Review of Hunger, directed by Sitisiri Mongkolsiri

I don’t know how I originally found out about this movie, but when I saw it on Netflix one day I nodded and realized had seen it before on the vast world of the Internet. One of the greater tragedies for me personally has been the lack of Thai movies I’ve watched, although the one movie I had seen in the past was really, really good.

I one day had watched Bad Genius on a whim and thought it was well-done, told myself that I should watch more Thai movies, and then never did. But Hunger was right up my alley when I read the synopsis, especially considering I’m obsessed with food and what it takes to get it to the table.

Imagine my surprise when I pressed play and realized the lead actress was the main character from Bad Genius. She looks a little older, which makes sense considering it’s been some years since that released, but she still has that charm from the previous movie, even though she plays a completely different kind of character in Hunger.

Onwards with the review!

Aoy is recruited from her family’s noodle shop to work in fine dining.

The main character in Hunger is Aoy, who works at her father’s noodle shop with her siblings. In the beginning, she seems a bit miserable with her job there, and doesn’t seem very happy with what’s she is doing,

But an anomaly happens one day: a well-dressed man comes into the shop, and after eating her noodles, he hands her a business card. It seems he thinks that her talents would be wasted at a quick stop people go to for cheap food, but at first it comes across that she doesn’t care.

She ends up going to the audition of sorts, where it’s another chef with a traditional culinary education. They are asked to make fried rice, and from the get-go it becomes obvious that Aoy’s technique is amateur.

The head chef dismisses the other guy and says that people with high educations have no imagination.

Aoy ends up being offered a spot on the team after he asks her whether she knows how to make food with flames, but from her time there at the beginning she realizes the head chef has anger problems.

Her skill level is not also up to par for his standards, especially when the group needs to cater an event for a high-ranking Thai official. The cut of meat he asked for is expensive and must be sliced thinly, so if she doesn’t time the char perfectly, the meat smokes and burns.

Which is what she does at the test kitchen, and she refuses to accept defeat. She ends up staying all night to figure out how to cook it properly and does it perfectly at the event.

One of the other chefs tries to engage in a romantic relationship with her, one that helped her out in the beginning. The situation worsens for those involved with the kitchen, as the head chef’s temper increasingly gets worse.

He curses out one of the other chefs for smoking in the kitchen and forces him to drink a soup with the cigarette put inside of it, but then when Aoy and the other chef have a date, she later realizes he stole expensive meat from the kitchen.

Another chef takes the blame and is kicked out of the team, told he will no longer have a career. Later on, another chef is dismissed. At home, Aoy’s father collapses and her family asks her to return to the noodle shop.

Aoy does eventually leave and joins another rising kitchen, where she becomes well known for utilizing flames as her technique. Her team gets hired to do an event with her former chef, who thinks of her as nothing.

At the event, a live video is broadcasted ruining her former boss’ reputation; previously in the movie, they ventured into the forests protected by the government and killed a local bird, which is very illegal.

He is arrested publicly, and Aoy finds the entire act disgusting. She ends up quitting and going back to the noodle shop, which is where the movie ends.

Overall Thoughts

One of the more interesting aspects of this movie tends to be the fact how it toes the line between socioeconomic classes. Aoy is intended to be a character who crosses over, as she was literally working at a noodle shop for locals before attending all of these fine dining events for Thailand’s elite.

There are specific shots to imply that the rich are like eating blood at times, and it really begins to hit her after the one family she fed ends up dead—the father murders his daughter and wife before committing suicide.

I think the movie really nails in the fact that Aoy is an interloper to all of this from the beginning, but the commentary feels like it’s becoming two different movies. It doesn’t do enough to sustain the current narrative in this form, which makes the final arcs become a drag as it sluggishly goes towards the end.

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