Film: Straw Dogs
I used to not give a heck for which actors play in a movie. I'm not a fanboy type, not really; I don't desire to meet Thom Yorke or
That's why I didn't care who's acting in a film much; sure, there are good actors and great actors, but it's director's job to know that, not mine. To me, the director is a grant of a good movie, not actors. Good director (in theory) won't pick a bad actor, or at least won't pick an unsuitable actor; or a hopeless actor; good director will lead an actor through a role. Every good actor had bad roles: the ones with hopeless script, the ones where he was miscasted, the ones where clueless director edited out good parts, the ones that he just walked through like a part-time job that he just had to get off his back... Actors, even the best ones, make very bad judges of what kind of film the future material will be; unlike good directors; or is it that the final outcome simply depends on director more than on actor? But even then, there's almost no acter in the world who didn't take roles in obviously worthless, shallow films, on principle of "take the money and run".
I'll fence myself from blank statement and say that I have a lot of trust in Johnny Depp's choice of roles. Sure, he did do bad films, but never hopeless ones; never basket cases; some of them were ruins once they were finished, but even awful "Don Juan de Marco" must've looked good on project paper. Former teenage star and actor of popularity that doesn't vain even if he doesn't make a film in ages, Depp never milked this popularity like others would. He made long breaks in 90ies simply because he found no roles worth taking, which just increased his notoriety. Lately, he seems to be bored of waiting for good roles to come so he lowered his standards a bit - but only a bit. You still won't see him in idiotic romantic comedies, co-starring Julia Roberts.
Anyway, this article is supposed to have nothing to do with Depp, he just kind of stumbled along as a subject. For a while there I was talking in past tense because I reduced extremeness of my opinion; this happened, I guess, when I realized that under given circumstances (given the material and freedom) a great actor can make a bad film still worth watching. And then, I just like seeing some people on screen.
Tim Roth, for instance, always makes exceptional screen presence, cool and emotional at the same time; and then, when I saw him dropping that coolness off for a trauma-ridden, all over low, embarrassment-ridden role in "Four rooms", making his performance nearly the only good thing in it - that's what bought me. But then, even he couldn't save Tornatore's "Legend of 1990", perhaps because he was miscasted.
Then the are actresses like Nastasia Kinski or Isabelle Adjanni, whose heavenly beauty makes me want to watch films just so I could stare at their face. That actually goes for Adjanni before her break into
But there's really only one actor who'd make me go and watching a film just to see him. It is (and this might sound confusing) young Dustin Hoffman. By young I mean that his appearance post-"Rain man" doesn't do much for me, and conveniently, in years after that he really made some bad films. But as young, he had that honest, unconventional beauty - or, if you prefer it, ugliness; he was, and still is one of the greatest actors, capable of projecting anything to screen; he was one of actors that defined the generation; he made a load of great films; and most of all, through his best roles like "The Graduate", "Marathon Man", "Straw Dogs", even "Cramer vs. Cramer", he was a living metaphor of the loss of virginity (not sexual, though he did have his teeth pierced in "Marathon Man"), of growing up. In all of those films he starts as an emotional child, disoriented in a world that is facing him, forced to stand up to this world, he grows. He was flawless and always new, in a role that is maybe hardest of all.
Could it be then that I liked "Straw dogs" just because it had Hoffman in it? Because most of other Peckinpah's stuff doesn't do much for me. Sure, Peckinpah is an old school master, his visionary use of violence and his fights with censorship are the stuff of legends now. It took a lot of guts to treat violence as authentically and unmasked as he did; he made some of the lengthiest scenes of killing ("Wild bunch") and he made'em dance as they died. His inventive use of slow-motion in action scenes is today so commonly used that blood-spattering or car-crashing always has to be in slow-motion. But it was him who used it first to show devastating results of violence in all it’s details.
