Sam Elliott comments on “The Power of the Dog”

[RobG]

FWIW, if you don’t like the movie it’s probable because the plot is flying over your head. I don’t mean that as an insult, the meaning isn’t revealed until the end, and even then you probably have to watch it a few times before you really see what’s really going on.

 

[Redmt]

I've watched a little bit of 1883. My parents LOVE it. It looks okay from what I've seen, but I don't really feel compelled by it.

Obviously your parents are highly intelligent with good breeding and a well cultured upbringing.

 

[hank4elk]

Glad I'm not the only one who can't get into his movies

Hell,I own them...

 

[Redmt]

FWIW, if you don’t like the movie it’s probable because the plot is flying over your head. I don’t mean that as an insult, the meaning isn’t revealed until the end, and even then you probably have to watch it a few times before you really see what’s really going on.

I'm out. I can't follow a story line if there's a commercial in it.

 

[Beignet]

FWIW, if you don’t like the movie it’s probable because the plot is flying over your head. I don’t mean that as an insult, the meaning isn’t revealed until the end, and even then you probably have to watch it a few times before you really see what’s really going on.

The ending was a stellar “ah-ha!”

Also, FWIW re: Brokeback comparisons - Power of the Dog novel was published in 1967. The short story Brokeback was based upon was published in 1997.

 

[Beignet]

NO!!! Pu-leeezz don't come down on 1883!! I love that series!! I don't care if it's real, phoney, factual, fairy tale,,,,,,, I don't care if the actors are overpaid crybabies! I love that show. Please don't pop my fantasy bubble.

I will give that show a little credit for alluding to the dark history of stockman’s associations in the territories.

 

[Bigjay73]

The ending was a stellar “ah-ha!”

I thought so. It wasn't really a cowboy movie, just happened to be the setting they chose for this story. Could have just as easily been a story in modern times about any occupation or lifestyle deemed masculine.

 

[RobG]

The ending was a stellar “ah-ha!”

Also, FWIW re: Brokeback comparisons - Power of the Dog novel was published in 1967. The short story Brokeback was based upon was published in 1997.

FWIW, the author grew up in Montana on a cattle ranch, unlike California "cowboy" Elliot. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Savage_(novelist)

The landscape in the movie was like 80% Montana. It looked familiar but something wasn't quite right. It made sense when I learned it was filmed in New Zealand.

I really don't care about any of this, but I figured Sam would show up the next day saying he was drunk off his ass. The comments seemed strange as I didn't even consider it a western. (In fact I had to convince my wife it wasn't a western before she'd watch it.) I'd say it was out of character for him, but he's so stuck in his typecast anything he says is out of character

 

[Beignet]

The comments seemed strange as I didn't even consider it a western. (In fact I had to convince my wife it wasn't a western before she'd watch it.)

My GF had to convince me the same. I thought it was going to be more Yellowstone type western mythology when she told me it was a revenge story set in Montana.

But, I also admit to watching Yellowstone and finding it mildly entertaining. Less so the more the story goes on though.

 

[RobertD]

I grew up next door to Jesse. Great guy from a great family. His dad ropes, and I always got to take care of their horses when they were out of town. There's a reason why he seems natural on a horse.

I meant to reply to this directly just to say that's really cool. I think people overuse the term "underrated" but I would say he is an actual example of a very underrated talent. Thanks for sharing.

 

[noharleyyet]

Sam Elliot’s best role was a lifeguard.

Yellowstone is a boutique commercial for Dodge with sporadic sneaky socio-political soliloquies delivered by a whispering Costner.

Have not viewed Dog nor 1883.

This is the heyday for slipshod productions. Thank the Lord midterms are unlatching the door.

 

[glass eye]

I read the plot in Wikipedia. Has absolutely nothing to do with dogs.

Well if you would have watched it to the end the title is revealed to be from a Bible verse where the psalmist was praying for deliverance from The Power of the Dog.
During biblical times many wild dogs were around and bad people were often referred to as dogs.
The cowboy was groomed by his childhood hero and now he was attempting to do the same to the "frail" kid. However, the kid was setting up the cowboy to be eliminated, thus saving his mother who was driven to drinking by the mental abuse of the brother-in-law.
Yes it was slow but in the end it came together.
Everybody wants explosions, fast plots, and unreal CG effects or else they get bored real quick.

