When "Hunger" was in Cannes, we were underdogs.
When we got a standing ovation, I turned to my dad and said,
"It doesn’t get any better than this."

"Pumped", "A New York Times Style Magazine" 2009

You can go through your whole career and not have an opportunity to work with someone like Steve McQueen
or opposite an actor like Liam Cunningham. I can remember turning to my dad at Cannes and saying,
"Enjoy this because this is as good as it gets on every level."

"Dazed and Confused" 2009

Premiere on 14 May 2008

“The Un Certain Regard selection of the 61st Festival of Cannes opens today with the presentation of "Hunger" by Steve McQueen.
Eligible for a Golden Camera award, Hunger , the first film by this British director, tells the story of Bobby Sands, the IRA political prisoner who was an emblematic figure in the Blanket Protest of the late 1970s. To obtain special political status for IRA prisoners, Sands launched an unprecedented hunger strike which resulted in the starvation deaths of ten men.
Steve McQueen talks about his intentions "Hunger":
"I want to show what it was like to see, hear, smell and touch in the H-block in 1981. What I want to convey is something you cannot find in books or archives: the ordinary and extraordinary, of life in this prison.
"Hunger" for me has contemporary resonance. 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 your last resource for protest. One uses what one has, rightly or wrongly...
In “Hunger” there is no simplistic notion of 'hero' or 'martyr' or 'victim'. My intention is to provoke debate in the audience, to challenge our own morality through film."

"This evening Thierry Fremaux introduced the jurors, but it was Steve McQueen who had the last word before the lights went out:
“Thank you very much for coming this evening. Cinema for me was all about when I was sitting in the audience as a child growing up. It was all about reflection, reflection not just in time, but in some ways what I wanted the screen to be, in a way - a huge mirror reflecting “us” in that screen.
I always saw myself in the motion pictures made in Turkey, France, Japan or wherever. So I hope you enjoy it and thank you very much."

Camera d'Or on 25 May 2008

Director Bruno Drumond, President of the Camera d’Or Jury, along with Dennis Hopper, awarded the Camera d’Or to "Hunger" by Steve McQueen presented in Un Certain Regard.
Mr. McQueen responded: "I want to say thank you to the Jury and to the decision-making, and also, it’s one of my great pleasures to receive this from one of my personal heroes, Dennis Hopper. He’s a man who takes chances and I respect that very much. My film “Hunger” was about the troubles in Nothern Ireland during the 1981 hunger strikes. Within the prison, there were prison officers who I identify with and protestors who I identify with. The film is about people in a situation and what these people do. Thank you very much."