Power of the Dog, The (Jane Campion, 2021) wr. Jane Campion, novel by Thomas Savage, prod. Emile Sherman, Iain Canning, Roger Frappier, Jane Campion, Tanya Seghatchian; Benedict Cumberbatch, Jesse Plemons, Kirsten Dunst; psychodrama: two ranch-owning brothers in Montana; won Best Director Venice; Netflix Original
Owen Gleiberman:
... All of this should build, slowly and inexorably, in force and emotion. But for a film that’s actually, at heart, rather tidy and old-fashioned in its triangular gamesmanship, The Power of the Dog needed to get to a more bruising catharsis. In its crucial last act, the film becomes too oblique. Cumberbatch has the showpiece role, and he’s good, but there’s not enough dramatic layering to Phil’s repression and violence. Campion has made a movie whose dramatic upshot is to denounce homophobia — an unassailable message. But maybe, at this point, not a revelatory one. The Piano was wrenching because it channeled the passion that social oppression couldn’t hold back. The Power of the Dog is more like an artful diagram of passion. Variety.
Keast, Jackie 2021, 'Jane Campion wins Silver Lion in Venice', IF.
Garry Gillard | New: 14 September, 2021 | Now: 26 January, 2024