Straw Dogs

Si vous ne connaissez pas l’original de 1971, alors vous percevrez ce film comme un thriller correct. Le réalisateur a fait du bon boulot avec les personnages (bien que certains choix de casting soient contestables), les paysages filmés sont beaux à voir et la montée en tension fonctionne. Même la transposition du thème à l’époque contemporaine tient la route. Pour le jeune public de Twilight, le film peut procurer une expérience sympa (contrairement à Psycho de Van Sant, lequel était une erreur de la nature). Mais les fans de la première heure se demanderont pourquoi ils devraient se farcir ce remake, puisque l’histoire est la même, mais qu’il n’y a ni la présence de Dustin Hoffman ni les astuces de Peckinpah. Et ce Sony Vaio sur le bureau du protagoniste central n’évoquera rien de glorieux. (22/01/2012)

I saw this remake long before the original of the same name from 1971, and I have to say, it's not even close to as good the original. What is desperately lacking here is suspense and atmosphere. The bland lead actor James Marsden probably needs no mentioning, he will never be Dustin Hoffman. (45%) (04/03/2021)

Rod Lurie failed to properly create an atmosphere. It's nice that he tries to approach the film with a more modern approach, but it doesn't matter because the old one doesn't lose anything in relevance. The beast can manifest in us at any time. Peckinpah used nudity and violence to emphasize the significance of the film, but today's creators are afraid of that. The new "Straw Dogs" are just a poor example of the direction in which these "mainstream" horror films, especially remakes, are heading. Empty confessions that don't even come close to the original movies. (12/02/2014)

The new Straw Dogs is a fairly decent but awfully pointless film. It’s even more pointless than other remakes, because there are already two versions of the same film, and one of them is only two years old. Yeah, I’m speaking about Deliver Us from Evil, an excellent Scandinavian film that I recommend to everyone. The new Straw Dogs I can only recommend to those who want to be on top of everything new that’s happening in the genre. It’s just a better average. (04/12/2011)

Quite suggestive filmmaking with an ingeniously deceiving direction. What initially appears as another dumb teenage killing road movie eventually turns into a rough survival slasher, where everything fits together as it should, the characters play for their lives, and the plot has unprecedented twists. I haven't seen the remake, but it doesn't bother me that much. This movie works excellently on its own. (04/03/2012)