Yet, knowing all that, most of his films don't do much for me. His westerns, some of which are acclaimed masterpieces, are too macho and self-righteous to be revisionist, yet made too late to be classic, in John-Ford sense of the word. His other works like "Getaway" or "Osterman weekend" look like well-done but uninspired routine works. There is a lot of redeeming value in them: tension, thrill, violence choreography - but those show off Peckinpah as more a craftsman than a self-aware author. They make me want to fast-forward the film to the nearest scene of violence.
Then there is "Straw dogs" that stand in the middle of his career as a milestone and as the most controversial film he's done. Some call it one of defining films of the decade; Others call it misogynist, self-righteous macho, simplified and one-sided. Yet I feel that this film has aged more than any other of his films, and looks modern even now. It could me that its 'siege' premise and its simplicity fit it into exploitation subgenre, that is living through a revival nowadays (not that good exploitation flicks are made nowadays - it's just that the old ones are looked over, re-evaluated and adorn). Then there is also Hoffman, whose fame aged better than, for instance, Steve McQueen’s ("Getaway"). Could it be, perhaps, that I watched "Straw dogs" long ago when I was a kid, but the film was shown late so had to go to bed Before the end, so watching it through now was a sort of fulfilling experience to me?
But let's see other qualities of the film: there is a flawless and swift way of introducing the scene; as Amy (played by Susan George) walks the street of a dusty Irish village, there is a sense that she doesn't belong there; boys that stare at her breasts set the relationship of one-way desire between her and village. Both short, thin man and one more manly and butch approach her; but it's thin guy who appears to be her husband, David Sumner, mathematician, played by Hoffman. The other one turns out to be her old friend, as she origins from this village. Yet it's not the husband who wins this round as he backs up at the other guy's ego. Thus his relationship with the village is established too.
As it appears, David Is a thinker, not a fighter. The only one he can stand up to, is his wife, plump woman-child, bored and unsatisfied while he works on his book. But the menacing presence of crude workers is there, and as they smile with vile grins and nudge each other, we know that the film is going to end up with David and Amy, sieged in the house, while villagers are thumping at the door, eager to get more than their weekly payment is.
But before that comes the gang-rape scene; an event of which David Remains unaware till the end of the film. It is by Peckinpah's logic that Amy Is bound to start for a moment actually enjoying the rape because David is not only unable to protect her, but also not able to satisfy her in bed. It serves characterization but it doesn't work that way in real life, and this is the scene in this film that doesn't click.
Next scene is somewhat redeeming, as Peckinpah, through crosscutting, combines previous rape with the next scene of village festivity, forming a vortex of Amy's inner torture.
Then comes the siege, as David Puts one villager under his protection, while a mob is accusing him for murder. And perhaps the most fascinating thing in the film is inevitability with which the violence comes, it's like a train that runs into a known direction, the one we're equally awaiting and frightened of. As inevitable is David's transformation as he has to stand up to the mob; he realizes that if he lets them step a foot into his house, they will claim right to his dignity and all his property - including his wife (wherein we notice that Peckinpah's insisting on previous rape scene caused inconstancy in this metaphor - as they already claimed right to his wife earlier).
This was the subject of controversy: is the urge to protect his territory the oldest, almost instinctive need of a man, as Peckinpah tried to show in this film - or is it just that he used it to exercise macho outlook of the world in which a weakling mathematician has nothing to do unless he starts to act like real man; probably both, but to reach to his point, Peckinpah used extreme means, that aren’t always very subtle. It is no doubt, still, that David is the character we’re most sympathetic with, even if his reluctance to act bold annoys us at times; Yes, standing up and killing someone is also one sort of a loss of virginity, and no matter how good consequences of that are, we still can’t help but feel sad for the loss of childhood, or for harmless, naive old David, uncorrupted by life.
And while we're at inevitability of violence that David Is about to do, there is this bear trap in the middle of the living room that emphasizes that inevitability. Presence of a deadly trap is just as menacing as the workers outside, and it is certain that it will be used to kill somebody - though we don't know who and how.
And then, there is Dustin Hoffman at his best. Cheers!
posted by Srdjan @ 12:14 PM
1 Comments:
I couldn't possibly agree more. Well written.
Post a Comment
<< Home