 

[RobG]

I read the plot in Wikipedia. Has absolutely nothing to do with dogs.

LMAO.... Reminds me of Zern's book review.

 

[tjones]

Has absolutely nothing to do with dogs.

Well if you would have watched it to the end the title is revealed to be from a Bible verse where the psalmist was praying for deliverance from The Power of the Dog.

Thanks for this. I had a reply typed up for the Canadian then wisely came to my senses BEFORE hitting the button.

 

[OntarioHunter]

I know what the "dog" symbolism was all about. Not over my head ... just a poor analogy.

Yeah, I get it. This is a movie about a tough guy cowboy so frustrated with his own sexual orientation that he has to make it with a hanky in the bushes and abuses his sister-in-law, supposedly I guess because she is a woman and he is not. Then her son saves her by befriending the tough guy and having him braid a lariet for him from a cowhide laced with anthrax. Really? I enjoy a story that's complex, but this is just all over the place. And it's a bummer to boot.

 

[shrapnel]

Well if you would have watched it to the end the title is revealed to be from a Bible verse where the psalmist was praying for deliverance from The Power of the Dog.
During biblical times many wild dogs were around and bad people were often referred to as dogs.
The cowboy was groomed by his childhood hero and now he was attempting to do the same to the "frail" kid. However, the kid was setting up the cowboy to be eliminated, thus saving his mother who was driven to drinking by the mental abuse of the brother-in-law.
Yes it was slow but in the end it came together.
Everybody wants explosions, fast plots, and unreal CG effects or else they get bored real quick.

I couldn’t get through half the movie. With names like Cumberpatch and fat faces like his brother, in a time when overweight people didn’t exist, I was done.

Figuring out the plot, regardless of all the hidden biblical meanings, wasn’t worth the price of admission. Movies are supposed to be entertaining, if I want a challenge, I will play chess.

 

[Beignet]

I couldn’t get through half the movie. With names like Cumberpatch and fat faces like his brother, in a time when overweight people didn’t exist, I was done.

Whatever your thoughts on the movie, fat people did certainly exist back then.

 

[OntarioHunter]

I couldn’t get through half the movie. With names like Cumberpatch and fat faces like his brother, in a time when overweight people didn’t exist, I was done.

Figuring out the plot, regardless of all the hidden biblical meanings, wasn’t worth the price of admission. Movies are supposed to be entertaining, if I want a challenge, I will play chess.

Teddy Roosevelt was always a fat-face, even in his younger days on the ranch in the Dakotas. Frederick Remington was so rotund it took a special horse and saddle to carry him. But yes, I would agree it was generally uncommon to find a beer gut working a ranch at the turn of the last century. Not much opportunity to put on weight. Also, obesity and saddle time don't mix. Spine tends to break down. A fat rancher was usually a crippled rancher. Or he was a rich transplant who really didn't "work" the ranch ... and took up politics instead. And finally, then as now maintaining the cowboy image required smoking which tends to inhibit rotundness ... at a price.

In the context of the times, when vigilantes strung people up merely for entertainment (like a mentally handicapped teen buried someplace in Lusk, WY who would have been my dad's great uncle), it is unlikely that a gay rancher would last long on the range. The West was a land of opportunity in more ways than merely economic. The pressure to relocate, both external and internal, was too great. Add to it a lack of family bonding, this story seems to be extremely implausible in the histirical context. But it's just fiction, right? I'm a historian and I do enjoy historical fiction ... if it reasonably fits the historical context. For fiction that's absurdly out of context I prefer Star Trek or Matrix. An example of stupidly outside the historical context was that recent film about Hugh Glass (Revenance?). They got his name right and the species of bear but beyond that nothing was accurate. I think seeing exotic species hanging on the wall of a turn of the century Wyoming ranch house would have been enough to send me looking for an exit.

 

[OntarioHunter]

Whatever your thoughts on the movie, fat people did certainly exist back then.
View attachment 214136

He was a lawyer and politician, not a rancher. In that historical context they were not the same thing. Different story in the present context.

 

[Beignet]

He was a lawyer and politician, not a rancher. In that historical context they were not the same thing. Different story in the present context.

The chubby character in the movie wore a suit the whole time, indicating that he did the administrative work instead of the hard field work. I think that was part of the idea behind the his brother's discontent toward him.