Duran Duran - Hungry Like The Wolf

What this video is

Released in May 1982 as the lead single from Duran Duran's second album Rio, 'Hungry Like the Wolf' arrived at the precise moment MTV was seeking visually ambitious content to fill its nascent programming schedule. The video's cinematic production — shot on location in Sri Lanka at a then-remarkable budget — stood in stark contrast to the static performance clips dominating the format. Its heavy rotation on MTV…

Why it matters

A canonical document of the New Romantic / New Wave movement and a primary exhibit in the history of the music video as an art form and commercial vehicle. The video demonstrated that short-form promotional clips could sustain genuine narrative cinema grammar — chase sequences, parallel editing,…

The director

Australian-born music video director and filmmaker, widely regarded as one of the most influential directors of the early MTV era. Directed the very first video aired by MTV — The Buggles' 'Video Killed the Radio Star' — and became Duran Duran's primary…