Straw Dogs

Straw Dogs is a thriller about David Sumner, a Hollywood screenwriter who moves with his wife Amy to her hometown in the rural South. The plan is to repair and sell her late father's house while David works on a script, but the couple's strained marriage is tested by growing hostility from the locals, particularly Amy's former boyfriend Charlie and his friends. What begins as friction escalates into violence.

The film is a remake of Sam Peckinpah's 1971 picture of the same name. Rod Lurie directed and co-wrote the screenplay with David Zelag Goodman; it sits between Nothing But the Truth and The Outpost in Lurie's filmography. James Marsden and Kate Bosworth play the couple, with Alexander Skarsgård as Charlie, Dominic Purcell as Jeremy Niles, Laz Alonso as Deputy John Burke and Willa Holland as Janice Heddon. Marc Frydman produced for Screen Gems and Battleplan Productions.

Released in September 2011, the film had a budget of 25 million USD and took about 10 million USD worldwide, a poor return. On IMDb it holds 5.8/10 from 38,000 votes and on TMDB 5.9/10 from 650 votes, while critics gave it 5.1/10 from 124 reviews, so audiences rated it somewhat more kindly than reviewers did.