75
Metascore
11 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100Slant MagazineChuck BowenSlant MagazineChuck BowenOne of the most ambiguous, neurotic, and disturbing of all American films.
- 100TV Guide MagazineTV Guide MagazineStraw Dogs is one of Sam Peckinpah's finest films, a relentless study in violence and machismo that is shocking, not only for its explicit gore, but for the degree to which it manipulates "civilized" audiences. Even the most passive viewer may find himself silently cheering on the carnage at the film's climax--an act that, in retrospect, gives much cause for discomfort.
- 100Slant MagazineNick SchagerSlant MagazineNick SchagerSitting through Peckinpah’s controversial classic is not unlike watching a lit fuse make its slow, inexorable way toward its combustible destination—the taut build-up is as shocking and vicious as its fiery conclusion is inevitable.
- 100The A.V. ClubScott TobiasThe A.V. ClubScott TobiasThough studio interference and his own personal demons hampered his later work, Straw Dogs shows a master in control of his effects, which made an artist of Peckinpah's sensibility an especially dangerous man.
- If The Wild Bunch was Peckinpah's most violent film, surely Straw Dogs has to be his coarsest and most intense. Peace and love? Forget it.
- 60The New YorkerPauline KaelThe New YorkerPauline KaelDespite Peckinpah’s artistry, there’s something basically grim and crude in Straw Dogs. It’s no news that men are capable of violence, but while most of us want to find ways to control that violence, Sam Peckinpah wants us to know that that’s all hypocrisy.
- 50Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertChicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertThe most offensive thing about the movie is its hypocrisy; it is totally committed to the pornography of violence, but lays on the moral outrage with a shovel.
- 50The New York TimesVincent CanbyThe New York TimesVincent CanbyIt is an intelligent movie, but interesting only in the context of his other works.