James Nunn’s latest film pits angry hippo against day-tripping tourists
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The Louisiana bayous can be dangerous places filled with all manner of critters that can kill you.
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With his new horror film Hungry, filmmaker James Nunn makes the bayou even more frightening by releasing a very angry Volkswagen-van-sized hippo into its murky waters.
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Yes, you read that right, a hippo.
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Out on video on demand on June 23, Hungry follows a small group of tourists whose day trip turns into a brutal fight for survival as a very determined and territorial hippo takes umbrage at them. Hippos, for the record, are one of nature’s deadliest mammals and are responsible for hundreds of human deaths every year in Africa.
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“The only cute hippo is a dead hippo,” says Walker (Joaquim de Almeida) in the film after a few of the tour guests come upon a huge hippo skull stored in a room at the bayou tour facility he runs.
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Placing a wild hippo in a bayou, it turns out, wasn’t an idea unique to Nunn’s imagination.
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Sun Spots
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Early last century, an unrealized U.S. congressional proposal sought to import and farm African hippos in the Louisiana swamps. The pro-hippo folks argued the animals would eat invasive water hyacinths as well be a source of low-cost protein as the country was having a meat shortage. President Theodore Roosevelt was a supporter of the plan that could supply “lake cow bacon.”
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“I actually didn’t even properly know that was a true story until we’ve shot the scene with Joaquin, where he says it,” said Vancouver actor Samantha Coughlan about the scene where de Almeida’s character explains the hippo-importing plan.
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“I remember on the day I was like, ‘is that real?’ And they’re like, yeah, it’s real.”
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Soon after Walker’s foreshadowing, the group heads into the bayou and faster than you can say ‘what could bite a 12-foot alligator in half?’ the angry hippo shows up.
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Coughlan plays Sally, a middle-aged woman who has gone on the excursion with her father and her teenage son (played by Vancouver’s River Codack). She said the set they shot on in Malta in 2024 blew her mind.
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“It was so freaking cool. It felt like we were on the bayou,” Coughlan, who is also in Nunn’s upcoming feature One Last shot, said about the swamp set the production built on the island country in the Mediterranean. “It was hot, it was sticky, it was huge.”
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Part animatronic and part computer generated, and fully frightening, the hippo gives off a bit of a Jaws vibe as it disappears into the murky waters leaving the viewer to wonder when and where it is going to pop up next.
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“We got to meet Nancy the first day, which was sort of like a head,” said Coughlan about the animatronic animal that was operated by divers in the water.
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Coughlan is known for projects including The Gorge (starring Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy), Arcadian (starring Nicolas Cage), and Damaged (starring Samuel L. Jackson), and is also a busy voice-over artist who has worked across film, gaming, animation and commercials.
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Born in Vancouver, Coughlan went to New York to study before heading to London in her early 20s to work in theatre. There, she co-founded a theatre company and worked a lot, including a role in Death of a Salesman (the one starring Brian Dennehy) and stints as an understudy for actresses Elizabeth Moss, Kiera Knightly and Alicia Witt.
