on, both girls have a price on them from the Council and Onigen traveling with her escort, Kato Takarora (Yasuki Kurata) that Saya had a run-in with years earlier.

This movie tries to be like a Japanese Kill Bill, but it’s not. Saya is no The Bride. The acting and dialogue is awful. The action sequences were somewhat cool, but the badly rendered CGI ruined most of them. The endless amounts of CG blood got on my nerves. The movie came from the same producers as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero. I was not impressed.

Judgment: If you want to see a vampire movie that is worse than Twilight, watch this movie.

Rating: *1/2