When Pigs Have Wings

About The Film

The fates of a pot-bellied pig and perpetually poor Palestinian fisherman become literally entangled in WHEN PIGS HAVE WINGS, a clever comedic parable of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Following a storm at sea, the hapless Jafaar (a humanistic performance by Sasson Gabay of The Band’s Visit) finds a 100-pound pig in his fishing net. His initial efforts to dispose of the oversized swine – first to a United Nations official (Ulrich Tukur), then to a Russian-Jewish farm worker (Myriam Tekaia) – only complicate his life, while providing plenty of fodder for sight gags involving smuggling pig sperm out of Gaza. A more darkly comic tone emerges later when the increasingly desperate Jafaar steps into a political and religious minefield, running afoul of local Islamist militants.

A former reporter who covered the Middle East, first-time director Sylvain Estibal draws on his keen eye for the region’s absurdities and class disparities, objectively skewering both sides of the conflict equally. WHEN PIGS HAVE WINGS nabbed the Audience Award at the Tokyo International Film Festival.