Pig created quite the stir this year. With its strange premise: Nicolas Cage plays a hermit in the woods who is forced out of hiding to recoup a stolen truffle-hunting pig, one may expect from the trailer they are getting John Wick meets Tarantino, but in Portland. But Pig is much more than that. It’s an unexpected film about loss, grief, and the enduring power of the kindness of sharing a meal. After making Barack Obama’s top movies of the year, it’s also a must-watch.

Here’re your five screenwriting takeaways from Pig.

1. An unexpected hero.  To say Nicolas Cage’s Rob is an underdog is an understatement. The man lives in a bare-bones cabin and interacts with almost no one. His happiness comes in the form of a simple life; his sole conversation partners are his pig and a young man who deals in selling the truffles his pig finds. That said, from frame one, Rob is a man you root for. Cage is more understated than usual here, more soulful. Nonetheless, his rage bubbles to the surface when needed, while the softer side of him is often laid bare in unexpected moments. Also hearing Cage utter: ‘I do not fuck my pig’ alone is worth the watch.

2. Portland’s culinary underground.  The restaurant world of Portland is a rich setting for one Rob has abandoned. There is a literal fight club amongst chefs, wait staff, and investors. It seems to be a group of people who harbor secrets and are constantly looking for some kind of escape, whether with good food and drink, or simply a good slap in the face. Maybe it’s because the job can take so much from you. Whatever the reason, it’s clear Cage’s Rob lost a lot while a slave to his business, albeit a successful one. When he states he’s never forgotten a single person he served, one believes him, and sees the toll it's taken on him all at once. 

3. Unlikely duo.  Rob's foil Amir (Alex Wolff) is in his own throes of grief, as his father hides away his ailing mother in a hospital in the wake of a suicide attempt. Amir is living in the shadow of his more successful father who seems determined to prove to Amir that the restaurant business is no life for him. Nevertheless, when Amir and Rob team up to find Rob’s pig, it’s impossible not to root for the underdogs who have lived life on the fringes possibly to their own detriments. The odd couple are infinitely watchable: A young man who thinks he treasures his Corvette but longs for Rob’s ability to find peace with very little. 

4. A scene for the sake of a scene.  In screenwriting, writers are often instructed that every scene must be full of conflict and drive and purpose. If it’s not moving the movie forward, cut it. But every once in a while, there’s a scene that is not centric to the story. One could easily cut it and the film could still function, but it’s such a lovely surprise and a quiet moment in chaos, and an excellent character study piece, that the audience may be less moved without it. This movie has one such scene between a little boy and Nicolas Cage musing philosophically and it’s so pitch-perfect that sometimes one should also know when to throw screenwriting rules out the window. 

5. More questions than answers.  In another break-the-rules move, this film presents more questions than answers. Wounded men are at the core of the film. They are united by heartbreak, something each of them understands so acutely that one bite of food evoking a strong enough memory can break each of them wide open. But sometimes that’s enough and questions don’t need to be answered if the theme is presented in such a beguiling way that the audience can’t stop watching, regardless, and draw their own conclusions. 

Final Takeaway: Pig is a gem of a movie that seems to fit into the canon of 2022 excellent filmmaking about "lost" people looking to get found, if only for a moment. In a time when too many people are disappearing, it feels right to remember what it feels like to care too much, even if what you care about is a truffle pig.