Review of Straw Dogs (1971) by Mike M — 13 Nov 2008

One to rank alongside "Salo" and "Irreversible" in the pantheon of horribly effective features, films it's possible to admire technically and viscerally, even as you object to them on a dozen other levels and come away feeling in need of a long hot shower afterwards.

.. Particularly contentious for having arrived around the time of the peace protests and the beginnings of the feminist revolution: at best, it could be understood as blunt mischief-making on the part of Peckinpah the provocateur; at worst, a load of reactionary macho codswallop.

George, introduced as a pair of erect nipples, has remarkably little to do save sit around and wait for something bad to happen to her, while the central rape scene appears fundamentally mishandled, allowed to become more ambiguous (and more of a sideshow) than it should have been.

You could call it the origins of ordeal cinema, but what it leads to is not "Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer" or "Funny Games", the last words in home-invasion terror, but misdirected posturing like "Straightheads", and Eli Roth leering and sniggering at boobs, bloodshed and backwards foreigners in those "Hostel" movies.