The Hunger (1983)

Director: Tony Scott

Starring: Catherine Deneuve, David Bowie, Susan Sarandon

A love triangle develops between a beautiful yet dangerous vampire, her cellist companion, and a gerontologist.

A Vampire movie you say? Oh, ok, if you insist. Note, there are spoilers here.

‘The Hunger’ doesn’t follow the usual traits of a vampire movie. It is classy, and stylish, with classical music. Having watched ‘The Hunger’, I definitely rather prefer the more commercial, mainstream, clichéd (if you will) vampire movies. This was incredibly boring.

Let me tell you what annoyed me the most about this movie: the smoking! Almost every scene in this film saw one of the characters with a cigarette, as if the director wanted to PROMOTE smoking. I’m a non-smoker, but that’s besides the point. It was off-putting; as if they didn’t know what the characters were to do with their hands – or their mouths for that matter!!

‘The Hunger’ also has the most annoying editing I’ve seen in a while, and it contains in your face sexual exploitation. And the smoking, smoking, smoking, smoking….

Dr Sarah Roberts (Susan Sarandon) works at the Park West Clinic, where a baboon has just attacked a woman. Why this was shown, I have no idea, as it plays no part during the rest of the movie. Yawn. Sarah is trying to find a cure for an age degenerate disease, and she has just published a book on sleep and longevity.

David Bowie stars as John Blaylock, a music teacher and husband to Miriam (Catherine Deneuve), who is a vampire. He ages by the minute, and I can only assume this was because he, too, was a vampire and needed blood, but this is explored in such a manner that I at times believed he was NOT a vampire. Yawn.

John went to see Sarah, seeking her help, but she ignored him, and only later realized he was in fact in desperate need of help, so she goes to his home where she meets Miriam. And so the two women have a lesbian encounter where Miriam bites Sarah (and we all know what that means…).

For such a short movie (93 minutes) the film is incredibly slow paced. This dreary vampire film couldn’t have ended sooner. I was so bored! Yawn. For me, it felt like this movie belongs at the bottom of the bargain bin. Yawn.

My only positive note on ‘The Hunger’ was David Bowie’s incredible makeup, which was superb!

Would I watch it again? Hell, no!

Please also follow my blog dedicated to 80s horror movies: https://paulinthe80s.wordpress.com/