Pig (2021)

Michael Sarnoski’s Pig stuck with me long after the credits rolled. It’s a movie best viewed without any preconceptions. All I knew going in was that Nicolas Cage stars as a truffle forager who uses a pig to find the savory fungi in the Oregon wilderness. When the pig is kidnapped, he goes looking for her in the big city. And, honestly, that’s all you should know going into it as well.

I typically try not to include spoilers in my reviews. Aside from details already given away in trailers or promotional material, I tend to leave out plot points in my summary of a movie’s story-line. I will try to leave out as much detail as I can in this review but it will be difficult to express my feelings about the film without revealing a little more than I’d like. So, if you’d prefer not to know too much, you can stop reading after the following sentence: Pig is a quiet, thought-provoking, and subversive film that features one of Nicolas Cage’s best performances in years.

If you’re still reading, you’ve either seen the film or don’t care about my revealing too much. I’ll still tread lightly around the plot-line.

What I enjoyed most about Pig is the way it — much like Cage’s character, Rob — doesn’t really care about your opinion of how things are supposed to be. In this world, things just are the way they are. If you go in with the idea that Cage is going to go full-on John Wick to get his pig back, you’re going to be sorely disappointed. And, yet, the movie doesn’t really build this expectation into its plot. The viewer might expect that because of Cage’s previous body of work coupled with his outward appearance in the film.

In other roles, Cage can (and frequently does) explode without much provocation. As Rob, the truffle farmer, he is more focused than furious. More zen than zany. We know he’s lost a woman who was close to him. However, we don’t know the circumstances. We know he’s hurting and the loss of the pig just adds to that pain. If this was the typical Nicolas Cage role, he’d reach his boiling point and unleash hell. That does not happen. At least not in the visceral sense. What does happen takes the action hero motif and stands it on its head.

Rob isn’t alone in his journey to find his pig. He’s aided by his main customer, Amir (Alex Wolff,) who has his own particular path to follow. Adam Arkin, in a small but pivotal role, is a menacing landmark of sorts on both of their quests.

Aided by a sparse, folksy score by Alexis Grapsas and Philip Klein and Pat Scola’s brooding cinematography, Pig feels as far away from big, blockbuster films as possible. Some may find it boring or slow. Those will be the people that expect it to be an action-packed revenge flick. Much of what you’ll get out of Pig will be the inverse of what you bring to it. And I think that’s why I enjoyed it so much.