Hungry, hungry fucking hippos! That's the pitch, that's the attraction, and frankly, that's about all the justification I need. Give me a bunch of unfortunate bastards, a body of water, and several tons of pissed-off hippopotamuses with absolutely no interest in sharing the neighborhood. I'm not showing up for a meditation on man's relationship with nature. I'm showing up to watch people discover that a hippo is essentially a homicidal refrigerator with teeth. Sometimes cinema really is that simple.
And, fuck, this flick is brutal.
Writer-director James Nunn drops a boatload of tourists into the Louisiana swamps, where their sightseeing excursion becomes an all-you-can-eat buffet for a territorial hippo. Madison Davenport plays Sistine, with Tracey Bonner, Joaquim de Almeida, Michel Curiel, Samantha Coughlan, Olivia Bernstone, Jim Meskimen, and River Codack filling out the passenger manifest. Some are likable, some are annoying, and some might as well have their obituaries printed on their boarding passes. Character development? A little. Bad decisions? Plenty. Casualties? That's why we're here, for Christ's sake.
And this shit delivers, complete with its final girl elements.
The hippo is the star, although Nunn takes his sweet fucking time bringing the beast out for a proper look. When it finally gets down to business, the combination of practical creature work and digital effects gives us some entertaining animal-attack mayhem.
Unfortunately, the movie is considerably more interested in teasing the next attack than delivering the kind of gloriously excessive carnage its premise practically demands. I wanted more teeth, more blood, and fewer people standing around discussing their increasingly obvious predicament. Still, there's something perversely satisfying about watching a creature that resembles an oversized bathtub toy turn a pleasant afternoon into a casualty report.
Hungry is exactly what it sounds like: a killer-hippo movie with a respectable cast, a ridiculous premise, a few decent attacks, and absolutely no business pretending to be anything more. It isn't Jaws, and the suspense occasionally moves about as quickly as the swamp water. But I have a soft spot for these disposable animal-attack pictures, even when they don't quite deliver the goods.
Ninety-three minutes, a bunch of tourists, and one seriously pissed-off hippo. Could it have been nastier? Absolutely. Did I watch the whole fucking thing? Of course I did. It's called Hungry, for God's sake. What the hell else was I expecting?
It is now streaming on Amazon Prime.
MPAA Rating: 13+.
Runtime: 93 mins
Director: James Nunn
Writer: James Nunn
Cast: Madison Davenport; Tracey Bonner; Joaquim de Almeida
Genre: Horror | Thriller
Tagline: This hippo isn't playing games.
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Distributor: Amazon Prime
Official Site: https://www.primevideo.com/detail/0KQ70S1P07Z3YWK1LA7MHP66MJ
Release Date:
DVD/Blu-ray Release Date:
Synopsis: After becoming lost in the Louisiana swamplands, a group of holidaymakers must fight for their lives against a rampaging hippo on the loose.
