NYFF: Steve McQueen Talks ‘Hunger’

No, not Steve McQueen the one-note tough guy ’60s/’70s action star, Steve McQueen the British Turner Prize-winning visual artist turned filmmaker whose debut film, “Hunger,” is an astonishing first film full of lyricism and hard-to-watch harrowing brutality. “Hunger” follows life in the Maze Prison, Northern Ireland with an interpretation of the highly emotive events surrounding the 1981 IRA Hunger Strike, led by Bobby Sands (Michael Fassbender, who puts in an amazing performance). McQueen said he was 11 years old when the Sands hunger strike happened, but the even was unforgettable. “It was one of those moments where things just stick in your head — an event where it sort of resonates.”