It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

I try and remove as much external context from any movie I watch as possible. If a movie was controversial or groundbreaking in some way at the time of release, then fine, but the more important factor to me will always be the 'is it actually any good though?' factor. In the case of Straw Dogs I don't see much more than an earnest yet somewhat creaky and slow-paced tale of rural torment, that ultimately ends up looking like a 70s western with added sex + violence. It didn't strike me as anything that original or re- watchable, and I can't imagine sitting through it again.Without giving any spoilers (to a 45 yr old film that everyone's seen) there were moments here that apparently shock to this day which I found to be fairly routine, rather than shocking. And it's not because I'm some hardened cinema tough guy whose seen it all (for example the stick-fight between Keith and Finger in Mike Leigh's Nuts In May gives me a nervous breakdown every time I watch it), but there just wasn't enough zing here to make anything jump out of the screen. The characters were well acted but barely beyond two-dimensional, the script was okayish but nothing spectacular, the incidental music was alright but sometimes clumsily applied.Ultimately Straw Dogs is a film that takes itself very seriously and as such everything that happens has a kind of morose inevitability about it (similar to a lot of old westerns, hence the earlier comparison). It's not a -bad- movie, but I can't help thinking the notoriety factor seems to have impacted on how a lot of people perceive the film on its own terms. I can't give it more than a 5/10.

David Sumner (Dustin Hoffman) is an American astro-mathematician city boy. He moves to his wife Amy's home village in Cornwall, southwestern England. He doesn't fit in the rural life. Her ex-boyfriend Charlie Venner is still interested. Charlie's friends are hired to repair the buildings. Their constant meddling start causing problems within the marriage.There's nobody to really root for in this movie. David and Amy start out as a happily married couple but for some unknown reasons, they start fighting. Out of the blue, she's flashing her boobs for the workers and he's coldly distant. Neither of them are that appealing. The connection drawn by Sam Peckinpah between violence and manhood could have been an interesting idea but this couple is really problematic. This movie is infamous for its violence and its rape scene. Amy's wandering eye really complicates matters, even the rape scene.

Minor Spoilers. I made a mistake and watched the remake first. I thought it was pretty good so i looked up the reviews for the original and they were mostly 8- 10s. So i got interested,I gotta say the remake is way better. The couple is unconvincing, they are more like two strangers living together. The women seems more in love with her rapists then her husband and she doesn't really care that hes being attacked and barely tries to help him. The first hour feels like its from a separate movie then the last hour. The fact that this movie was banned for a while astounds me. Sure it might've offended some people back in '71, but its far from gruesome. Skip this and watch the remake. Like i said just because its old doesn't make it a classic.

I was a 16 year old girl (maybe 15 cant remember) I read about it in the TV guide and decided to give it a go. I recorded it (too late for me) then watched it one cold winter evening alone in my bedroom. I remember what scared me the most! Tom Heddon, that big scary fat man! When he did his intimidation to David in the pub I was literally shaking thinking this is my idea of hell being around such scary violent people. And one thing that also scared me was when Janice's cousin dragged her inside, I felt scared and glad I wasn't in her position, being stuck at home with these scary rapist men. And I remember thinking when I saw Amy and how young she was and how she reminded me of myself, how I wondered why she wasn't scared of anyone. I thought wow, shes a stronger girl than me, and I never wanna be in her or Janice's situation. Just watching it on TV scares me! I watched the film a couple more times in my 20s and I wasn't scared at all and neither of the idiot men really scared me, I suppose back then I was just an innocent teen! Just thought I'd share my little story.