Hunger & Revanche

Tough stuff, indeed. Hunger is an unflinching look at the extremities of life in the Maze prison during the Troubles in Northern Ireland, the first feature of Steve McQueen. No, not the American icon of cool, but a burly black Brit who is a Turner Prize-winning artist. Without excessive aestheticizing and without special pleading, this tour de force presents not just the brute facts but the personal feelings of conflict between terror and repression, between power and the powerless, between captivity and freedom, between prisoners within and without the walls of H-Block. In short, the conflict between humanity and inhumanity. While remaining particular and specific about the case of the IRA and the mortal hunger strike of Bobby Sands and others in 1981, McQueen’s steady gaze illuminates hidden corners of human motivation and behavior. Michael Fassbender is outstanding as Sands, but the cast maintains a uniform verisimilitude. In fact, this film presents more truth than many will be able to stand. Definitely not for the squeamish, it’s sensational in a deeper sense, making one feel the pain of captive existence on one’s own skin. The storytelling is elliptical and evocative, but centers around one scene where the camera remains fixed for much longer than ten minutes on a silhouetted two-shot of Sands facing off across a table with a sympathetic but adversarial priest, endeavoring to justify his extreme strategy. McQueen’s own strategy is not to change minds, but to open them. (2008, dvd.) *7+* (MC-82.)

The Criterion Collection is branching out from their impeccable dvd reissues of classic films to more current releases. Besides Hunger, they’ve just put out Revanche, an Austrian film that was nominated for Best Foreign Film at the Oscars . Gotz Spielmann combines elements of thriller, psychodrama, and parable in this film, whose title may translate either as “revenge” or “rematch.” Two different couples are introduced in alternation and you surmise they will intersect at some point, but you won’t be able to predict how, or what will happen next. But stick with it and the film unfolds to unexpected depth. One couple lives on the seedy margins of Vienna; she’s a Ukrainian prostitute and he’s an ex-con gofer in the brothel where she works. The other lives in a rural village; he’s a policeman and she’s a hausfrau who longs to be a mother. Their paths cross; many complications ensue. You have to watch carefully and patiently to find out what will happen, which is as shocking and quietly devastating as the splash into a country pond that begins the film, sending concentric ripples across the quiet surface. Neither of these films is fare for everyone (plenty of nudity plus revulsion in each), but I thank Criterion for both. (2009, dvd.) *7+* (MC-84.)