- Release year: 2025
- Director: György Pálfi.
- Producers: Martin Hampel, Thanassis Karathanos, Giorgos Kyriakos, Kostas Lambropoulos, and Effie Skrobolas.
- Screenplay by: György Pálfi and Zsófia Ruttkay.
- Cinematography by: Giorgos Karvelas.
- Music by: Szabolcs Szõke.
Synopsis: the adventures of a hen, from the moment she’s born to her attempts at having chicks.
Shotgun Commentary: the craziest, most original and bewildering movie of 2025.
Review
Hen (original title: Kota) is a Greek drama/comedy/thriller/horror movie that, against all odds, manages to deliver an absolutely flawless story. The fact that anyone managed to shoot the adventures of a chicken with no CGI is the kind of achievement that restores your faith in humanity. Space has its Artemis crew; cinema has the Hen crew. You can now enjoy this insanely great film at Dunoon Film Festival (8th–10th of May), where it will be screened along with lots of other wonderful projects. More on that after the review!
The feature, as previously stated, follows…a hen. Well, technically, one hen played by eight hens: Eszti, Szandi, Feri, Enci, Enikő, Nóra, and Anett. Each of the hens was trained to do specific actions depending on their abilities and strengths (running, flapping, close-ups…), so no CGI was used, which is an impressive feat on its own. However, that is not the end of it; the story told is actually engaging as hell, and there are many reasons for this.
The stress of living
Firstly, the narrative. We follow the hen from the moment of conception on a farm all the way until she is grown, when she is discarded, probably because she is black (there are no other differences between her and the other hens). Instead of being given to “the boss”, she is taken by a worker with the intention to make her into soup.
This segment is not that long, but it is probably among the most stressful parts of the film. For anyone who knows what tends to happen to chicks on farms, watching the fluffy babies being thrashed around from box to box by conveyor belts and other mechanical contraptions feels suffocating. You are waiting for them to die horribly, which, thankfully, does not happen. Not on screen, anyway.
Later she goes on a road trip of sorts and gets stalked by a fox in a gas station, Night of the Hunter (2023) style. She survives and eventually ends up in a restaurant where lots of shady things are happening. We will not get into details so as not to spoil the crux of the feature.
Putting yourself in the… chicken feet?
Throughout this whole ordeal, you would never be able to tell that it is eight hens and not one that you are seeing on screen. This is largely thanks to the trainers who taught the hens but also due to the second reason I want to bring forth: the cinematography. This aspect is almost as relevant as the story itself, if not more.
The camera is often positioned at chicken height in order to create a more immersive experience for the audience. This height forces you to adopt the hen’s perspective throughout most of the film, which intensifies the feeling of threat, fear and helplessness that viewers experience over moments that would not have felt nearly as huge had they been shot from the POV of the humans on the scene.
All in all, Hen is the ultimate display of 2025 talent. It is an absolute miracle that a project as daring as this is so successful in its delivery. The future of cinema shines bright thanks to filmmakers like Palfi.
You can now enjoy this fantastic piece at Dunoon Film Festival, running from the 8th of May to the 10th. Hen will be screened on Saturday the 9th at 14:00 at Studio Cinema Dunoon.
MORE INFO ON THE SCREENING, EVENT, AND TICKETS HERE!
Advice to take from this movie:
- If your hen keeps escaping the coop… just let it.
- Sometimes you just need to run about with a box in your head, and that’s fine.
- Chicks have a tough life. Respect chicks.
What’s your take? Have you watched Hen? Don’t hesitate to let me know your thoughts in the comments section below, or leave a message on my contact page! For more reviews and cinema-related articles, check out the rest of my blog! 😀