Taming the Dog in ‘The Power of the Dog’: On the atmospheric illustration of power and manipulation
Taming the Dog in ‘The Power of the Dog’: On the atmospheric illustration of power and manipulation
TW: Spoiler alert for “The Power of the Dog”
Despite its title mentioning the animal “dog”, you rarely see their existence. You only see cows and horses everywhere. You only hear them from time to time. There are few scenes where you see one of its characters, Peter (Kodi Smit-McPhee), playing with the dog nonchalantly. Also here, dogs are visually and literally smaller than cows and horses—hence, an indication of a difference in power.
The film opens with the cows fighting against each other, visual imagery of dirt and aggressions. Then we are introduced to Phil (Benedict Cumberbatch) with a panning shot, him being framed inside these windows—gazing at him trapped inside the boxes. Phil mentions his later mentor Bronco Henry repeatedly—to his brother, fellow cowboys, and himself. Despite his hypermasculine and domineering demeanor, he has this way of telling stories when it comes to this invisible character—nothing but a dead body, an element of the past that is still alive in him. This overt repetition seems not to be normal, hence, an obsession with someone’s presence. All these things are hidden by those thick animal skin clothes making him a tough person who is looked up to by anyone. Yet all changed when George (Jesse Plemons) was married to Rose (Kirsten Dunst), Peter’s mother. Suddenly, there’s a threat in their house.
Phil (Benedict Cumberbatch) and the phallic mountain range.
Women in this film are irrational fear of men. Perhaps, reminiscent of Laura Mulvey’s theory of castration, which was literally shown when Phil castrates a cow. Maybe that is what Phil feels towards welcoming an unknown presence resulting in his bullying towards Rose.
Campion mounted Rose downstairs as she played a piece on the grand piano in a novice way, and Phil, standing above Rose, played the same music with a banjo, a smaller instrument yet in an expert manner. There is a political directorial choice in placing one over the top of another, hence, resulting in Phil gazing at Rose. This results in Rose’s constant anxiety as if an omnipresent being observes every move of hers. To cope, she leans on alcoholism.
Despite this mean behavior towards her, Phil remains silent in his room, listening to the moans and the creaking of the bed. He is left alone with his small banjo that cannot overpower the sounds produced by love-making, an intimate moment he probably longs. The scene that can be compared to this is when he goes inside the barn house and caresses Bronco Henry’s saddle. Here, it is established, Phil and Bronco Henry had a thing in the past and Phil couldn’t move forward.
Campion humanizes Phil’s unlikeable character by letting the audience understand the context of the film. What does it feel like to be queer in this hypermasculine world? Visualized by these aggressive cows and horses fighting against each other. These vast phallic mountains where these cowboys’ naked bodies are mapped. It is a man’s world. Not only a man’s world, but it is where macho-feudal upbringings were born. The question is: how do you reclaim the space?
When talking about queer cinema, it is inevitable to talk about the female gaze. It is the direct opposition of patriarchy, and this is where the film proceeds to take its viewers—a reclamation of power.
When Peter went back home during the summer, he saw his mother losing to alcoholism. Quoting him: “When my father passed, I wanted nothing more than my mother’s happiness. For what kind of man would I be if I did not help my mother?”
On the surface, Peter seems unbothered. Powerless. An anxious man who makes annoying sounds with his comb. Cowboys call him gay. Phil bullies him too. His built, twice smaller than Phil’s. What can he do? Until one day, Phil befriends Peter suspiciously. His mother is strongly against this yet they seem to develop a deep connection with each other. Phil’s intention is not stated, but it seems that he wants to be close with Peter to use him. Yet things happen differently.
Peter tells Phil that his father once told him that he was oddly strong—which Phil disagrees with. On the surface, it seems that a romantic connection sparks between the two. