Straw Dogs(2011) vs Straw Dogs(1971)

Straw Dogs – 2011

EVERYONE HAS A BREAKING POINT

My breaking point… this movie!

Having not seen the original I didn’t know what to expect going into this movie.  Since I don’t watch much TV I hadn’t seen the trailers however a friend of mine wanted to go see it so I looked it up on IMDB.  Not wanting to spoil it by reading other people’s reviews I read a brief synopsis of the plot.  All it described was a man and his wife moving to a community that didn’t accept them.

Since the original is notorious for a rape scene I figured that would be essential to the plot… it is not.  Guess I was expecting a movie more like I Spit On Your Grave or Last House On the Left where the rape is not only important but a motive for revenge later on in the film.  What I got was more like the Halloween remake that also has a rape that’s pretty much meaningless and is only in the movie to be unnecessarily cruel and misogynistic. 

Straw Dogs is set somewhere in rural Southern America and the audience isn’t allowed to forget that for a second.  From the good ole boys hired to repair the barn roof, (all of whom are lazy, crude, and imposing.  One is the spitting image of Larry the Cable Guy complete with ripped sleeves) to the religious conservative high school football obsessed townies.  

Git R Done!

Our movie starts off with a couple driving down the road acting like lovesick newlyweds, singing along with the goofy song playing on the radio(now every time I see an opening driving sequence I think of that really stupid one in Funny Games.  It’s a shame because prior to that movie anytime I’d see an opening driving sequence I used to think of The Shinning even though that one doesn’t really open with a driving sequence).  After dining in the local bar/restaurant David Sumner(James Marsden) meets his wife, Amy’s(Kate Bosworth) high school boyfriend, Charlie, who just happens to be the one of the guys repairing(one little thing that bothers me is why they even bother having the barn roof restored anyway) their barn roof.  It’s funny but they explain the damage to the barn was due to a hurricane but somehow the house went undamaged?  For some reason that anachronism just bothers me.

Charlie says: Sleeves r fer college boys n suckers!

It seems strange saying this but even though nothing much happens throughout the first half of this movie I wasn’t bored with it for a second.  The characters are interesting enough to keep my attention and I enjoy seeing them interact with one another, particularly James Woods’ character the angry alcoholic ex-coach.  It’s true for almost every role he’s ever been in but he just steals every scene he’s in and when he gets pissed it’s real fun to watch.

The coach’s daughter is for reasons unexplained infatuated with the town’s man-child which often gets them both in trouble.  During a picnic the coach’s daughter approaches Jeremy(the man child) and gets tackled by a very drunk and very angry coach.  A crowd starts gathering around the scene until Amy intercedes while Charlie restrains him.  On their way back home Amy accuses David of being a weenie and David tries defending his inaction.  This is one of many times Amy nags David about being passive aggressive.  

Back at the house the group of contractors gold brick and take off early to hunt(or poach).  Charlie and the boys invite David to go hunting but he refuses.  TEST TIME!  Pick the answer that best describes how this movie wants us to perceive the David character

A.      The good guy

B.      Reasonable

C.      Diplomatic

D.      Cowardly

E.       All the above

The truth is David is an accurate representation of most modern urbanites.  When you live in a big city you try to get along with people the best you can and appeal to their sensibilities using tact and guile.  Unfortunately for David this is something the people in this movie often exploit.  I’m not complaining but if David were seen as more assertive then this movie would become predictable.

Amy spends half of this movie wearing short shorts and skin tight clothes drenched in sweat and when I say skin tight I mean she might as well be wearing bodypaint.  After a jog she complains to her husband that their contractors are leering at her.  He tells her if that isn’t the reaction she wants perhaps she dress more conservatively and wear a bra.  Maybe it’s because I’m a guy but I tend to agree with him.  Feeling insulted she asks him if he thinks she’s asking for this.  The rest of this argument ends the same way it would if you were trying to convince your teenage sister to stop dressing like a slut.  She responds by going upstairs, opening a widow pointed at the contractors, staring them down, and taking off her top… hmmm if you weren’t asking for it before you are now.

 I'd hate to say she's asking for it but is it really wise to tempt fate?

It’s about time I stop avoiding it and get down to rape.  Towards the midway point of the movie David relents and goes huntin’ with Charlie and his buddies.   While hunting deer(it was ducks in the original) Charlie disappears and shows up at the house.  The events leading up to the rape is pretty creepy and it’s how I imagine a real rape goes down.  Most times when you see a rape in movies or tv its usually a quick, violent, brutal attack perpetrated by a stranger.  In Straw Dogs it’s a deluded ex-boyfriend that’s convinced his actions aren’t a violation but somehow consensual.

