Ravenous (1999)

Directed by

Antonia Bird

Genre

horror film, cannibal film, thriller film, comedy thriller

Country

Czech Republic, United Kingdom, Mexico, United States

Runtime

1h 40m

Rated

R

Rating

6.8 of 10 from 699 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

A 19th century US Army captain is sent to a remote mountain fort. He and the other soldiers encounter a mysterious man who has survived an ordeal in the snow. The stranger brings news of a hidden camp and stories of cannibalism that soon test the men's sanity and survival.

bleakdarkly comictensegrislyslow-buildingunsettlingsurrealgallows-humoredatmospheric

What happens

Ravenous is a 1999 black comedy horror film directed by Antonia Bird and written by Ted Griffin. Set in the 1840s, the film stars Guy Pearce as John Boyd, a US Army captain who is exiled to a remote military outpost in the Sierra Nevadas, where he and his colleagues encounter a sadistic cannibal, played by Robert Carlyle. The film also stars Jeffrey Jones, David Arquette, Jeremy Davies, Stephen Spinella, Neal McDonough, and John Spencer in his final film role. Griffin's screenplay combines elements from the Donner Party and that of Alfred Packer, the real-life "Colorado Cannibal" who survived by eating five companions after becoming snowbound in the San Juan Mountains in the 1870s. An international co-production between United Kingdom, United States and Mexico, Ravenous had a troubled production history. Issues over budget and shooting schedules were still ongoing when filming was about to start in Slovakia. After the original director Milcho Manchevski was fired three weeks into production, he was replaced by Bird at the suggestion of Carlyle. The score was composed by Michael Nyman and Damon Albarn, who used period-accurate instruments and utilized several minimal music techniques. Released by 20th Century Fox in the spring of 1999, Ravenous was a box-office bomb, grossing $2 million against a $12 million budget. However, despite initial reception being mixed when released, it has since garnered a reputation as a cult film. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

Trailer

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