Directed by Kirsten Sheridan, Disco Pigs is the 2001 film based on Enda Walsh’s 1996 play, starring Cillian Murphy as Darren (‘Pig’) and Elaine Cassidy as Sinead (‘Runt’).
Most of the time before I see a film, old or new, I have at least a minimal idea of what the film is going to be about. Before I saw Disco Pigs, all I knew was that it was some sort of love story, and Cillian Murphy was in it. Once the film began and I felt myself immediately falling for these characters, I hoped severely that the film would carry their story to its rightful conclusion. And indeed it did.
SPOILERS!
There have been plenty of films which deal with the overall changes that occur between friends or siblings as they reach adulthood, but this was the first I’ve seen that portrayed spiritual twins, separated only by having different birth parents. Pig and Runt’s relationship goes beyond being friends, neighbors, and even pseudo-siblings, because they’re exactly the same person- King and Queen of each other’s universes. They don’t need or wish to know anyone outside of their adventurous, fantasy world, and their bond seems virtually unbreakable. Only when Runt begins to show the slightest interest in a classmate does their world start to disintegrate, as Pig’s love for Runt is slowly torn between childish infatuation and sexual desire.
When they were newborns, Pig came out of the womb in tears, an only found solace within Runt’s company. We learn that Pig grew up without a father, while Runt’s father was often a violent drunk. As a child, it was Pig’s duty to wait for Runt (the salesman story), but as they got older, Pig felt it his duty to rescue her. Runt wants to preserve the innocence of their bond while she forms relationships with other people, but Pig feels the only way he can hold on to her is by becoming not only her friend, but her lover. As the outside world begins to intervene more frequently, and Pig feels Runt slipping away, his violence escalates. By the conclusion, they realize that for one of them to have a chance at happiness, the other must break away permanently.
In the beginning, Runt talks with Pig about swimming out into the ocean and never coming back. When she’s sent away to school, she looks up to the sky and realizes that she isn’t drowning without Pig- in fact, being away from him felt freeing for the first time. Runt decides that ‘blue is the color of love’ before she grants Pig’s last request, and this could be symbolic of both the ocean and the sky. Pig and Runt’s love was like an all-consuming abyss, an intense blue flame on a candle, but such flames tend to go out without the right components to keep the fire burning, just as Pig and Runt’s bond couldn’t last if one felt differently than the other. Love means letting go, and that’s what Pig finally realized he had to do in the end. After Pig passed, Runt looks up to the sky and talks to him, before walking away from the ocean.
When you were younger, you may have had an imaginary friend or simply enjoyed playing by yourself, in your own world. As we get older, and more people enter our reality, our own private world disappears, and we start to depend on the relationships we have with other people. Rarely do we return to this state of solitary bliss where we can survive off the love we give ourselves. Pig and Runt’s relationship ran so deep because they found this type of internal love within someone else, at such a young age. Instead of having an imaginary friend, they had each other. Some believe that we all have a twin flame, a guardian angel, or spiritual counterpart, which although invisible, serves to protect us and keep us balanced. Pig’s spiritual twin was externalized in Runt, and her’s in him- two separate persons fused into one.
When Runt grew apart from Pig, Pig felt literally empty- in mind, body and soul. He had never been alone before, never had to make his own decisions, and thus was divided internally. He began talking to himself; a sign of trying to build his own moral code. But by pushing his romantic feelings an emotions on Runt, the opposite happened- anger and rage seeped through. His violence seemed justified in his eyes, because he didn’t have a sense of right and wrong without Runt’s approval and support.
Runt made Pig feel complete, yet Runt slowly realized their relationship was not healthy. By never questioning each other’s motives and habits, and never letting anyone else in (classmates or otherwise), they became too yin or too yang- almost like one half of a mind was shared between two people. Without balance, it’s difficult for one to grow as a person, let alone stay mentally stable, and thus when Runt started to think for herself, Pig was not strong enough to do the same. Some believe that a twin flame, or true soul mate, is the polar opposite of who we are now, and most often it takes lifetimes to find this person in physical form. This is interesting if you consider Pig and Runt’s rare relationship.
The colors red and blue are also very symbolic in the film. Besides what I mentioned previously about ocean, sky, and the color blue, the color red is also prevalent- in Pig’s violence, the salesman’s car (from my memory), Runt’s head wound, and the color of the sweater worn by Marky (which Pig rips off after beating him).
Overall, Disco Pigs is a film that will stay with you because it’s not about love- not what we consider love by society’s definitions anyway. This is a film about soul mates, about opposites attracting, and perhaps a moral lesson on why finding one’s soul mate in life is so difficult. Pig and Runt found their soul mates at birth, yet their story had a tragic end… A beautifully tragic end to their story, but a new beginning for Runt.