An overweight teen is bullied by a clique of cool girls poolside while holidaying in her village. The long walk home will change the rest of her life.
What are the conditions that give rise to a slasher? It varies from film to film, but something they often share is a status of victimhood. Usually, we’re granted that backstory as a reveal in the film’s final third. That trauma they experienced gives them their preternatural abilities and motivates them to hunt down other teens, bullies, cops, and enemies from their deep past. The actual backstory might take only a few minutes onscreen; it’s not the film’s focus. “Piggy,” from director Carlota Pereda, preoccupies itself entirely with that backstory. It delves deep into the limits of our empathy and shows us where a monster might come from. “Piggy” looks at vicious teens and serial killers and asks us: Who’s the real monster?
Laura Galán plays Sara, the titular protagonist. Local teenage girls Maca, Claudia, and Roci bully Sara for her plus-sized body and family butcher shop. They label her cerdita, or ‘Piggy.’ When an unknown man witnesses the terrible bullying, he kidnaps the three. Sara, on her way home, discovers he’s kidnapped her tormentors. In a moment of panic, she lets him go and ignites a spark in this killer’s heart that motivates him to protect her from any and all bullies (of which there are many in this sleepy Spanish villa.) As bodies pile up and questions put Sara front and center, she must decide whether to save the girls or let the townsfolk feel her pent-up wrath.
As writer and director, what Pereda does so perfectly well is to give us the exact kind of mother-daughter relationship that explains our heroine Sara perfectly. Trapped with a shrew of a mom and a hen-pecked father, Sara’s relationship with her body hinges entirely on control. From the beginning, we see her as an outsider to her peers. The cool girls are all traveling down to the swimming spot. They post photos of Sara sitting dutifully at her father’s butcher shop counter, online labeling the entire family as piggies. It’s the kind of pain and remorse we see fueling Sara’s quiet behavior. Still, when her mother needles her over starting a diet, Sara’s shame becomes clearer and clearer. It’s a perfectly poised relationship that’s truthful to Sara as a character and her community.
The largesse of the film follows Sara’s efforts to both cover up a kidnapping and also maintain what little control she has. Her hero, a gruff Ben Foster lookalike played by Richard Holmes, bears little intelligence from what we see. His infantile attachment to Sara drags her deeper into the conspiracy to hide his murders. In a small town, everyone knows everything, so Sara’s efforts to keep herself out of this only force a comedy of ever-increasing errors that can’t be fixed. Its focus on where Sara sits, morally, never wavers, and might be this movie’s greatest strong suit.
Galan’s performance might come across as subdued, but what teenage victim hasn’t been permanently muted due to unforeseen factors? She grows with the character, and no moment feels outsized for such a professional. It’s a physically demanding movie, so Galan pulls off every aspect deftly with just the right twist of tear or prolonged eye contact. We sympathize with Sara even as she hides evidence, lies to the police, and cries under interrogation. She’s a leaf blown about in a maelstrom nobody could’ve predicted. It’s a delight to watch her.
The rest of the movie’s cast feels remarkably well-rounded. Irene Ferreiro, Claudia Salas, and Camille Aguilar wield their mean girls’ bully personalities like sharpened knives. They’re juicy roles for the young actresses who make a meal of it. Julián Valcárcel dotes on his daughter as the dopey dad. Fernando Delgado-Hierro makes a convincing rookie police officer. He’s the only one putting anything together in this film, and even then, it’s too late. Lastly, Carmen Machi takes the cake. Her performance as Sara’s mother makes her truly the cornerstone on which the movie was built. She can portray aspects of the same emotion. Her defending her daughter can just as quickly turn around and prick Sara about lying to the police. Machi holds this film together by being the all-important emotional glue to Sara’s shattered Chinese vase.
Of course, this movie is a horror, and we’d be neglected as an audience if we didn’t see some blood. Make no mistake; this movie earns its violence. Nothing ever comes up out of the blue. When the Stalker murders another of Sara’s bullies, it’s in a classic horror movie style with knife raised and blood splattered. The final thirty minutes include a chase scene through rusted pig pens. Someone’s hand gets blown clean off. It’s not gratuitous or delighting in its violence. Every beat serves the larger story at hand.
“Piggy,” asks some hard questions and delivers mixed answers. Still, no revenge film is perfect, and a slasher-revenge duo that manages to retain its moral center while making us sympathize with a potential murderer must be pulling off some hat trick. It grips you right from the start, but ever after, it holds you in place, the threat of danger right around the corner. It’s a delightful film with solid performances. It places the vengeful slasher’s quest front and center and makes us empathize with a monster. I loved “Piggy” and recommend everyone go check it out!
Now Playing in Select Theaters and on Video-On-Demand
