Pig Hunt 2008

John Hickman [Travis Aaron Wade] and his girlfriend Brooks [Tina Huang] are San Francisco residents who invite their friends—self-proclaimed tough guy Ben [Les Claypool], his close friend Wayne [Rajiv Shah], and the inexperienced Quincy along with his dog Wolfgang—to a weekend of hunting and drinking near John’s uncle’s remote cabin. The group’s dynamic is tense from the start: Ben and Wayne can’t stand Brooks, and the friction needlepoints their trip as they drive through the countryside. A stop at a gas station/general store brings them face to face with a van of hippie women and their leader, the Hippie Stranger [Bryonn Bain], who live in a woods commune and, as rumors swirl, raise emus for meat. The store owner fills their heads with a local legend, “The Ripper,” a killer hog said to weigh thousands of pounds. After stocking up, they press on to the cabin, passing a hillbilly homestead where a boy drops a dead animal carcass on their car, an omen that the forest may be unfriendly. They arrive to find the cabin vandalized and uninhabitable, so they set up camp outside and brace for the weekend.

The next morning, Jake Tibbs [Jason Foster] and Ricky Tibbs [Nick Tagas], John’s kin, arrive with a willingness to join the hunt, though Ricky—an unstable Gulf War veteran—carries a dangerous edge. Jake is eager to fit in and Quincy, still eager to prove himself, rounds out the group’s dynamic while Brooks outshoots the men, earning some grudging respect. The trek through the woods leads them to the Big Wallow, where a piglet call lures boars into view. A boar rams Wayne, breaking his kneecap, and Wolfgang charges after the herd as Brooks takes another shot. Ricky calls Jake to witness a disturbing find: a perfectly formed piglet lacking the armor of a full-grown hog. The discovery unsettles everyone, and Quincy returns with news of a hidden crop—marijuana plants growing nearby—prompting them to follow him into the woods, leaving Brooks with Wayne.

John refuses to profit from the plants, insisting they’re on his property and not for sale, while a cryptic sign near the crop hints at the hippies’ true activities. Tensions flare as Ricky snaps, taking John at crossbow-point, and Jake tries to intervene. Ben arrives, misreading the danger, and shoots Ricky to protect John, who then must cope with the loss of his cousin as Jake runs to tell his clan. The group tries to return to Wayne, but Wayne is attacked again; a single shot echoes in the trees and he vanishes. The turmoil continues at the cabin where Ben and Quincy discover Wolfgang’s mutilated body and realize the Tibbs clan has claimed the woods for themselves. Ben kills a pursuer and escapes, but Quincy is knocked from a vehicle and killed with a single gunshot to the back of the head.

Back in the forest, John and Brooks encounter the Hippie Stranger again; he carries a cattle prod and explains that he’s searching for an escaped animal and offers help, suggesting they contact the police from his commune. He guides them through the danger and helps them fend off an assault by the Tibbs clan, taking out several hillbillies in the process. Meanwhile, Ben reaches the commune where he’s given drugs, encounters a dying Wayne, and soon faces a predatory force that approaches him from behind—his scream signaling a brutal end.

The remaining Tibbs clan members push toward the woods around the commune, where they are stalked and killed by the murderous hippie women—one man is seized by something else. Brooks and John arrive at the commune with the Hippie Stranger; they’re captured, with Brooks forced into a muddy pen while the leader takes her to confront the danger inside. The Ripper is finally revealed, feeding on the remains of a Tibbs clan member. Jake infiltrates the commune, confronts the cult, and shoots a few of its women, forcing one to unlock the cell that holds John and Brooks. As Jake confronts the Ripper, the Hippie Stranger attacks, stabbed in the eye, and is killed by John. Jake dies from his injuries, while the Hippie Stranger’s followers turn their attention to Brooks as the boar is coaxed toward them. Brooks uses a cattle prod to draw the creature’s attention, and the Ripper tears into the attacker before John fires a precise crossbow shot under the boar’s jaw, ending the threat. With the danger temporarily contained, Brooks and John make their escape, only to come face-to-face with the feral boy who had watched from the tree at the film’s start, a stark reminder of the forest’s enduring, deadly watch.