No Surrender Cinema: Straw Dogs (2011)
In a world where people are tired of being pushed around, how much does it take before one man pushes back? How far would you go to protect your home, your wife, and yourself from those who seek to do you harm? These are the questions that will be answered in No Surrender Cinema this month as we look at James Marsden and Kate Bosworth’s fight for survival in Straw Dogs!
Released 40 years after the original (which starred Dustin Hoffman in the role of David Sumner, the character portrayed by Marsden here), the modern adaptation of Straw Dogs tweaks a few things from the original, but maintains the overall plot and feel. Screenwriter David and his actress wife Amy venture back to her hometown to settle affairs after the passing of her father. The couple aren’t in town long before David is mocked for being out of his element. David looks exactly how you would picture a middle aged screenwriter who’s wading the murky waters of Hollywood to look; his clothes are right out of a GQ ad, he’s got hipster glasses, and a fancy car. The fact that he’s working on a screenplay about the World War II Battle of Stalingrad just adds an extra dose of pretentiousness to his character, and that’s not good when the locals, especially Amy’s ex-boyfriend Charlie Venner (Alexander Skarsgard), catch wind of the couple being in town. It’s not that David’s unlikable, but he’s clearly a beta male intimidated by the townies and drunks that populate this film’s version of Small Town, USA.
It’s obvious from the get go that Amy is Charlie’s “one that got away”; he slides next to her in a restaurant booth the moment her husband walks away. The same bar, where Charlie is a regular, has an old high school picture of the couple still posted front and center. Amy is clearly frustrated by Charlie’s actions, but dummy David unknowingly feeds into Charlie’s designs on Amy by hiring him and his crew of ruffians to fix the roof on Amy’s father’s house. Amy grows angry when Charlie and his crew ogle her during her morning run, but when she expresses her concerns to David, he spins it back on her saying that maybe she intended on getting their attention. In a rather awkward scene, Amy’s anger towards Charlie and the crew manifests into her flashing them all. Shit starts going further south from there, as Charlie’s crew antagonize David at every turn. This is your tradiational Southern town that appears to be frozen in time, with very few residents making it to bigger, greener pastures. They get drunk, get rowdy, watch football, and go to church. The fact that David isn’t down with any of that keeps him on everyone’s shit list, but by this point David could fart in a Taco Bell and still be seen as public enemy number one.
David’s obliviousness and pacifism begin to grate on Amy, causing a rift between the two. During a fight between the town drunk/football coach (James Woods) and a mentally disabled man (Dominic Purcell), it’s Amy who steps in. She chides David for not doing anything, but David refrains. When they get home and find their cat has been hanged, Amy starts wondering just how much more shit is going to have to happen for David to do what Macho Man wanted Hulk Hogan to do and BE A MAN. While David is taken away from the home under the guise of a hunting trip, Charlie’s obsession with Amy takes a dark turn when his aggressive pining leads to rape. On top of that, once Charlie finishes the deed, he sits back and does nothing as one of his underlings, Norman, also rapes her. Amy doesn’t reveal the details of the attack to David, but David senses she’s upset over something and says they won’t be bullied out of the home; he fires Charlie and the crew the next morning.
All of the psychological warfare that went on during the first 2/3 of Straw Dogs takes us into the final act, where the battle of wills finally descends into violence. Purcell’s character Jeremy, the “village idiot” of sorts”, accidentally smothers his underage girlfriend while hiding from her father (Woods). The coach recruits Charlie’s gang of dirtballs to help him find his daughter, and the Sumner’s streak of bad luck continues when they run Jeremy over on their way home. When Coach and crew get wind that Jeremy is holed up at the Sumner house waiting for medical attention, they converge on the property, looking to harm him. The arrival of the sheriff (Laz Alonso, currently starring on The Boys as Mother’s Milk) does nothing to quell their hostile nature, and things escalate further when Coach Heddon shoots him dead. Realizing the gravity of the situation, David morphs into the ultimate protector, gathering whatever he can from around the house to fend off the assault. Hot oil, nail guns, and bear traps all come into play as David’s boiling point has been reached, and he prepares to take out the small town trash.
Straw Dogs is light on the action until the final act, but the psychological aspect of the plot is enough to keep viewers hooked and wanting to see David get justice for himself and his wife. David is aloof and blissfully unaware of how his attitude appears towards the town and his wife, but he doesn’t mean to be that way… it’s more like a kneejerk reaction caused by his Hollywood attitude. Meanwhile, you’d never known Amy was a famous actress aside from the few times it’s mentioned. Instead, she’s portrayed as the small town girl who made good who thinks she still knows how to “handle” these types, until it’s made clear that she’s seen as just another object. Charlie’s longing for her isn’t out of her being the “one that got away”, but rather an act of jealousy, and allowing his friend to harm her in that fashion adds a new layer of disgust to a shitty human being. That said, the final act is built more on the Coach’s actions and the other men joining in the raid on the Sumner home than David picking off the group for the rape of his wife. It’s also a role reversal for David and Amy, as Amy’s broken will causes her to consider surrendering Jeremy to the violent mob, while David assures her that he will take care of them and she will be safe.
The original Straw Dogs is a controversial classic, so this reboot had a lot to live up to. There’s no denying that the original is the better of the two films, but Marsden becomes captivating during the climax, turning into a veritable MacGyver with his homemade arsenal and welcoming the challenge of Charlie and co. Telling one of the wounded men, who is stuck in a broken window, that he hopes he “slits his f–king throat” and matter of factly waiting for the men to break in shows that any trace of his pacifist nature is long gone and he’s making up for lost time. Those final minutes of the film are the most fun, because we’ve been rooting for David to finally do something, and these are all men who deserve his violent reaction.
This version of Straw Dogs makes the rounds on streaming apps quite often, including perennial Bulletproof Action favorite Tubi, and has been seen on the Starz/Encore family of premium cable channels. Though some may feel that the film drags or glorifies sexual abuse, the major plot point of the film (good people getting pushed to the brink, and the resulting fallout) was done very well. Having seen the original years ago I knew what to expect going in, so the shocking moments weren’t all that shocking (though they were equally as uncomfortable as the ’71 release). Technically you could call it an exploitation film, but I’ll simply call it something you should add to your queue if you’re looking for an entertaining thriller.
