Hunger

I'm about halfway through the Fangoria Titles and this is the new low of lows.The other films have at least one redeeming quality, but I couldn't find anything to appreciate in this one. Low budget doesn't have to mean bad, but the acting, set, and acting are subpar. Very little happens in this movie, don't let the reviews that praise it for being 'psychological' fool you. The first ten minutes are told primarily in the dark. This sequence could have been effective, but merely sets the stage for further mediocrity. Some of the editing is so poor you have to piece together what is transpiring by guesswork. These are not characters that devolve to survive in desperation, just poorly drawn characters that you won't care about. Not much logic to be had here.

Do not waste your time, no redeeming value.

I watched this movie by accident and while it definitely has some flaws, overall, I walked away finding the whole thing quite interesting. It's an obvious late addition to the torture porn trend in mid to late 2000s horror (a trend I'm not a fan of, but, let's be honest, Saw and Hostel brought back R-rated horror with a vengeance and all horror fans should be forever grateful for that).

There are some profound continuity issues with this movie--the women have impeccable hair well into the experiment (everyone's hair gets greasy and matted after a week, so the makeup department and script supervisor should have raised the point with the director). Someone else has mentioned the men should have had much fuller beards by the third week of the experiment. These are nitpicking issues that, unfortunately, viewers in the age of absolute literalism in entertainment will focus on. Overall, however, the story is interesting and I like the fact that nothing is over-explained. In that way, the movie is a nice throwback to the superior horror movies of the 1970s,

HUNGER: Definitely a film that requires rapt attention. Though the film starts out slow, the pace allows you to learn about each character. As the film progresses, one can't help to think about food deprivation and what limitations or lengths we'd go to to survive. Do you give in the animalistic behaviors that fear of starvation can bring about? Is one mentally strong to battle the mind and prevent a psychotic break? Does survival of the fittest mean becoming a monster? Hunger definitely makes you think and as the film progresses you find yourself cheering and engrossed with hope that someone survives the sadistic monster that initiated the mind bending slope if starvation and hell all-in-one. Rated 6 for storyline, buildup of film, focused location and good characters. A slow paced film with lapses at times; but worth watching.

I'll admit, I have a thing for low budget horror films. But I don't review all of them, just the ones that impressed me. This one definitely falls in that category.

Here's a few reasons:

1) It's less about gore (although there is some) and more about human behavior. It's an incredibly psychological film that really makes you wonder "what would I do in this situation?" and, possibly, leave you surprised at your answer. Not what I was expecting, but definitely kept me watching.

2) The acting was pretty good. So many of the low-budget movies get stuck with a good story but wooden acting--not this one.

3) The story. They actually give you a solid background for what's going on and it never felt too rushed or too slow.

This isn't the goriest or grossest I've seen, but you still might want to leave your stomach at the door. If you're into dark, scary movies about human depravity, this one's for you. I found it entirely fascinating.

Every human being needs to eat, drink and breathe in order to live. We are able to survive longer without food than air and water, but how far would we go to make sure we have food? There are starving people all over the world that simply starve to death, but that is a way of life for them. In other words: they aren't used to having anything to eat. What if they came from a nation where they have never had to go a day without a meal?

"Hunger" is from the bag of your unorthodox psychotics. If your traditional psychotic is one that kills people with no regard but still is a hands-on killer, the unorthodox psychotic is the one that sets up elaborate schemes or traps in order to kill his prey.

In this film a very mentally deranged man places five random strangers in a secluded yet locked location with no sustenance to survive except water and each other. His plan: see if they would cannibalize themselves in order to survive.

This is a movie that delves into how depraved human beings can become when facing death. It was an interesting movie that gave us some gore and a little bit of depression. I think we'd all like to believe in our basic humanity but what would we do?