Straw Dogs (2011) /Movie Review

Release Date: 21 October 2011 (India) |16 September 2011 (Canada & USA)

Runtime: 110 min Genres: Thriller

Taglines: Don't let them in.

 L.A. screenwriter David Sumner relocates with his wife to her hometown in the deep South. There, while tensions build between them, a brewing conflict with locals becomes a threat to them both.

Directed by Rod Lurie

Writing credits : Rod Lurie, David Zelag Goodman, Sam Peckinpah, Gordon Williams

Original Music by Larry Groupé

Cinematography by Alik Sakharov

Film Editing by Sarah Boyd

Cast

James Marsden,  Kate Bosworth , Alexander Skarsgård , James Woods , Dominic Purcell , Rhys Coiro ,

Billy Lush , Laz Alonso , Willa Holland , Walton Goggins , Anson Mount , Drew Powell , Kristen Shaw ,

Megan Adelle , Randall Newsome

Budget: $12,500,000 (estimated)

Production Co: Screen Gems, Battleplan Productions
Sound Mix: SDDS  | Dolby Digital  | DTS

Filming Locations: Bossier City, Louisiana, USA

Review

Dull, unnecessary remake

 johnno-17 (Greece)

Sam Peckinpah's "Straw Dogs" remains a most disturbing, morally ambiguous confrontation between the brute code of uneducated farmboys with the complex attempts at rationalization by a sophisticated, neurotic, hyper-educated urban college professor attempting to escape the responsibilities of living in an increasingly complex world. It is also a magnificently constructed motion picture, elegantly photographed, brilliantly edited, hauntingly scored, with powerhouse performances from every actor.

This wholly unnecessary remake on the other hand is amateurish swill - banal photography, drama-class acting (and why not? all the characters have been reduced to caricature), and soap-opera rewriting. It's basically a television movie with some sex and violence thrown in for the fan-boy crowd. It's even got the requisite car-chases, and supposedly pointed dialog about adultery and motivations, blah blah blah.

Graceless, visually dull, with no sympathetic characters, but a lotta boom! crash! foe those who think loud noises and pyrotechnics make up for lack of intelligence and imagination.