The Hunger

Tonight, I had to balance out last night's viewing, so I took solace in Tony Scott's The Hunger.

Adapted from the novel by Whitney Streiber, Catherine Deneuve plays Miriam Blaylock, a centuries old vampire whose current companion, John, played by David Bowie, is beginning to age rapidly, his centuries catching up with him. With John's passing Miriam sets her sites on a new companion, sleep/longevity researcher Dr. Sarah Roberts, played by Susan Sarandon.

I've probably seen this movie a few dozen time since the first time I saw it, late night on HBO back in the mid eighties. It's what I think of as a comfort movie- the quiet dialogue, the gauzy visuals and the chamber music score make it a perfect movie to fall asleep to (my other favorite comfort movie is John Carpenter's The Thing.)

Bowie and Deneuve's characters are both musicians, and as such, music plays a huge component in the story, from the opening scene in a night club where Bauhuas performs their hit "Bela Lugosi's Dead" to Deneuve's seduction of Sarandon set to The Flower Song from Delibes' Lakme.

It's a classy seduction scene.

The movie was filmed through a filter so it has a somewhat etherial look to it, and to a horror loving teenager back in 1985, it was a shock to someone who'd grown up on either the black and white classics or Hammer's movies- that horror movies could be more that just scary movies, they could be art.

I had to catch it a couple of times before I could watch the end credits to see who the band was during the opening sequence. Bauhaus. I remember how thrilled I was when I found their collection Singles: 1979-1983 at the record store in the mall- Mother Records and Tapes at Greenbrier Mall in Chesapeake. I've since worn the tape out, but the cd still has a special place in my music collection.