The sweltering heat of summer in a small town hangs thick in the air in “Piggy,” the blistering feature debut from Spanish filmmaker Carlota Pereda. Part coming-of-age romance, part psychological body horror, “Piggy” firmly establishes Pereda as a bold new voice in feminist horror — that recently flourishing sub-genre popularized by the likes of Julia Ducournau, Ana Lily Amirpour, and Jennifer Reeder.
Aided by a dynamite performance from newcomer Laura Galán, As body shame and self-loathing morph into a disturbing complicity with violence, “Piggy” pushes the torments of youth to their naturally wicked ends. The film’s most brilliant trick is to mire the audience in the twisted moral dilemma with which its protagonist is grappling, taunting us with the question: What would you have done differently?
Loading its resonant title with double meaning, “Piggy” opens in a butcher shop. The opening frames include a whole pig hanging from a meat...
Aided by a dynamite performance from newcomer Laura Galán, As body shame and self-loathing morph into a disturbing complicity with violence, “Piggy” pushes the torments of youth to their naturally wicked ends. The film’s most brilliant trick is to mire the audience in the twisted moral dilemma with which its protagonist is grappling, taunting us with the question: What would you have done differently?
Loading its resonant title with double meaning, “Piggy” opens in a butcher shop. The opening frames include a whole pig hanging from a meat...
- 10/14/2022
- by Jude Dry
- Indiewire
Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.
Center Stage (Stanley Kwan)
Following her breakout with Jackie Chan in Police Story and before her iconic roles in the films of Wong Kar-wai and Olivier Assayas, Maggie Cheung delivered one of the best performances of her career in Stanley Kwan’s lush, definitive, and boldly conceived biopic Center Stage, also known as Actress. Now gorgeously restored in 4K from the original negative, and approved by Kwan himself, the film follows Cheung as iconic silent film star Ruan Lingyu, who committed suicide at the age of 24 in 1935 after a tumultuous private life that was frequent fodder for the vicious Shanghai tabloids—and began to mirror the melodramas that brought her fame. With Cheung receiving the Best Actress award at Berlinale, the film...
Center Stage (Stanley Kwan)
Following her breakout with Jackie Chan in Police Story and before her iconic roles in the films of Wong Kar-wai and Olivier Assayas, Maggie Cheung delivered one of the best performances of her career in Stanley Kwan’s lush, definitive, and boldly conceived biopic Center Stage, also known as Actress. Now gorgeously restored in 4K from the original negative, and approved by Kwan himself, the film follows Cheung as iconic silent film star Ruan Lingyu, who committed suicide at the age of 24 in 1935 after a tumultuous private life that was frequent fodder for the vicious Shanghai tabloids—and began to mirror the melodramas that brought her fame. With Cheung receiving the Best Actress award at Berlinale, the film...
- 10/14/2022
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Today Focus Features opens Tár, the strikingly original return of Todd Field, in four locations in NY and LA. The film premiered at Venice winning star Cate Blanchett Best Actress as musician and conductor Lydia Tár. Early this week, it seemed to mesmerize a sold-out Alice Tully Hall at the New York Film Festival.
A 97 with critics on Rotten Tomatoes, Deadline’s review here called Field’s first film since Little Children 16 years ago, a “daring and quite comprehensive immersion in a rarified world [that] features a lead performance the likes of which doesn’t come along very often.” Field wrote the part for Blanchett but at an NYFF Q&a he said he waited to send her the script until it was done and Focus chairman Peter Kujawski “asked me, ‘Who do you have in mind?’ I said I was still thinking about it. Because I was superstitious. That she would say no.
A 97 with critics on Rotten Tomatoes, Deadline’s review here called Field’s first film since Little Children 16 years ago, a “daring and quite comprehensive immersion in a rarified world [that] features a lead performance the likes of which doesn’t come along very often.” Field wrote the part for Blanchett but at an NYFF Q&a he said he waited to send her the script until it was done and Focus chairman Peter Kujawski “asked me, ‘Who do you have in mind?’ I said I was still thinking about it. Because I was superstitious. That she would say no.
