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| Dustin Hoffman, Susan George, Peter Vaughan, Del Henney, Jim Norton, David Warner |
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Anamorphic
widescreen |
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Dolby Digital
5.1 |
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DTS |
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Trailer(s) |
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Featurette(s) |
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Documentary |
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Audio commentary
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Deleted scenes
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Concept art
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Multi-angle
feature |
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[last lines]
Henry Niles (David
Warner): I don't know my way home.
David Sumner (Dustin Hoffman): That's okay. I don't either.
An American mathematician retreats to his young wife's hometown in the English countryside, only to arouse the wrath of the primitive locals.
 Few
films in history have generated the kind of controversy that greeted
Sam Peckinpah's Straw Dogs on its release. Famously described
by Pauline Kael (in a surprisingly mixed review) as 'the first American
film that is a fascist work of art', the reaction from critics who
saw it as a misogyinistic celebration of violence gave the film
the worst kind of reputation. It was cut by several minutes for
its American theatrical release, and banned in Britain after a short
theatrical run, only to resurface on home video for the first time
just last year, when it was finally granted a certificate by the
British Board of Film Classification.
Today, over thirty years after its initial appearance, Straw Dogs remains a powerful film that elicits a strong response from any viewer. But a new generation of viewers and critics are taking a different stance toward the film, and the recent Criterion Collection two-disc DVD release is indicative of this new shift in critical opinion towards this infamous work. Viewing the film from a contemporary perspective, Peckinpah seems more like a highly perceptive misanthrope than the misogynist pig the consensus opinion once made him out to be. Definite interpretation of the film's intended meaning also remains problematic due to the disparate elements at play within the picture: characters' behavior ranges from the brilliantly observed subtle nuances of a marriage that's more like an emotional war zone, to the over-the-top caricatures that make up the primitive Cornish population. Representing the caveman mentality at its worst, one could argue that Hoffman's!
final acts of bloody retribution are more a defeat than a victory. What makes this reading problematic, however, is the extent to which his wimpy, pacifist character is made to look ridiculous throughout the first part of the film, causing audiences desperate for some kind of affirmative action in the picture to yell out phrases like 'Kill them all!' during the film's controversial climax. The famous rape scene is similarly difficult to give a definite analysis, consisting as it does of a complex, vividly edited mixture of actions, reactions and emotions. But whatever your own interpretation of Straw Dogs is, it remains a fascinating example of cinema's potentially polarizing nature, and true talent's unique ability to engage the viewer in moral issues that may prove impossible to resolve. |
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Different special edition DVDs are available in North-America (a two-disc set from the Criterion Collection) and in the UK (a single-disc release). The UK release has two audio commentary tracks, a location report and several interview with various cast members among the extras. The Criterion release has a single audio commentary, a feature-length documentary on Sam Peckinpah, a few recent interviews and archival location reports, and more text-based supplements. Neither one has region encoding. A movie-only release is also available in North-America from Anchor Bay, encoded for Region 1, without anamorphic enhancement. The Criterion Collection release (which will be available for a limited time only) served as the basis for this review.
The anamorphic widescreen image
is framed at an aspect ratio of approx. 1.78:1. Always a murky, unpleasant film to look at in its previous home video incarnations, the transfer on this release is nothing short of revelatory. The print looks amazingly clean, with barely a scratch or a bit of dirt in sight, and offers a wealth of well-defined visual detail. Colors are also far more natural than any previous video version allowed for, and even the darkly lit final section of the film boasts impressive detail and strong blacks.
The original mono soundtrack is presented in Dolby Digital 1.0. It's been cleaned up and restored using hiss removal technology, and the resulting track sounds adequate, though it does sound shrillish and is disappointingly lacking in bass. An alternate audio track holds the isolated score and sound effects, and allows Jerry Fielding's eerie dissonants to come a little further to the fore, though it would have been preferable to do without the effects, as they tend to intrude unpleasantly on the music.
Films as controversial and polarizing as Straw Dogs cry out for special edition DVDs that offer the right level of historical context while investigating and re-evaluating the film from a contemporary perspective as well. The Criterion Collection has outdone itself on this occasion and more than lived up to the challenge of offering a well-rounded analysis that covers every angle while also offering a technically perfect presentation of the film itself. Kudos therefore to The Criterion Collection for raising the bar yet again on their own remarkable accomplishments.
Starting with disc one, the only supplement besides the isolated score and effects track (which is discussed above) is a superlative audio commentary track from film scholar and Criterion regular Stephen Prince. He proclaims Straw Dogs to be Peckinpah's masterpiece and then continues to defend it on all the points for which it has so frequently been criticized. He uses screen-specific evidence to support his own arguments and his general interpretation of the film, and does so both entertainingly and convincingly. The film remains open to other legitimate interpretations besides that of Prince, but his lucid, intelligent analysis will prove thought-provoking even to the most convinced enemies of the film.
Moving on to disc two, the main addition here is the 82-minute BBC-produced documentary 'Sam Peckinpah: Man of Iron'. This excellent overview of the director's troubled career and personality consists mostly of interview footage with regular collaborators like Kris Kristofferson, Jason Robards, James Coburn and several others. Unfortunately, the film clips originally used within the documentary had to be replaced by still photographs due to rights issues. But this formidable and insightful documentary is still a must-see for anyone with an interest in American film history. It draws a very vivid picture of one of cinema's most influential and most colorful personalities.
Somewhat more specific to Straw Dogs itself is the 26-minute featurette 'On Location: Dustin Hoffman', produced for television back in 1971, in which we follow the young movie star through several moods around the location shoot of the film. This excellent vintage piece is nicely complemented by an eight-minute collection of Behind-the-Scenes footage, shot for British TV in black-and-white, and missing the audio for the last minute. This item is cheesier than the longer Hoffman doc, but it's still a fascinating bit of virtual time travel. Two solid interviews conducted just recently with actress Susan George and producer Daniel Melnick offer more specifics on the production, including some wonderful anecdotes and tales about the controversy that greeted the film's release.
A selection of correspondence from Peckinpah is included here in a series of text screens, in which the director responds to criticisms leveled at his picture by a few critics and viewers. As Stephen Prince observes in his commentary track, Peckinpah's response probably did more harm than good, as his replies leave as much room for interpretation as his film does. But they are intelligently written and interesting to read. Finally, the theatrical trailer along with three TV spots rounds out the extras on the second disc. The set is completed by a marvelous 20-page booklet containing an articulate essay and a rare 1974 interview with Peckinpah. In a wonderfully customer-friendly move, the Criterion Collection has informed buyers by way of a sticker on the box that this is a limited edition set that will only be available for a limited time, after which it is likely to go the way of The Killer, Saló and This is Spinal !
Tap, and start fetching enormous OOP prices on eBay. Our advice is to get it while it's still readily available: it's a choice you're not likely to regret.
 The
animated menu screen has the front cover image blurring in and out
of focus, accompanied by some jarring cues from the score. The main
menu on disc two is similarly designed, using a still of Susan George
as its background. Navigation and relevant annotations are impeccable,
as is always the case with Criterion Collection releases.
Dan
Hassler-Forest
Reviewed:
May 2, 2003
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here for IMDB info on Straw Dogs.
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