We’ve had plenty of animal attack movies over the years. Of course, Jaws is the granddaddy of killer sharks, spawning dozens of knockoffs of all budgets and nationalities (for this writer, the Italian ones are a real pleasure). You’ve got your crocs and alligators (Crawl being a notable recent example). We’ve had bugs, spiders, snakes, rats — hell, technically even the Jurassic Parks count. And if you haven’t seen 1984’s Wild Beasts, it’s time. In that film, PCP gets into the water supply at the local zoo, and a literal menagerie of animals attacks an airport and a mall and a ballet school and a slaughterhouse. Fun movie.
The point is that the framework for these stories is sturdy. You strand some people in a remote place with an angry critter, and then you watch them get eaten. Although of course execution-dependent on a case by case basis, the real novelty comes in the film’s choice of said angry critter. Which brings us to Hungry. With a title that is clearly a pun on the famous ’80s board game Hungry Hungry Hippos, it’s not hard to guess that, yes indeed, this is a killer hippopotamus movie. It’s possible that there have been previous ones, but none that this writer can think think of. And regardless, what’s important here is that the hippo lives up to the film’s title.
Of course, there’s a perfunctory plot upon which to hang the river horse mayhem to follow. After being unceremoniously fired by her crappy boss, Sistine (Madison Davenport) and her bestie Hannah (Olivia Bernstone) book a trip to New Orleans to party themselves silly. As part of the fun, Hannah books them on a bayou tour for a little alligator sightseeing. But when the gators fail to appear, the boat captain goes off course to more rarified territory — always a good plan — where the boat is attacked and capsized by our big hungry boy. All the other tourists on board are broadly sketched, possessing just enough personality and potential pathos to make it satisfying when they get chomped. Sorry, nervous lady, you’re not going to make it home to your kids.
If this all sounds very silly, that’s because it obviously is. Then again, you could play this exact same scenario for laughs and get absolutely nothing out of it — director James Nunn’s choice to play the material almost entirely straight is the film’s salvation. The hippo VFX, meanwhile, are a mixed bag, which is to be expected at this budget level; if that doesn’t quite excuse the sometimes lesser quality, it at least means the dodgy parts are easy to overlook. But Hungry is sort of summed up by its MVP, old-school character actor Joaquim de Almeida (Clear and Present Danger, Desperado) as a grizzled hunter named Walker, who is introduced growling: “The only good hippo is a dead hippo!” There you have it.
DIRECTOR: James Nunn; CAST: Madison Davenport, Tracey Bonner, Joaquim de Almeida, Michel Curiel; DISTRIBUTOR: Aura Entertainment; IN THEATERS: June 7; STREAMING: June 23; RUNTIME: 1 hr. 30 min.
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