The Power of the Dog

by Linda Winsh-Bolard

The odds were stacked against me.

The film opens in 1920s Montana. I know Montana, and what is shown, is not Montana in any century. It is New Zealand.

The crucial set up for the following development is the restaurant scene. Only such a set up could never happen anywhere in the West. I know the history, and the social strafes, of the West rather well.

The kitchen scene, that leads to the marriage, which leads to the power war, is absurd. No single woman at the time could run a restaurant of any kind. Kitchens had number of people working in them at all times; it was that labor intensive.

It is hard to find the rest of the power struggle convincing, when the set up is false.

This film is about greed, greed for recognition, money and power, within a family. It is about insecurity of being different. It is about being helpless.

Such domestic wars are happening since the dawn of human kind, will be happening until the end of all humans.

In this particular film, the war is initiated by one of the brothers Phil (Benedict Cumberbatch) against his sibling, George Burbanks( Jesse Plemons), for a business they both work in. Who will be the boss, who deserves to be the boss, who will get the most of it, who will best the other.

George marries Rose Gordon (Kirsten Dunst), the restaurant owner, and a mother to Peter, whose proclivities might be close to Phil's. Phil distrusts her, despises her and belittles her and her son. In the sixties, when the novel, on which the film is based, was written, maybe people were surprised by Phil's homosexuality. In 2021 they were expecting him to be gay. Closeted gay man, furious about himself and all others, in a testosterone filled wild, wild West.

Except, the wild, wild West created by the often first generation Americans of Jewish background, coming in from the Eat, in Hollywood, never existed.
Much is made of the differences in appearance and behavior of the brothers. In 1920s West, the cowboys would have stayed, literally, at the wrong side of the tracks. The money did not mixed with those who worked for it. The social divide was firm, the trappings defined, crossing it nearly impossible. Choosing sides, the brothers chose the trappings.

Women of the West hardly resembled the weak, dependent, long suffering, bonnet wearing crowd trotting behind their men, shown in Hollywood movies. Western states granted women property rights and divorces at the drop of a hat. Women run all kinds of things, were no strangers to guns, initiated workers strikes and were experienced social climbers.

Rose was such woman before her marriage, we see her descending to hell because of family pressures. It is possible, certainly the acting of Dursten, Cumberbatch and Plemons, they are all excellent actors, makes it seem possible to believe, but it remains unlikely.

It is a slow, painful film, including the piano scene. Rose becomes the High Noon of the brothers fight, each certain that they are right. Secrets and family ties, none unexpected.

It is an art movie. Wonderfully shot, beautifully acted, minutely examining this one family at this time.

Jane Campion could have staged it in today's Kansas City; it would have made little difference to the story, but freed it from the Western label.

That would have been a good thing. It is not a Western.

If your favorite movies are Schenectady and Roma, you will love it.

If your idea of a western runs to Once Upon a Time in the West or Hostiles, you will not.


Written and directed by Jane Campion, based on novel by Thomas Savage, director of photography Ari Wegner, music by Johny Greenwood

*
I admit, the spat between Sam Elliot and Jane Campion made me revisit the review. Jane Campion is no more a cowboy than Sam Elliot is.

The West is not a mythical place, it is a real piece of land with defined history.

Elliot is right, no one trots around in chaps. Try it.