The Truffle Hunters Is a Quiet Contemplation on a Lonely Life

The men who appear in the The Truffle Hunters, a documentary by directors Gregory Kershaw and Michael Dweck, keep to themselves. They pride themselves on being able to walk through the forests of Italy and rely on their dogs to sniff out the most prized and expensive of truffles to sell. They do not share their secrets. One old-timer who has been in this profession for quite some time is asked whether he’d ever pass down his secrets to someone else to continue his legacy; his answer is no. Making it easier, the younger man asking such questions frames it if the hunter had a son. The answer is still no. That’s how dedicated some of these men are to such a rare profession.

A group of hunters talk amid their dogs in The Truffle Hunters. Sony Pictures Classics

The Truffle Hunters looks at the lives of a handful of guys who have taken on the lifestyle of hunting for truffles. One of them happens to be married, but most of them keep to themselves, with their only meaningful relationships being with their dogs. One elder hunter seems to speak more openly with his dog more than with anyone else, sharing his plans for his own demise with his canine companion. A comparatively younger hunter also takes great care of his many dogs by bathing them in the bathtub with a song.

The very act of truffle hunting is made a bit more exciting for the many adventures being framed through dogs with cameras mounted to their heads. We see everything the dogs witness as they sniff through the wilderness and maybe dig if they have a lead. The footage seems to turn up little in the way of truffle discovery, but one has to wonder whether nothing was found or if the hunters wanted that footage removed for fear of secrets revealed.

More fascinating are the scenes where the hunters spend their off-hours finding stuff to do. The youngest of them uses the silence of the countryside to play their drums as loudly as possible into the open nothing. The oldest will bicker with his wife, who fears her husband is too old for such adventures. And somewhere in the middle age range is a man struggling to find the right words to write a book and growing increasingly disillusioned and frustrated with the life he has chosen.

A buyer observes truffles for sale. Sony Pictures Classics

Kershaw and Dweck take care to make sure there’s a fly-on-the-wall approach to this subject matter, never letting the film turn into a talking-head piece or an explanatory film on the profession. I doubt the hunters would ever be that open, anyway. One area where one would think the directors would favor such a route is when the environment shifts to the stuffier crowd that purchases the truffles for incredibly high prices. But no, they mostly keep quiet unless on the job determining which truffles are most suitable for sale. There’s also a bit of an uneasy nature to watch one truffle aficionado eat some grated truffle on a pasta dish in complete silence. As he nears the end of his meal, he merely remarks that it’s good. A lifestyle of devotion to such retrieval and it all amounts to such simple savoring.

The hardships of the hunters are also quite present. Health concerns crop up that they try to push to the backs of their minds. Concern for their dogs becomes an issue when taking into account that the grounds they may be walking on have poison traps, leading to talk about finding the right mouth guard. And then there’s the tragic moment when a dog goes missing in the night, sending one hunter into a bitter depression.

A bearded hunter shares a quiet moment with his dog in The Truffle Hunters. Sony Pictures Classics

The Truffle Hunters is a fascinating film in how it stands back and finds the melancholy and drive of its subjects’ lifestyle. There’s rarely a moment when the hunters expand on just why they keep doing what they do. Perhaps the final scene speaks the most, when one hunter, going against the wishes of his wife, sneaks out the window for one more day of searching the wilderness for treasure. While the selling of truffles does garner profit, it doesn’t seem to be about that as much to the many who pursue it. Perhaps it’s just a calling for a lonely life of quiet passion, where the quest is more enticing than the prize. Even if one of them were to find the most expensive truffle in the country that would pay them enough to retire, they’d still be out in the woods the next day, hiking with their dogs seeking the next one.