The Pig Walks (David Lynch, 2002, USA)

The Pig Walks is another David Lynch short film made in his period of increased productivity after the release of 2001's Mulholland Drive. The film, which is animated, opens in an abandoned industrial landscape that is very typical of Lynch's work. The background is rotted yellow and red. The walking pig enters quite early. This "pig" is ostensibly a pig but seems to have been reformatted into a Cronenbergesque hunk of flesh. It is also stripped of its normal skin and seems to be flayed. It lumbers across the screen, opening its mouth and moving its arms slowly. It also casts a shadow across the back of the screen. It makes a low guttural and growling sound. Meanwhile, in the background, there is the sound of crackling. 

The pig monster continues to lumber across the screen, slowly and steadily progressing toward an unknown destination. The computer graphics are on the more primitive side, but this lends the film an even creepier quality - as if it is from some lost video game from the 1990s. The film concludes with the pig monster walking off of the screen, as the screen fades to black.

This short film lives up to its title, but is there any greater meaning here? It is most likely that Lynch probably wanted to experiment a bit with CGI, and this is the result. As with most David Lynch shorts, the sound design here is the star of the film and is enough to give someone nightmares. The animation might leave something to be desired, but it feels that it could be out of a Resident Evil video game. Overall, The Pig Walks is a simple experiment for Lynch completists to seek out but is not recommended for general audiences or even casual fans of the great director.

6/10