Hey, what's warm and makes your feel nourished all over? No, we're not talking about wholesome food. We're talking about the uber-adorable Marty.

But food plays a huge role in this feel-good classic. In fact, it plays a role so important we had to divide it into three, just so you could get the full scope of food-related symbolism at work.

Grade-A Prime

Marty is a butcher. No, he's not a creepy butcher like Daniel Day-Lewis in Gangs of New Yorkor the whole cast of the grisly The Butcher Boys. He's a nice butcher. He literally brings home the bacon… or at least wraps it up for other people to bring home.

But what does it mean that he processes meat for a living, wrapping up sides of beef, chops, ribs, chuck, cold cuts, and sausage for the wives and mothers of the neighborhood?

Chayefsky could've written Marty as a bricklayer, a school teacher, a janitor, a baker, almost any occupation was out there for the taking. But Marty's status as butcher is important to who Marty is… and to the story and story's universe in general. He's a good dude in a good neighborhood, helping keep his Italian neighbors' kitchens full of meatballs and prosciutto.

The Food of Love

There's no getting around it: Food can be pretty romantic. From candlelit dinners to breakfast in bed, food = love. Sometimes the food of love is oysters, sometimes it's Valentine's Day chocolate, and sometimes it's an uneaten slice of pie.

Love can make you de-prioritize lots of things: schoolwork, chores, or eating much of anything. At the coffee shop, a close-up shot of Marty and Clara's table reveals crumpled napkins, half-drunk cups of coffee and plate of hardly-touched pie. They're simply too into each other to remember to take a bite.

A Mother's Love is Beyond Measure, Except at Dinnertime

Across cultures, family meals bond parents and children, no matter what's in the dishes. And for mothers (and fathers) the world over, cooking for your kid is a demonstration of love. Teresa is no exception. Peep Marty sitting at the Saturday supper table with no less than seven different dishes, even though he's the only taking a bite.

Notice how director Mann makes sure that the food is in the foreground, the camera set opposite to Marty as Teresa floats the suggestion that her son go out that night. Marty might get mad, get up to holler a little, but eventually he agrees that he'll go dancing and sits again at the dining table laden with his mother's love. To stop eating in that moment would be an insult to his mother, a cardinal sin for this household.

Later, it's with a particular vitriol that Tommy points out that his wife doesn't even go to an Italian butcher, but rather picks up some random pork chops in plastic wrap at the local supermarket. It may seem like he's just talking about meat (while advising Marty not to buy the butcher shop), but from the way Tommy and Virginia have been fighting, it may also have something to do with his wife's inability or disinterest to keep house like his ma did.