Rating: 
Summary: Great movie but has the slow spots & bad teeth of real life
Review: My one line summary is my review
Rating: 
Summary: GLAD IT'S BANNED
Review: The BBFC probably banned this film in England because it's so poor. The acting is wooden, which is a shame because Hoffman is a stunning actor. The rest of the cast just act like trees and the plot is full of holes. The only thing this film has going for it is the nice country setting - and the giant mantrap. Sadly this is not a good film.
Rating:
Summary: What's the big deal?
Review: I just saw this video, and I wasn't very impressed. The violence wansn't shocking or graphic, really. And since the Amazon reviewer mentioned it, Clockwork Orange was a much better study of violence. I would say that Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid stands as Peckinpah's best film. Despite everything I have said, Hoffman, as usual, was excellent.
Rating: 
Summary: QUINTESSENTIAL PECKINPAH!!!
Review: This picture displays both the best of Sam Peckinpah and the worst!If there is any movie I love and hate in equal measure, this is it! One one hand, Peckinpah shines brighter than he ever had or would again by showing the neceseity of violence! For three-quarters of the picture everything is quiet, painfully quiet. We watch docile Dustin Hoffman allow a bunch of bullying ruffians, harrass him, murder his cat and rape his wife. And then in the film's final quarter, Hoffman fights back and defends his home in an absolutely intoxicating, adrenaline rush of violence the likes of which has never been seen before or since. This finale is made all the more effective by the dead quiet that has presided over most of the picture. What I disliked about this picture, was it's message about women provided by the horribly sexist Peckinpah. Like "The Wild Bunch", Peckinpah seems to say that women are the downfall of the male gender. The married mathemetician Hoffman plays is quiet and spineless, unable to stand up for himself because his wife has symbolically castrated him. Only, at the end, when Hoffman leaves his wife and defends his property has he symbolically gotten his balls back. I cannot forgive Peckinpah for his apparent hatred towards women, but as a statement about repressed violence, I must give this movie five stars because I cannot deny the brilliance of it!
Rating:
Summary: Absolutely terrible DVD transfer!!!!!!!
Review: DVD usually offers a much better picture than VHS videotapes. However whoever did the transfer of this film to DVD needs to get another job. During the entire finale of this film the picture was so distorted I ended up shuting the movie off. Little dark squares seem to pop up all over the screen. Also there seems to have been a problem whenever there was an outdoor shot that had fog in it (which is the entire climax). The characters move around in the fog as if they were shot with a stop motion camera. This is one movie where you should definately keep your VHS copy.
Rating: 
Summary: Wait! Don't turn it off yet....stay for the ending.
Review: Straw Dogs was one of the boringest films I had seen in some time (first forty five minutes). The last forty minutes, or so, was so intense I barely took a breath (afterall, Sam Peckinpaugh did direct it). A very good study of the human animal's potential for violence no matter how tame they might appear. Good performance from Dustin Hoffman.
Rating:
Summary: Peckinpah's psychological character study
Review: I remember hearing Charlton Heston once remark about Sam Peckinpah that the man had a great career and vision but then sadly "started blowing off heads." Heston may be right in his analysis of Peckinpah's dedication to dramatic violence, as one need look no further than the closing sequences of the seminal "Wild Bunch" to see a death toll of truly shocking proportions. This director's proclivity for bloody violence, usually shown in slow motion to ratchet up the effect, doesn't find as much expression in the 1971 psychological thriller "Straw Dogs." There are a few nasty encounters with a shotgun peppered throughout the final twenty or thirty minutes of this atmospheric picture, but nary a head leaves its shoulders here. Starring Dustin Hoffman, a few years after his stint in "The Graduate," and a fresh-faced Susan George, "Straw Dogs" spends more time setting up a pervasive sense of doom than concerning itself with a huge body count. Actually, this movie's restraint is surprising for a Peckinpah picture. Then again, I haven't seen a lot of Sammy's films, so perhaps this movie falls into a period when the director felt a need for moderation. David Sumner (Hoffman) and his British wife Amy (George) decide to rent a cottage in England while David works on writing a book. The village the two decide to live in has intimate connections with Amy Sumner, who lived there before meeting and marrying the bookish David. A gang of local thugs, who the Sumners hire to repair the roof of the cottage's barn, well remembers Amy. One of the guys actually had a relationship with this mouthy woman, a link that bodes ill for the amiable but wimpy David. Even worse, the goons have the support of the primary troublemaker in town, a man who even the local constable tiptoes around. The Brits resent David's slightly arrogant manner, his nerdy appearance, and the fact that he goes home with one of their own every night. Disrespect for David takes mild forms at first, usually in the form of funny looks or comments muttered under the breath, but soon the tension between the men and the Sumners escalates into the murder of a pet cat and intimidation on the road leading into the village. David rationalizes away the threats by stating that the problem will simply "go away" if he ignores it. His wife, who seems to know more about how things work in town, urges David to confront the local men. The tension becomes palpable as Sumner must deal not only with the hostility of the local populace but with his wife's strident calls for