The effect of the rape loses a lot of its impact by cutting to David in the forest every 30 seconds or so.  At best the cuts are distracting, at worst they are annoying.  After we focus on the rape for a little while Charlie finishes then one of his friends shows up.  I should note here that this scene was done way better in the original.  In that one a gun is pointed at him while he’s still on top of her and Charlie seems to protest a bit.  In this one Charlie gets up, sits down, and becomes catatonic like he has PTSD.  I still don’t understand this scene.  Did his friend know what he was going to do?  Did Charlie let him in on his plan?  Niether of these questions are answered.  Another thing I found strange about the rape was later on in the movie Charlie shares scenes with David and Amy and he does not act awkward or paranoid toward either of them especially when David fires him.

After the rape David has to find his own way home when the rednecks abandon him.  When he gets home he tells Amy about it and out of the blue she accuses him of being a coward.  This is as close as the movie gets to Amy confessing about the rape but it just doesn’t go that far.  From here the movie gets a little uneventful until about the last 20 minutes of the film.

At the football game David's wife insist they go to the coach’s cheerleader daughter absconds with Jeremy to the locker room to make out with him.  Even in print that looks fucked up to me.  It reminds me of that scene in Gummo where the sleazebag is taking advantage of the retarded girl.  The coach notices his daughter is missing and runs around looking for her when another teenager tells him she saw her with Jeremy Niles.  The coach in a rage tears off looking for her.  When he gets close to the locker room Jeremy tries to silence her and accidentally kills her.

Meanwhile in the stands the cheering crowd triggers something in Amy and she flashes back to the rape.  David notices something’s wrong and takes her home.  While on the road trying to console her he runs a fleeing Jeremy over.  They take him to their house and call a hospital, this is overheard by Charlie and the coach via police radio and they haul ass to the Sumners to get Jeremy.  I’m not going to go much further about how this plays out you’re just going to have to see the movie for yourself.

Most people complain that remakes stray too far from their counterparts however this one doesn’t stray at all.  Only superficial things like setting, characters, and dialogue are changed.  If they were going to change anything they could have at least made the movie a little more coherent rather than just updating it.  I accuse myself of doing these very same things.  I often bitch about how remakes change things too much without realizing if they didn’t change anything I may as well watch the original movie.

 I give this a 50/100.  It's a failure but still I really enjoyed James Woods.  This movie also has the distinction of being one of few movies I've seen that has a nude scene with no nudity.  Guess Bosworth didn't have nudity in her contract or they just didn't want to pay her extra.  Wet tshirts must be some kind of hollywood gray area.

Straw Dogs – 1971

In the eyes of every coward burns a straw dog

There’s not much else to say about this one that wasn’t said above.  It’s pretty much the same thing only in England.  The remake keeps more or less close to the original unlike a lot of other modern remakes(The Texas Chainsaw Massacre for example) and that’s probably why I didn’t like this one either.  It’s hard to tell which is better acted because at least in the remake I can hear James Marsden’s dialogue.  A lot of times I found myself missing dialogue because I couldn’t hear it for all of Dustin Hoffman’s mumbling.  The rest of the time his acting is just really stiff like he’s high or just miles and miles away.  I’m convinced even if his wife did reveal she was raped he wouldn’t convey any emotion that would be even vaguely recognizable as human.  That may sound harsh but as much as I didn’t like the remake I HATED this one.

That said I was really excited going into this one.  I felt positive since I wasn’t impressed with the remake I was going to like this one.  After all it’s usually the original that gets it right.  Once again a rape occurs that’s never mention by anyone making David’s motives at the end of the movie ambiguous.  Once again his wife blames him for the rape and accuses him of being a coward.  In this one she’s not so much defiant and vulnerable as she is just a bitch.  When the villagers are trying to break into the house she tries to convince her husband to let them in, when that doesn’t work she runs to the door and tries to let them in herself knowing what will happen to Jeremy  if she lets them in.   

I think what horrified and confused me the most was the rape itself(as it should but not for the reason it was supposed to).  The rape is done a little bit better but in this one at times she’s reaching out to him or embracing him making the act of the rape fucking confusing.

While I may have been a little disappointed with the remake this one just aggravated me but maybe that has more to do with seeing the same movie twice and being bored both times.  The remake I found was a little more relateable because I am an American, and I am from the south, and I have been to small towns similar to the one in that movie.  I wasn’t entertained by either one of these movies and I know I’m beating a dead horse when I say this but our hero’s triumph over the evil rapists in the end is deflated by the fact that he doesn’t know his wife was raped.  After watching both of these movies I couldn’t help but wonder if they’d be better or worse without the rape.

Whoo boy I give this one a 20/100.  Total failure.  I suppose my grade is so low because this movie has so much hype attached to it.  Look at the imdb pages for both these movies the original has a 7 point rating whereas the remake has a 5 point rating.  I can only imagine that's because it has Sam Peckinpah's name on it.