Produced by: Tony Scott and Ridley Scott
Hosted by: David Bowie and Terrence Stamp
Cast: Daniel Craig, Karen Black, Lena Headey, Balthazar Getty, Giovanni Ribsi, Eric Roberts, and Kate Vernon.
If you find yourself questioning the familiarity of The Hunger: The Taste of Terror, look no further than the British, Canadian horror anthology series, The Hunger. Despite being produced by Tony Scott and being half hosted by David Bowie, the series has nothing to do with the film of the same name. Debuting in 1997 and appearing on Showtime, The Hunger fused supernatural and horror elements with eroticism and a lot boobs. However, due to the series' late night time slot and the limitations of half hour episodes, the series received negative reception. Once Masters of Horror took over in 2005, The Hunger seemed to be left behind in the wake of a show that featured more gore, and many more scares.
For some reason E1 Entertainment has decided to release 6 episodes of The Hunger on DVD format, unaltered and without any additional extras, but is it worth your time? My initial answer was yes. Having never been exposed to The Hunger before, I found a unique and aesthetically pleasing style exuding from the first 3 episodes of Volume 1. Upon closer inspection however and a little internet research, I'm hard pressed to understand why this release is even happening in the first place. E1 Entertainment already released both seasons of the seemingly failed TV series to the public back in 2009. This DVD set comes with only 3 episodes from each season, boasts no special features, and chooses a bizarre collection. Rather than serving as a best of compilation, the episodes seem to be pulled from the series based on the order that they were aired. The first 3 episodes of each season are the basis of each trilogy, so once again I ask, what is the point?
The series is a strange hybrid of industrial snuff film footage, and at times stunning camera work and artistic and breathtaking images. What I found most jarring unfortunately were the introductions to each episode provided by Stamp and Bowie respectively. These introductions felt like badly edited horror films by high school students given a camera for the very first time. Segments of Stamp poetically ruminating on the trials of love and despair are violently interrupted by strange industrious sounds, and static. What he is saying bears little significance if all I am concentrating on is my desire to not throw my computer across the room. Things get better when the actual episodes begin, then things are ruined at the end when Stamp concludes things. The host in this case feels very throw away. Despite both Bowie and Stamp's good credits, neither bring anything of note to the series. On the contrary the series might be significantly helped if the host segments were deleted entirely.
I was however quite taken with the first three episodes of the first trilogy. The Swords especially drew me in, due to the beautiful colors and superb acting skills of Amanda Ryan. Menage a Trois while not as moving, delivered the same style of unique shots and spectacular images. The second trilogy however delivers something painfully similar to the style of the opening segments done by the hosts. All beauty and aesthetic charm is thrown out the window in favor of crude lighting and a style not too far from the likes of Saw or Hostel. I can't help but feel completely thrown off from the change in both tone and style that the 2nd trilogy causes me to take absolutely nothing memorable away from it. If you do feel the need to check out The Hunger, I strongly suggest sticking to the first season where it felt like a little more care and feeling went into it.
Overall, The Hunger does little to convince me that its failed success on TV was a fluke. The soft core porn theme prevalent in all episodes is fine at the start; but once you realize that a prerequisite for all the actresses was nice boobs, things start to sour quickly. Additionally while I did take away some quite positive things from the first trilogy, it did leave me with a bitter resentment of each episodes length. Thirty minutes is hardly enough time to establish a well thought out plot that handles these kinds of stories and themes. The audience has little, if any time to grasp anything worthwhile, and we are left with a consistent feeling of simply wanting more. Despite being helmed by the Scott brothers, employing some fantastic actors and adapting the stories of well known authors, The Hunger falls short of anything memorable.
The Hunger: The Taste of Terror is in turn a pretty useless release still unworthy of most people's time. Even if you were a fan of the series, this DVD compilation is nothing you haven't seen before and that, my friends, is a problem.
The Hunger: The Taste of Terror is being released by E1 Entertainment on September 21 2010.
Rating: (2 out of 5):
