Review of Lawn Dogs (1997) by Sam I — 19 Jun 2006

To begin with Lawn Dogs seems a pleasent film, but nothing earth shattering but it sucks you in with a sensetive screenplay and well drawn characters that you come really to care for.

As Devon Mischa Barton is the anchor of the film and she's absolutely fantastic, showing an understanding of her character far beyond her tender years. There's challenging material for her too as the layers of her character slowly reveal themselves.

Sam Rockwell is also excellent as Trent. He's hardly squeaky clean (he's been to prison) but he's well meaning and relatively smart, smart enough to know how people will react to him and Devon being friends. The way Devon charms him works for the film because, first of all, it works for us but also because both treat it as an utterly innocent thing.

The scenes that Rockwell and Barton share are simply joyous, whether they are stealing chickens, dancing on the roof of Rockwell's truck or, in an enormously touching moment, showing each other their scars. That's my favourite moment of the film. Devon's scar is in the middle of her chest and when she starts to open her dress to show trent something Bartons delivery of "It's not my chest I want to show you, stupid" when he turns away is just perfect.

The cast is uniformly fantastic with Kathleen Quinlan and Christopher McDonald as Devon's parents and the brilliant Beth Grant cameoing as Trent's mum.