Charismatic rancher Phil Burbank inspires fear and awe in those around him. When his brother brings home a new wife and her son, Phil torments them until he finds himself exposed to the possibility of love.
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- Joe GDecember 29, 2025A beautifully shot film with confident direction and striking cinematography. The score does much of the heavy lifting, generating tension, fear, and sexual unease with remarkable precision. It creates the constant impression that something important is unfolding, all without ever showing much of anything at all. Nearly all action, context, or moments that would traditionally constitute dramatic interest occur offscreen. What remains is suggestion rather than substance. It’s difficult to say whether there is a complete story here, or even a clear point, beyond atmosphere itself. And yet, because of the score and visual control, what is shown feels charged, consequential, and heavy with meaning, even when nothing ultimately arrives. In that sense, the film functions as an experiment: a demonstration of how a director can manipulate audience emotion through craft alone. Individually, the elements are exceptional—acting, cinematography, music, and writing all operate at a high level. Collectively, however, they never coalesce into something substantial.
- jackmeatAugust 29, 2025My quick rating - 5.5/10. Guess I'll get one more in for #Oscars2022. I know I am going against the grain here, but this movie felt so "forced" to be important. And what is there important subject to touch upon? Homosexuality? That does say #Oscars2022 and not #Oscars1987. I had to pick some arbitrary year since this is NOT some new and taboo topic. This isn't because I have something against that, if it were actually the point of the movie. It, just like many other points of this movie, seems to be more just thrown in. Jane Campion does a great job directing this flick, most likely the highlight of the whole production. But the story is basically two brothers, one being Benedict Cumberbatch playing the more "cowboy" role of tough guy, which is a stretch in how he portrays it, and the other being Jesse Plemons. He is more of the educated college man married to a drunkard, played by Kirsten Dunst. I am naming everyone off since nearly everyone is up for an award this year. The alpha cowboy constantly pushes his brother around and sees his wife and her awkward son, Kodi Smit-McPhee, as an annoyance and constantly belittles them all. Then, out of the blu,e this attitude changes and KSM and Cumberbatch become buddies. It is hardly explained in the slightest and just doesn't fit. For some reason, KSM is also up for supporting actor, but between him and Plemons, I really prefer the latter. KSM spends most of his time onscreen looking out of place, silent, and your one clue about sexuality, caught looking at a magazine with naked men. Again, just stuck in there to point something out, no lead up to or a why? Now onto the pacing of this. At 128 minutes, it is so slow, I felt as though it was 4 hours long. So little is ever going on. We don't need gunbattles and stagecoach robberies, but give us literally something. Maybe some insight into the characters themselves. Why is Dunst a drunk? The scene of her failing to play piano for everyone is supposed to be some form of a sign, but it is just there and moves on. They don't even touch upon her issue until later on in some ramble, which again seemed thrown in. But the PC correct, oh, wait, you NOW say "woke" crowd are trying to force us to like this because it claims focusing on sexuality is artistic, but to me, personally, in today, it should be more of a detriment to think that is what makes something artistic. Now, it is just society and has been for quite a long time. With all the Oscars this is nominated for, for the most part, I won't be rooting for many of them that don't involve behind-the-camera accolades. Maybe Plemons, since his work in the first half or so was quite good until the second half, where the whole thing basically fell apart. To me, this was made for one reason only: to try and win gold statues, and in doing so, they all forgot to bring us an actually well-put-together movie. I know I said a lot more bad than good, but when you are among the top 10 of the year, you expect not to have to make sure others know it just doesn't belong in the same category.
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The Power of the Dog was released on November 17, 2021.
The Power of the Dog was directed by Jane Campion.
The Power of the Dog has a runtime of 2h 7m.
The Power of the Dog was produced by Roger Frappier, Jane Campion, Emile Sherman, Iain Canning, Tanya Seghatchian.
Charismatic rancher Phil Burbank inspires fear and awe in those around him. When his brother brings home a new wife and her son, Phil torments them until he finds himself exposed to the possibility of love.
The key characters in The Power of the Dog are Phil Burbank (Benedict Cumberbatch), Peter Gordon (Kodi Smit-McPhee), Rose Gordon (Kirsten Dunst).
The Power of the Dog is rated R.
The Power of the Dog is a Drama, Western film.
The Power of the Dog has an audience rating of 7.6 out of 10.
The Power of the Dog had a budget of $35M.
The Power of the Dog has made $271K at the box office.