Rent The Power of the Dog (2021)

Excellent Drama - The Power of the Dog review by GI

A mysterious psychodrama with a menacing atmosphere to it and arguably director Jane Campion's best film since The Piano (1993). It's a slow burning drama with a lethal ending that creeps up on you and takes you completely by surprise. Benedict Cumberbatch and Jesse Plemons plays two brothers, Phil and Charlie, who own and run a ranch in 1925 Montana. Whereas Charlie is a gentile, quiet man Phil is a brooding bully, a boorish man who continually insults his brother but is emotionally reliant on him. When Charlie marries widow Rose (Kirsten Dunst) Phil is driven to outrage and begins a campaign to harass and ridicule her. But he is also oddly transfixed by her sensitive teenage son, Peter (Kodi Smit-McPhee) and starts to teach him how to ride and 'man up'. Peter seems drawn to the attention that Phil gives him whilst also worrying about his mother who, under Phil's constant torment, begins to fall into depression and alcoholism. Cumberbatch is excellent in this film, capturing the complexity of the character of Phil, from his festering resentments to his strange sensitivities and behaviours. Dunst too is superb as the wife who is slowly driven to despair under the subtle but maliciousness of Phil. This is a film that creeps up on you, it cleverly avoids revealing itself, indeed you'll think you have worked out what'll happen but chances are you'll be wrong. It's a story where the pieces fall into place right at the end but are present from the beginning. This is a gothic tale, a film made with real artistry. I highly recommend it.

Flea bitten - The Power of the Dog review by cr

Weighing it at over 2 hours this "slow burn" drama left me cold. Yet again the lovies fawn over this oscar laden epic and yet there is little or no entertainment value here. Like diana which i saw recently this is a pyschological drama which is heavily signposted by characters doing illogical things and really irritating music.

We are told that the ranchers in question are wealthy and yet they share the same bedroom with 2 single beds. If phil is so outraged by his wife and brother why doesnt he move out? He is a grown man!

There are good performances but you need to be engaged and care about the characters and all of them are unappealing.

Not recommended.

The Power of the Dog - a review - The Power of the Dog review by WS

It’s 1925, and the West is no longer the "Wild West". The trappings of modernity - radio, recorded sound, and magazines - are starting to seep into everyday life even in remote rural Montana. Brothers Phil (Benedict Cumberbatch) and George (Jesse Plemons) are prosperous ranchers who, whilst on a cattle drive, spend the night at an inn run by the widowed Rose Gordon and waited upon by her effete, toothpick-thin son, Peter. George asks Rose to marry him, and she moves into the mansion the brothers share, much to the disapproval of the supercilious and sarcastic Phil, who despises her as a gold-digger. The arrangement works out well for Peter, who is able to enrol in medical school with George's money, but Phil starts to wage psychological warfare on Rose, undermining her already fragile mental state. He mocks her piano-playing skills and stymies her attempts to improve by playing the banjo in the next room.

Eventually Phil takes a shine to Peter, who turns out to have far more iron in his soul than his fragile physique and soft demeanour would suggest. He teaches the boy to ride and starts plaiting him a rawhide rope, promising him that when it's finished he'll teach him how to use it, and they go on a trek together into the wilderness. Rose, meanwhile, steadily disintegrates, becoming an alcoholic.

This film requires the viewer's undivided attention, as plot points and the characters' motives aren't always clearly signposted. The sublime New Zealand landscape stands in well for the Rocky Mountains, and we get a masterful performance from Benedict Cumberbatch as a hyper-confident lone wolf. Whilst not altogether a likeable character, he has some good qualities - he's hard-working, focussed, sober and has no desire to ingratiate himself with his social superiors. What I found particularly fascinating about this film was its edgy and politically-incorrect take on masculinity. There are surely echoes of "Fight Club" here - remember where Tyler Durden says "We're a generation raised by women...I'm wondering if another woman is really the answer we need"? This sums up Phil's attitude and even that of the film - that women are a demoralising, strength-sapping influence on young men. "Don't let your mother turn you into a sissy!" Phil exhorts the young lad. It is not clear whether we, the viewer, are meant to sympathise with this intensely male-centred worldview, or see it as nihilistic and self-destructive.

I've no intrinsic objection to films that are atmosphere- rather than plot-led, or those that rely heavily on using established genre tropes in an apparently unironic way. But I found the limited character development to be less than satisfying. Phil, a man with no unmet needs and nothing to prove, is really more like a force of nature than a human being, so in his case, the fact that he doesn't evolve or progress isn't really a shortcoming - “change” for him would be a fracture. But it’s a little perplexing that George stays so passive in the face of Rose’s increasing dipsomania and depression. And we don’t really get any sense of how Peter’s ambitions or sense of self have evolved as a result of his experiences. So, it's hardly a "coming of age" story, either.

I also found the brothers' backstory to be sketchy and unconvincing. I can easily imagine Phil (who we learn is a university graduate) as a self-sufficiency nut, spurning a predictable middle-class life to become a rancher. Not so the mild-mannered, bowler-hatted George, who looks every inch an insurance actuary. We never see him doing any manual work and it's not clear what he contributes to the enterprise or why the men put up with each other.

An intellectually stimulating film but one that left me feeling emotionally disengaged, I’m undecided between "quite" and "very good". Seeing as it’s got a 95% critics’ approval rating, and I’m in a contrarian mood, I think I’ll round it down to 3 stars.