Steve McQueen’s directorial debut ‘Hunger’, co-written by award-winning writer Enda Walsh (Disco Pigs), is set to open the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes Film Festival, which takes place from 14th- 25th May 2008.
The Northern Ireland-shot film depicts the final six weeks of the life of IRA hunger striker’s Bobby Sands, who died in the Maze prison in 1981. German-born actor Michael Fassbender, who was raised in Killarney, Co. Kerry, stars as Sands. Irish actors Liam Cunningham (Anner House, Showbands), Stuart Graham (Small Engine Repair, The Clinic), Liam McMahon (Northanger Abbey) and Lalor Roddy (Middletown) also star.
"What I want to convey is something you can't find in books or archive: the ordinariness and extraordinariness of life in this prison,” said McQueen, a Turner Prize-winning video artist. “The body as a site of political warfare is becoming a more familiar phenomenon. It is the final act of desperation; your own body is the last resource for protest. One uses what one has, rightly or wrongly.”
Produced by London based Blast! Films, ‘Hunger’ is co-financed by Film4, the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland, Northern Ireland Screen and the Wales Creative IP fund.
The film was shot in October / November 2007 and January 2008, by DOP Sean Bobbitt and is produced by Robin Gutch (Death of a President, Soundproof) and Laura Hastings-Smith (The Lives of the Saints), who last month was chosen to attend Cannes as part of European Film Promotions' ‘Producers on the Move’ initiative. Production design is by IFTA-nominated Tom McCullagh (Closing the Ring, Mickybo & Me). Icon Entertainment International are handling the international film sales.
