The Power of the Dog

The Power of the Dog (2021)

Watch the new Jane Campion film they said. It’s the Oscar front-runner they said. What they did not say was that I’d be an anxious wreck most of the way through it. Thanks to the director’s previous form (The Piano, Holy Smoke) I expected a lusty sexcapade not a Hitchcockian slow burn.

Based on the 1967 novel by Thomas Savage and adapted for screen with Oscar-winning pedigree by Campion. It is 1925 and the wealthy Burbank brothers have settled on a Montana cattle ranch. Their distant relationship is further fraught when one (Jesse Plemons) marries Kirsten Dunst and inherits her peculiar son (Kodi Smit-McPhee).

Benedict Cumberbatch plays Phil Burbank who is not at all thrilled with this new arrangement and sets out to intimidate his new family with tuneful whistling and slow heavy footsteps in rattling spurs.

It’s never clear why George Burbank is estranged from Phil; probably because he’s a bully. Or, why his new wife Rose becomes a drunk; probably because of the incessant torment to play the piano. But I enjoyed her descent into A Steetcar Named Desire territory.

The tone occasionally shifts from menace to homoerotica when Phil changes his tune and takes a shine to his new step-nephew. But I found myself laughing at the obvious metaphors just to alleviate the tension.

Good performances all round but they needn’t compete in the Oscar race. Though it would be nice for Dunst, who by now has been ignored by the Academy for 30 years (how good was she in Interview with a Vampire?!). As usual I have high praise for the cinematography. New Zealand steals the show while Montana’s Tourist Board screams into a pillow.

If you need speed and high jinks this is not for you. Same applies if you’re a vegetarian - I should know I was sat with two of them. But hula-hoop your frustrations away and lose yourself in the majestic mountain landscapes.

7 Gaping Bloody Thumbs Up 👍🏻