Straw Dogs
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| Straw Dogs | |
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| Directed by | Sam Peckinpah |
| Produced by | Daniel Melnick |
| Written by | David Zelag Goodman Sam Peckinpah Gordon Williams (novel) |
| Starring | Dustin Hoffman Susan George |
| Music by | Jerry Fielding |
| Cinematography | John Coquillon |
| Editing by | Paul Davies Tony Lawson Roger Spottiswoode |
| Distributed by | Cinerama Releasing Corporation |
| Release date(s) |  Dec 29, 1971 |
| Running time | 118 min 113 min (R-rated version) |
| Country | US |
| Language | English |
| IMDb profile | |
Straw Dogs is a 1971 film directed by Sam Peckinpah. Dustin Hoffman and Susan George play the lead roles. David Warner, although uncredited, is also featured. The screenplay is based on the novel The Siege of Trencher's Farm by Gordon Williams.
The film was released theatrically in the US the same year as A Clockwork Orange, The French Connection, and Dirty Harry, sparking a heated controversy over apparently excessive violence in films.
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[edit] Plot
The film tells the story of an American mathematician, David Sumner (Dustin Hoffman), and his British wife, Amy (Susan George), who move to Amy's home town in Cornwall, United Kingdom to escape crime and violence in the United States. They face increasing levels of harassment by the local residents who kill the Sumners' cat, intimidate David, and finally, unbeknownst to David, subject Amy to a brutal double rape. When Henry Niles (David Warner) a local man with a mild mental disability (controversially portrayed in the film as a child molester given his "accidental" murder of a teenage girl who made advances to him), is given sanctuary in the Sumners' house, the locals attempt to break in and subject him to mob justice. Forced into action, the normally cowardly David embarks on a spree of violence in which he savagely murders the local mob. In the final scene, he drives Henry back to the village. Henry turns to David and says "I don't know the way home." To which David replies "That's OK...I don't either."
[edit] Censorship
The movie gained notoriety in the UK after it was banned in 1984 by the British Board of Film Classification under the then newly introduced Video Recordings Act due to a scene of sexual violence in which Amy Sumner is raped. A portion of the scene had already been cut by the studio prior to the film's US release in order to obtain an R rating from the MPAA. The film was again refused a license in 1999, after the distributors refused to cut the problematic scene. The film was finally certified uncut for video and DVD release on July 1, 2002. The film was screened on Channel 4 in 2003.
[edit] Title
The title of the movie is drawn from a common translation of the Tao Te Ching, an ancient Chinese philosophical treatise. Verse V reads:
- Heaven and Earth are impartial;
- They see the ten thousand things as straw dogs.
- The wise are impartial;
- They see the people as straw dogs.
Many ceremonies in ancient China, during the time of Lao Zi, incorporated the use of dogs woven out of grass. These effigies were revered and respected during the ritual, but afterward, discarded and burnt.
[edit] Reception
Straw Dogs was wildly controversial on its release and has remained so to this day. Most of the controversy revolved around the long and highly explicit rape scene which is the centerpiece of the film. Critics, especially feminist critics, accused Peckinpah of glamorizing rape and engaging in misogynistic sadism. They were particularly disturbed by the seeming ambiguity of the rape scene, in which Amy appears at certain points to be asking for and enjoying the abuse she is subjected to. Peckinpah's defenders claimed that the scene was unambiguously horrifying and that Amy's trauma was truthfully portrayed in the film. Peckinpah's detractors continue to cite this scene as proof of Peckinpah's chauvinism and misogyny.
The violence in the film in general also aroused strong reactions. Many critics saw the film as an endorsement of violence as a redemptive act and the film as a fascistic celebration of violence and vigilantism. Other critics saw the film as an anti-violence story, pointing out the empty bleakness with which the film ends.
Peckinpah himself defended the film as an exploration rather than an endorsement of violence, claiming that he was working out his own obsessions with violence as a result of human interaction and inability to communicate. He also claimed that the character of David was, in fact, the villain of the film, who deliberately, if subconsciously, brings the violence down upon himself. According to Peckinpah, the homicidal rampage at the end of the film is actually an expression of David's true, repressed self.
The film remains very divisive among critics and audiences, though even its detractors have largely come to admit its importance and artistry, and the film has come to be seen, for better or worse, as something of a modern classic.
[edit] Trivia
- In the past Hoffman has often said that he only took the part for the money.
- The film was made on location at St Buryan in Cornwall and Hoffman and George were regulars at The Ship, a pub in Mousehole.
- To get the right reaction of shock when David enters the public house, Peckinpah had Hoffman enter the pub without pants. It worked.
- When David beats one of his attackers to death with a poker it was Hoffman's idea to use a watermelon. Pieces of the watermelon can be seen flying up into the frame. Peckinpah kept the shot in the film and passed off the watermelon debris as flying brain matter.
- In its original release, some American movie theatres would screen the film with short breaks after the violent sequences so the audience could recover (or leave the film altogether).
- Peckinpah liked to push Hoffman's buttons during shooting, and at one point the two reportedly almost came to blows.
- Peckinpah passed the time during breaks by practicing knife throwing.
- When Peckinpah described his concept of the rape scene to Susan George she walked off the set in disgust and did not return until Peckinpah agreed to tone it down.
- Upon being offered the film, Peckinpah informed producer Daniel Melnick that he was blacklisted because of his notorious reputation. Melnick replied that that was exactly why he wanted him to direct the film.
[edit] External links
| Films directed by Sam Peckinpah |
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| The Deadly Companions • Ride the High Country • Major Dundee • The Wild Bunch • The Ballad of Cable Hogue • Straw Dogs • Junior Bonner • The Getaway • Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid • Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia • The Killer Elite • Cross of Iron • Convoy • The Osterman Weekend |
