Phil behaves so cruelly he drives them both to tears, reveling in their hurt and rousing his fellow cowhands to laughter - all except his brother George, who comforts Rose then returns to marry her. At the Red Mill restaurant on their way to market, the brothers meet Rose, the widowed proprietress, and her impressionable son Peter. The Burbank brothers are wealthy ranchers in Montana. All of Phil's romance, power and fragility is trapped in the past and in the land: He can castrate a bull calf with two swift slashes of his knife he swims naked in the river, smearing his body with mud. I’d even wager a win for Cumberbatch as best actor.Severe, pale-eyed, handsome, Phil Burbank is brutally beguiling. Given its performance at the Golden Globes, Critics Choice Awards and BAFTA’s, I predict it will take best picture and best director for Jane Campion. It certainly gave me a lot to think about and I am sure it will do well at the Oscars. Finally, a (hopefully) mainstream gay romance that doesn’t end it tragedy!ĭespite those misgivings, I truly enjoyed The Power of the Dog. It is for this reason that I am absolutely giddy with anticipation for the release of Bros, the upcoming gay rom-com starring Billy Eichner, which is being distributed by Hollywood giant Universal Pictures. but we certainly have more freedom to do so now than in Montana in the 1920s or in Wyoming during the 1960s/1970s. I realize that not everyone has the privilege to be out in the U.S. The gay community has made such gains in the last 20 years, yet the culture at large still seems fixated on a storyline of grief and shame that is no longer relevant. It was the same thing with Brokeback Mountain in 2005. It just makes me ponder why such a sad representation of a queer person’s life gets such mainstream acclaim. The main thought I was left with, however, was why did we need this story told? I am not downplaying its brilliance, or the amazing performances given by the lead actors. Peter had played a long game throughout the movie and had finally achieved revenge on behalf of his mother. Suddenly we realize Peter purposely gave Phil the tainted rawhide from a dead cow he had discovered earlier in the film. We come to find out it was anthrax that killed him, which is only transferable from diseased animals. The next morning Phil’s hand is infected, and he is desperately ill. Phil uses the rawhide to finish hand braiding Peter’s lasso even though he had an open and bloody wound on his hand. This sets Phil into a blind rage assuaged only when Peter replaces the lost rawhide with his own supply. To get back at Phil, Rose drunkenly gives away all of Phil’s rawhide to the Native Americans, since he was only going to selfishly burn the excess anyway. Despite easing up on Peter, Phil intensifies his attacks on Rose by exploiting her drinking and embarrassing her in front of the local governor and his parents (Rose’s in-laws). Phil proceeds to teach Peter how to ride horses and begins hand-making him a lasso out of rawhide. When coupled with an earlier scene of Phil masturbating with a dirty white cloth belonging to Bronco Henry it is suddenly clear that the two had a secret romance before Bronco Henry’s death a few years prior to the action of the film.īenedict Cumberbatch (R), George Mason (L) in The Power of the Dog | Photo: Kirsty Griffin/ NetflixĪs time passes Phil softens his demeanor towards Peter, likely reminded of himself as boy, and decides to mentor him in the same way Bronco Henry had done years prior. By way of Peter, we the viewer discover Phil’s stash of Bronco Henry’s old male physique magazines. As the story progresses, we come to understand the deep connection Phil had to his mentor Bronco Henry who taught him to be a cowboy. No concrete reason is ever given for Phil’s cruelty, it just seems to be an extension of his existing personality as evidenced by his aggression with peripheral characters and his superior/shaming attitude towards his brother. We come to understand that he is incredibly intelligent, having been educated at Yale, yet he somehow still decided to commit his life to ranching. Similarly, he constantly makes fun of Peter, who is studying to be a doctor, by calling him “Miss Nancy” and ridiculing him in front of the other ranchers. Throughout the film he openly mocks Rose goes out of his way to humiliate her, which causes her to develop an alcohol problem. When Phil’s brother and co-owner of the ranch George (Jesse Plemons) marries the widow Rose Gordon (Kirsten Dunst), he makes it a point to make her and her son Peter (Kodi Smit-McPhee) miserable. Cumberbatch plays ranch owner Phil Burbank, an overtly aggressive cowboy who is the literal definition of toxic masculinity.
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