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Monday, May 16, 2011

Trailer Dissection: Straw Dogs

The department of Totally Unnecessary Remakes, in conjunction with Stories Like This Worked A Lot Better in the 1970s and Somewhere Sam Peckinpah is Super Pissed, presents:


Hey, Born Yesterday! An excellent movie about a somewhat nerdy guy who battles a brute for a pretty blonde woman. Something tells me that Straw Dogs is really going to hammer its themes over the audience's head.


In real estate location is everything. If movies have taught me anything, it's that a secluded house (not to mention a huge house with plenty of places to hide and be found) is the location where you will be murdered.


The law of glasses in movies: A girl in glasses is plain, even if she's played by Hollywood's most beautiful actress. A man in glasses is wimpy, even if he's played by an actor who has not only played a superhero, but has maintained his superhero physique. To be fair, the protagonist of the original Straw Dogs wore glasses, too, but he also looked like Dustin Hoffman.


Trucker hats? Check. Cammo? Check. Generally seeming like they just walked out of the bar scene from The Accused? Super check. Fellas, you're hired.


He's probably thinking that this would be so easy it wouldn't even be worth it. But, on the other hand, he's got to kill the time somehow.


The power relationship here could only be made clearer if Alexander Skarsgard was holding a power tool at crotch level.


I think she's just realized that this isn't going to be a thought-provoking exploration of violence against women but a more standard issue exploitation/revenge tale which involves her being exploited and him becoming a real man by getting to do the revenge part.


Well, it's nice that they at least threw her a bone by letting her shoot someone.


I knew things wouldn't work out with that house.


... And here's the exploitation part (the trailer friendly part of it, anyway)...


... And here's the revenge part.


So there you have it. Straw Dogs, a movie its makers want you to see so badly that they basically show you the whole thing in the trailer:

2 comments:

Unknown said...

This looks - excuse my French - fucking dreadful.

Not to mention pointless. What's next to be remade? A Clockwork Orange? And when will the remakes of reboots start? Seriously, this pisses me off more than pretty much anything else about Hollywood at the moment. Grr!

Norma Desmond said...

Let's hope no one is ever stupid enough to remake A Clockwork Orange.