- 10/7/2022
- by Jill Goldsmith
- Deadline Film + TV
There’s a reason Carlota Pereda films Sara (Laura Galán) urinating through her clothes as an old friend (Irene Ferreiro’s Claudia), who’s drifted away towards the clique that bullies her, puts a bloody hand on the back window of a serial killer’s van while screaming for help. We need to understand her fear. Just because Sara is a teenager who’s been brutally victimized by an entire town of peers doesn’t mean she’s measuring the situation and deciding to let Claudia, Maca (Claudia Salas), and Roci (Camille Aguilar) die. She’s afraid for her own life. What if she tries to save them and the killer (Richard Holmes) watching from the driver’s seat simply throws her in the back? So she freezes. And, to her surprise, he helps her instead.
Therein lies the complexity of Piggy, a feature expansion of Pereda’s short film of the same name.
Therein lies the complexity of Piggy, a feature expansion of Pereda’s short film of the same name.
- 10/4/2022
- by Jared Mobarak
- The Film Stage
A premiere at Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, Carlota Pereda’s Piggy takes a Carrie-esque look at fighting back at bullies with a horror twist. Set in rural Spain, the film follows Sara, a teenager who is subject to ruthlessly bullying. Her day finally comes when she witnesses her tormentors being kidnapped and the story gets darker from there, to say the least. Ahead of an October release, the first trailer has now arrived.
During the sweltering summertime of rural Spain, Sara carries an extra load of teenage agony due to the perpetual bullying from her peers. She’s also an outsider at home—her parents and little brother just don’t understand her—so, feelings internalized, she’s often found buried in her headphones, drowning out her surroundings. One day, Sara’s usual solo dip at the local pool is disrupted by the presence of a mysterious stranger...
During the sweltering summertime of rural Spain, Sara carries an extra load of teenage agony due to the perpetual bullying from her peers. She’s also an outsider at home—her parents and little brother just don’t understand her—so, feelings internalized, she’s often found buried in her headphones, drowning out her surroundings. One day, Sara’s usual solo dip at the local pool is disrupted by the presence of a mysterious stranger...
- 9/23/2022
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
After catching a lot of positive attention from its screening at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, the Spanish-language horror film Piggy will be screening at Fantastic Fest this weekend… and on October 7th, the movie will be receiving a nationwide release at Alamo Drafthouse theatres! It will then be getting a VOD release as well. In anticipation of the Alamo Drafthouse release, a trailer for Piggy has arrived online and can be seen in the embed above.
Directed by Carlota Pereda, Piggy has the following synopsis:
With the summer sun beating down on her rural Spanish town, Sara hides away in her parent’s butcher shop. A teenager whose excess weight makes her the target of incessant bullying, she flees a clique of capricious girls who torment her at the town pool, only to stumble upon them being brutally kidnapped by a stranger, who drives off with them in his van.
Directed by Carlota Pereda, Piggy has the following synopsis:
With the summer sun beating down on her rural Spanish town, Sara hides away in her parent’s butcher shop. A teenager whose excess weight makes her the target of incessant bullying, she flees a clique of capricious girls who torment her at the town pool, only to stumble upon them being brutally kidnapped by a stranger, who drives off with them in his van.
- 9/22/2022
- by Cody Hamman
- JoBlo.com
Piggy Trailer — Carlota Pereda‘s Piggy (2022) movie trailer has been released by Magnet Releasing. The Piggy trailer stars Laura Galán, Richard Holmes, Carmen Machi, Irene Ferreiro, Camielle Aguilar, Pilar Castro, and Claudia Salas. Crew Carlota Pereda wrote the screenplay for Piggy. Poster Piggy Movie Poster Plot Synopsis Piggy‘s plot synopsis: “With the summer sun beating down on [...]
Continue reading: Piggy (2022) Movie Trailer: A Bullied Teen is Torn Between Saving A Potential Lover & Saving His Victims...
Continue reading: Piggy (2022) Movie Trailer: A Bullied Teen is Torn Between Saving A Potential Lover & Saving His Victims...