action as well. It soon gets to the point where Amy questions David's manhood over his meek manners and sycophantic behavior. Things go from bad to worse when Amy's former boyfriend, who sees David's simpering personality as a sign of weakness, decides to reassert his claim to Amy. In a scene that led to a ban on the film in Great Britain for three decades, the gang lures David away from the house so Amy's former beau can pay her a visit. The subsequent scenes are tough to watch, not necessarily because of their brutality but due to Amy's response to part of the proceedings. Not until another goon steps in does Amy show great resistance to what has happened, leading a viewer to believe that David's wife actually encouraged this sleazy rendezvous. Peckinpah seems to want us to think so, since Amy casts aspersions on David's manhood immediately before this incident. Surprisingly, Amy's misfortune is not the final straw that breaks the dog's back. Instead, a local criminal accidentally kills a local girl affiliated with the same village dregs making David's life miserable. Subsequent events find David providing sanctuary for this criminal as the thugs lay siege to the Sumner cottage. The result: a meek, educated man regresses into an animal capable of incredible violence. "Straw Dogs" moves at a glacial pace as Peckinpah builds tension through the encounters between the Sumners and the locals. The performances are generally good, with Hoffman standing out as the harassed mathematician who wants to leave well enough alone and finish his work. David Warner, a personal favorite, does a good job as the mentally challenged criminal Henry Niles. Unfortunately, Warner doesn't appear onscreen as much as I would have liked. The thugs are, well, thugs. Susan George, on the other hand, grates as Amy Sumner. I hated her character, a woman who is quick to push David into confrontation, calls into question his manhood when he resists her efforts, and then essentially stands back in the end by letting him face the goons all by himself. Amy's reacquaintance with her former boyfriend creates a sense of ambiguity on the part of the viewer towards Amy Sumner: on one level, you hate her for "enjoying" the crime, but on the other hand you feel for her when things go further than she anticipated. But you feel sorry only to a point, and perhaps that is what Peckinpah intended. I cannot help but think this director created the Amy character in order to express a deep-seated misogyny. Overall, I liked "Straw Dogs," but I wouldn't watch it again soon. I unfortunately watched the Anchor Bay DVD version, but a Criterion disc has since emerged sporting lots of extras that might shine a spotlight or two on the inner workings of the film. If you want to watch this picture, you should probably get that disc. Obviously, there won't be a Peckinpah commentary on the DVD (he's been dead for years), but Criterion does a good job with its releases. For me, I think I'll stick to "The Wild Bunch" and "The Getaway" in the future.
Rating:
Summary: Peckinpahs masterpiece
Review: Forget THE WILD BUNCH, personally I found STRAW DOGS to be the crowning achievement of Sam Peckinpah's career. An American mathematician (Dustin Hoffman) and his sexy British wife Susan George are tired of the violence of the US so move to the wife's home town in England. What seems to be an idyllic new beginning is shattered when they find themselves harrassed by several local hooligans. Watching STRAW DOGS is like being subjected to chinese water torture, Peckinpah builds the tension slowly and with such expertise that though everybody knows what is going to happen to the couple it's a matter of WHEN. The violence is not glamorised, nor as graphic as the likes of I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE. I'm not a huge geek or anything, but I will say that this is the type of movie intellectuals pee their pants over and debate over tiny cups of espresso in arty-farty cafes. As more of a beer and meatball sub kinda guy I'll spare you the varisty style nonsense and say that STRAW DOGS is a definite must-see, with Hoffman giving one of his best performances (which is REALLY saying something considering the likes of LENNY, PAPILLON etc etc). Peckinpah has never been darker (or better).
Rating:
Summary: HORRIBLE!!!
Review: I agree with another reviewer in that you'll either love this or hate it. But I think most people will hate it. (Note: I have nothing against violence in films, and I liked the Kill Bill movies.) The main problem here is that almost every character in this film is utterly unlikable, and terrible things happen to the two characters who are likeable. But even that wouldn't be so bad, if the film had a message. Dustin Hoffman's character is a whiney, wimpy, and mean spirited person who, when he finally decides to act, he does so for all of the wrong reasons & defends the wrong person. I end up hating him MORE than the bad guys.
I rank this as the most unwatchable movie I have ever seen, even below "Short Cuts".
However, if you liked "Short Cuts", you'd probably like this, and vice versa.
Rating:
Summary: One of the most solid thrillers ever made!
Review:
When a peaceful mathematics teacher is menaced by a group of hooligans around his house playing to be hard, will suddenly know this sleeper giant which exists in the deepest regions of the human soul.
The rage has never been so eloquent and graphically shown on screen never before. Dustin Hoffman elaborates an impressive portrait of rising fury, irrational behavior when you defy the unknown limits of the patience. To my mind Hoffman made with this towering performance one of five masterworks: Lenny, Little big man, Rain man, Midnight cowboy and this one.
Extraordinary camera work , outstanding performances and frenetic atmosphere in the climax final sequence confirm once more the artistic virtues of Sam Peckinpah one of my favorite American filmmakers ever.
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