David Farnor | On 26, Aug 2021

Director: Michael Sarnoski
Cast: Nicolas Cage, Alex Wolff
Certificate: 15

Taken but with a pig. John Wick with truffles. That’s what you expect when you hear the premise of Pig, Nicolas Cage’s latest film. He plays Robin, a once-famous chef who has since withdrawn from the high-dining scene in Portland, Oregon, to live out his days in a cabin in the woods. His only company? A pig, with whom he hunts for truffles. Their only contact with the outside world comes in the form of Amir (Alex Wolff), who visits weekly to buy their truffley wares and take them into the city, where he sells them to restaurants seeking the desirable local ingredient.

Then, one day, his pig is taken. Pignapped. And so he has to venture back into the world he has left behind to reclaim his beloved companion. But where you might expect an all-out, brawling saga for retribution, Pig surprises by being closer to Saturday Morning Kitchen than Kill Bill. Writer-director Michael Sarnoski, making a distinctive feature directorial debut, keeps things decidedly low-key digging through the grubbiness of retribution and unearthing a poignant, moving tale of loss and love.

That’s done artfully through a string of low-key moments of exposition, as the John Wick-style reputation that surrounds Rob’s mythical outsider is gradually rounded out with his real, tragic backstory. The set pieces, rather than shootouts are punch-ups are meals, whether that’s an intimidating interrogation in the midst of well-off foodies – mildly unnerved by the presence of Cage’s bedraggled, bearded, bloodied interloper – or a quiet feast whipped up in a kitchen for two. Pig’s strength is that it understands the alchemy, the intimacy, the social ritual of sitting down to eat with someone and treats it with a respect normally reserved for Studio Ghibli and the films of Hirokazu Kore-eda. The cooking scenes we witness are as liable to tug on your heartstrings as tease your appetite.

The key ingredient to this bewitching concoction is Nicolas Cage, who delivers his quietest and most moving turn since David Gordon Green’s Joe in 2013. Hiding behind straggled facial hear and dishevelled clothes, he serves up a haunted, soulful sense of grief with heartfelt perfection. If the actor has, in more recent years, become mostly known for his larger-than-life screen presence, he brings that same sincere, earnest commitment to the material to this introspective character study. Whether he’s burrowing by trees or holding a frying pan, it’s a treat to see a maestro in action – this is slow-cooked cinema that’s worth savouring.

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