Hunger
This was never going to be an enjoyable film, but while Hunger is in most respects a technically adroit film, it completely lacks both context and soul and hence, in my opinion, it doesn't work. Brutality and stark realism is acceptable for a strong purpose, but at the end of this film you're more likely to be going home thinking 'why did I watch all that misery?' as opposed to some important revelation.

There is one very good thing in this film - a very very long scene in the middle between Bobby Sands and a priest. The back-and-forth is excellent, and the skill required to do it in one shot is incredible. The problem is that the rest of the film feels like filler around this. Much of the film before this is the story of one of the warders and how he gets on with his job but doesn't really like it. Is this a clumsy attempt at balance or a clumsy way to drag the film out to feature length? I suspect the latter. There's also a very long shot where a man cleans a corridor, which goes on for literally minutes. It's almost Lynchian - but David Lynch's films are so multi-textured and varied that I allow and even appreciate the occasional indulgence, whereas here it also, again, feels like filling in time. The hunger strike itself isolates Sands and reduces what is going on to the effects on his body - and it's pretty disgusting, all the more so because there is no context applied within the film. I've no idea what we're supposed to feel at his death, but I can't say I felt much at all. Without some reference to what the protest was about or why it was important, the film is anchorless and verging on the grotesque - the prisoners almost appear petulant because their reasons aren't explored. A couple of quick quotes from Margaret Thatcher just aren't enough. Also, and while people who say these kinds of things usually tend to annoy me, it does seem problematic that the things these people did (or didn't) do to land them in prison in the first place are completely glossed over - even without delving into the highly complex rights and wrongs of the Troubles, this skirts the point and it can't really get away with it. There's too little dialogue and too many arty shots, however well-done they may be.

Michael Fassbender is to be commended, I suppose, for what he must have done to himself to play this part, and he acts well. Liam Cunningham as the other half of the amazingly long take also deserves praise.

This film failed for me - it ends up as more an art installation than a film, and in divorcing it almost entirely from any context, it makes it cold, clinical and soulless. It is shot well, and the middle scene is excellent, and on those grounds it can't really get any lower than a 4, but I'm not giving it any more than that. 4 out of 10 therefore.