“Hunt” is as about as dark and despondent as imaginable. Shot in late autumn in sombre hues and occasional in and out focus camerawork it weighs the viewer down with depressive weight and there is nowhere to go but down.
Yiannis (Giannis Belis) is a hunter of fowl and he smokes as if in a suicidal quest. The film opens with him hunting in the woods and then attending his mother’s funeral in a small Greek hillside village. He returns to his flat in an urban area of Greece to his metal work job. In a sombre dilapidated work setting he welds, smokes and coughs.
His next-door neighbor, Elias is a night watchman with a dog that continually howls and whines and despite the complaints lodged by Yiannis to Elias continues to abuse his dog. Yiannis exhibits compassion toward the forlorn canine by feeding it through an opening in a balcony adjacent to Elias’ and stroking its head and paws and speaking gently to it augmenting the rage of Elias resulting in a threat to “fuck up” Yiannis if he continues.
Yiannis expresses guilt to the owner of the metal works he had not visited his mother frequently enough and it is eating him up. Then a problem is raised by Kyriakos, Yiannis’ notary about his inheritance that will cost thousands of Euros to rectify. He makes an error in preparing an order for a major customer. His coughing worsens yet the cigarettes never stop. And he has a crush on the bakery lady, makes a piece of jewellery for her but hasn’t the courage to express his affection by giving it to her. A lonely old man perhaps knowingly dying.
He has recurring dreams of a man trudging in the heat across salt flats and flashes of his mother in the coffin. He suspects Kryiakos, his notary is swindling him. And one day while hunting with a bird in his sights he fails to pull the trigger. One afternoon during his meal the dog continues his whining, and Yiannis pounds on the door and is hurled abuse by Elias.
Matters have gone as far as patience and a shattered mental health can endure. The dog finds a loving home with the son of his boss. Cruelty to an animal has ended. Moral justice is served.
Watch the film if you are prepared for a dark journey.
The director is Christos Pitharas.
Watch the trailer here https://www.youtube.com/embed/s0x32PLVMT4
RKS 2024 Film Rating 92/100.
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