Sands film premieres at Cannes
A biopic on Irish prisoner Bobby Sands who died after 66 days on hunger strike, part of an epic battle of wills with British premier Margaret Thatcher, got its world premiere Thursday in Cannes. "Hunger" is likely to spark controversy in Britain where some commentators have already denounced it as a celebration of the martyrdom of a terrorist, but director Steve McQueen denied he portrays Sands as a hero. "I'm not saying I agree or disagree with Bobby Sands, what I'm saying is I don't know," he told AFP. "The film is about people making decisions, bad or right decisions, and the consequences of that." But he did say there were parallels between Northern Ireland's now-closed Maze prison in 1981 and what has happened more recently in the US detention centre in Guantanamo in Cuba and the US-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. "Hunger," starring Michael Fassbender, tells the story of the decision by Sands and other Irish Republican Army (IRA) inmates to go on hunger strike in the Maze to demand political prisoner status. Sands had been jailed on firearms offences he was accused of committing as part of the IRA's deadly campaign to end British rule of Northern Ireland and unite the Protestant-dominated province with the largely Catholic Republic of Ireland. He and his fellow inmates had previously carried out various actions to gain political status, including the notorious "dirty protest" in which they wore only blankets and smeared their own excrement on their cell walls. But then British premier Thatcher refused to give in to their demands and the hunger protest began. Sands, who got elected to the British parliament during his strike, was the first of ten prisoners to die over the following weeks. "Like in any situation ... you use the things that you've got at your disposal," said McQueen, 38, a London-born artist for whom "Hunger" is a first feature film. "In that case, it was the body. Excrement, urine, whatever, you use what you have, they were limited to that." "Hunger" recounts the last weeks of Sands' life in graphic detail, showing the brutality of prison warders and the horrifically declining state of Sands' emaciated body. The British viewpoint gets scant mention, but McQueen insists he is not dealing in simplistic stereotypes of hero or martyr, but seeking to make people "reflect on what went on in an adult intelligent fashion." The media coverage of the Maze hunger strike sparked a wave of sympathy around the world for Sands and his fellow strikers, whose deaths resulted in a surge of IRA activity and an escalation of violence in Northern Ireland. A 1996 film on Sands' life, "Some Mother's Son," sparked controversy when it screened in Cannes in 1996. McQueen is an official war artist in Britain and a winner of its prestigious Turner prize. He previously sparked controversy when he produced a series of postage stamps showing the faces of soldiers killed in the current Iraq conflict. "Hunger" is showing in the Un Certain Regard competition in Cannes, a sidebar to the main race for the Palme d'Or.
A biopic on Irish prisoner Bobby Sands who died after 66 days on hunger strike, part of an epic battle of wills with British premier Margaret Thatcher, got its world premiere Thursday in Cannes. "Hunger" is likely to spark controversy in Britain where some commentators have already denounced it as a celebration of the martyrdom of a terrorist, but director Steve McQueen denied he portrays Sands as a hero. "I'm not saying I agree or disagree with Bobby Sands, what I'm saying is I don't know," he told AFP. "The film is about people making decisions, bad or right decisions, and the consequences of that." But he did say there were parallels between Northern Ireland's now-closed Maze prison in 1981 and what has happened more recently in the US detention centre in Guantanamo in Cuba and the US-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. "Hunger," starring Michael Fassbender, tells the story of the decision by Sands and other Irish Republican Army (IRA) inmates to go on hunger strike in the Maze to demand political prisoner status. Sands had been jailed on firearms offences he was accused of committing as part of the IRA's deadly campaign to end British rule of Northern Ireland and unite the Protestant-dominated province with the largely Catholic Republic of Ireland. He and his fellow inmates had previously carried out various actions to gain political status, including the notorious "dirty protest" in which they wore only blankets and smeared their own excrement on their cell walls. But then British premier Thatcher refused to give in to their demands and the hunger protest began. Sands, who got elected to the British parliament during his strike, was the first of ten prisoners to die over the following weeks. "Like in any situation ... you use the things that you've got at your disposal," said McQueen, 38, a London-born artist for whom "Hunger" is a first feature film. "In that case, it was the body. Excrement, urine, whatever, you use what you have, they were limited to that." "Hunger" recounts the last weeks of Sands' life in graphic detail, showing the brutality of prison warders and the horrifically declining state of Sands' emaciated body. The British viewpoint gets scant mention, but McQueen insists he is not dealing in simplistic stereotypes of hero or martyr, but seeking to make people "reflect on what went on in an adult intelligent fashion." The media coverage of the Maze hunger strike sparked a wave of sympathy around the world for Sands and his fellow strikers, whose deaths resulted in a surge of IRA activity and an escalation of violence in Northern Ireland. A 1996 film on Sands' life, "Some Mother's Son," sparked controversy when it screened in Cannes in 1996. McQueen is an official war artist in Britain and a winner of its prestigious Turner prize. He previously sparked controversy when he produced a series of postage stamps showing the faces of soldiers killed in the current Iraq conflict. "Hunger" is showing in the Un Certain Regard competition in Cannes, a sidebar to the main race for the Palme d'Or.