Pig (2021)

I appreciate people who avoid trailers or reading reviews (and can easily skip reading this); the idea of taking a movie in without preconceptions, expectations or spoilers is like the pure film viewing experience. But I can’t help myself – I like watching trailers, I like reading advance reviews, probably to my detriment. So it was with Pig (2021). I loved the trailer – the set-up of a crusty Nicolas Cage (who I love as an actor) on the pursuit of a truffle-hunting pig that was stolen from him – and how the trailer didn’t exactly spell out if this was a revenge movie or a horror movie somehow. If you read enough about it (like this very review), you’ll know that it subverts expectations and promises genre thrills, but is a bait and switch in terms of what type of movie it is. I liked Pig and Cage is great, responding to the material and direction by giving a restrained performance that is all about stillness and stoicism, mainly letting the blood and bruises on his face do the work (which the character has no desire to clean up). In the end, I felt the movie was a bit prescriptive; I know the writing intentionally leaves things open and not everything is explained, but it still felt a bit thin. I wanted a bit more depth or just messiness, something along the lines of David Gordon Green’s indie film with Cage, Joe. There’s a great scene in a nouveau restaurant that feels like an inverse of the diner scene in Mulholland Drive, a scene that develops into a dream or a nightmare, that’s just rightly played and delivered. I wish the film had developed more in that vein or was a bit thornier and either even more grounded and realistic or stranger and surreal in its eventual theme. Feels like it takes it down the middle of the road tonally. Supporting actors Alex Wolff, Adam Arkin and David Knell are all good. Anyway, Pig is out in cinemas now. Second best movie where Cage lives out in the woods after Mandy (which is one of my all time favourite movies) – hopefully he can add a few more entries to this sub-sub-genre. Recommended, if slightly underwhelming to me.