- 9/21/2022
- by Rollo Tomasi
- Film-Book
"We're blowing this out of proportion." Magnet Releasing has finally debuted the official US trailer for an acclaimed Spanish indie horror feature title Piggy, which originally premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival earlier this year. The film is opening in the US starting in October, and is also opening in Spain this October after playing at the San Sebastián Film Festival this month. In this horror, 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. "In Carlota Pereda’s strikingly bold and ominous feature adaptation of her award-winning 2018 short film, Sara must decide whether to cooperate with the police and parents’ questioning about the kidnappings, or take her own, unbridled path—while also discovering the power of desire and belonging, and the distinction between revenge and redemption." Starring Laura Galán, Richard Holmes,...
- 9/21/2022
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Following its world premiere earlier this year at the Sundance Film Festival, Carlota Pereda’s Piggy will be released in Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas on October 7th, followed by a further theatrical and VOD release on Ocotober 14th, and we have a look at the official trailer!
Written and directed by Carlota Pereda, Piggy stars Laura Galán, Richard Holmes, Carmen Machi, Irene Ferreiro, and Camielle Aguilar, with special collaborations by Pilar Castro & Claudia Salas.
You can watch the official trailer below, and be sure to read Heather Wixson's Sundance interview with Carlota Pereda!
Synopsis: "With the summer sun beating down on her rural Spanish town, Sara hides away in her parent’s butcher shop. A teenager whose excess weight makes her the target of incessant bullying, she flees a clique of capricious girls who torment her at the town pool, only to stumble upon them being brutally kidnapped by a stranger,...
Written and directed by Carlota Pereda, Piggy stars Laura Galán, Richard Holmes, Carmen Machi, Irene Ferreiro, and Camielle Aguilar, with special collaborations by Pilar Castro & Claudia Salas.
You can watch the official trailer below, and be sure to read Heather Wixson's Sundance interview with Carlota Pereda!
Synopsis: "With the summer sun beating down on her rural Spanish town, Sara hides away in her parent’s butcher shop. A teenager whose excess weight makes her the target of incessant bullying, she flees a clique of capricious girls who torment her at the town pool, only to stumble upon them being brutally kidnapped by a stranger,...
- 9/21/2022
- by Derek Anderson
- DailyDead
Based on her 2018 short of the same name, Carlota Pereda’s contribution to 2022’s Fantasia International Film Festival is one of the most horrific films in the line-up, for reasons which have little to do with the serial killer whose crimes it addresses and everything to do with mundane forms of cruelty which are all too common in real life.
Laura Galán plays Sara, a lonely teenager from Villanueva de la Vera in Etremadura, Spain. Her mother (Carmen Machi), who talks over her constantly, is completely oblivious to her social situation, urging her to tag along on trips with other high schoolers where she would not be welcome, making assumptions about a friendship with Claudia (Irene Ferreiro) which effectively ended years ago. Sara hides away as much as she can. She’s pretty busy anyway, expected to help out her father (Julián Valcárcel) in the family butcher’s shop, errands for one.
Laura Galán plays Sara, a lonely teenager from Villanueva de la Vera in Etremadura, Spain. Her mother (Carmen Machi), who talks over her constantly, is completely oblivious to her social situation, urging her to tag along on trips with other high schoolers where she would not be welcome, making assumptions about a friendship with Claudia (Irene Ferreiro) which effectively ended years ago. Sara hides away as much as she can. She’s pretty busy anyway, expected to help out her father (Julián Valcárcel) in the family butcher’s shop, errands for one.
- 8/3/2022
- by Jennie Kermode
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
In most films, the sight of a slaughtered human body — weighed down at the bottom of a public swimming pool with blood gushing from its wounds — would be the most stomach-churning thing in any given scene. “Piggy,” however, is not most films. In Spanish writer-director Carlota Pereda’s striking psychological slasher, the image passes without comment in the background, so incidental that we briefly wonder if our eyes have deceived us. For we’ve already been rattled by the real violence of the scene: plus-size teenager Sara (Laura Galán) being gleefully and relentlessly taunted by svelte mean-girl bullies, who then attempt drowning her with a pool net for extra laughs. Small wonder Sara doesn’t notice the dead man in the water, or that we barely register it. Pereda’s viciously impressive debut uses standard genre shocks almost as macguffins; it’s the all-too-recognizable horror of brutalized adolescence that really makes us wince.
- 1/25/2022
- by Guy Lodge
- Variety Film + TV
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