Pig

The story of a man and his pig becomes an exploration about the toll of male emotional avoidance with one of the great Nicolas Cage performances.

As far as bare bone plots go, it doesn’t get much barer or to the bone than Pig, the directorial debut of writer/director Michael Sarnoski. Nicolas Cage plays Rob, a man who lives in an isolated cabin in the woods with his beloved truffle pig. When his prized porker is stolen and he’s beaten unconscious, Rob recruits his yuppie truffle dealer Amir (Alex Wolff) and sets off on a quest to get her back. On the surface it’s easy to think ‘John Wick (2014) with a pig’ but this charming and surprisingly emotional film is so much more than that.

The subtle screenplay subverts the tropes of the man on a mission sub-genre, instead offering a treatise on loss and redemption. Cage is a famously unrestrained performer and this is his most restrained performance in years. It also makes it one of his best. It can’t be understated what a great scene partner Wolff is and together, they perform an intricate dance as they navigate their way through the underbelly of Portland’s fine dining culture. A stirring exploration of sense and memory, more than anything Pig asks the audience to wonder how many of the world’s problems could be solved by men going to therapy.

– Maria Lewis, Assistant Film Curator