Straw Dogs (1971 film) Straw Dogs (1971 film) Straw Dogs is a 1971 psychological thriller film directed by Sam Peckinpah and starring Dustin Hoffman and Susan George. The screenplay, by Peckinpah and David Zelag Goodman, is lightly based upon Gordon M. Williams's 1969 novel, "The Siege of Trencher's Farm". The film's title derives from a discussion in the "Tao Te Ching" that likens people to the ancient Chinese ceremonial straw dog, being of ceremonial worth, but afterwards discarded with indifference. The film is noted for its violent concluding sequences and a complicated rape scene. Released theatrically in the same year as "A Clockwork Orange",
Straw Dogs (1971 film) in the context of his other works." "Variety" wrote, "The script (from Gordon M. Williams' novel "The Siege of Trencher's Farm") relies on shock and violence to tide it over weakness in development, shallow characterization and lack of motivation." "Entertainment Weekly" wrote that the contemporary interpretation was that of a "serious exploration of humanity's ambivalent relationship with the dark side", but it now seems an "exploitation bloodbath". Nick Schager of "Slant Magazine" rated it 4/4 stars and wrote, "Sitting through Peckinpah's controversial classic is not unlike watching a lit fuse make its slow, inexorable way toward its combustible destination—the taut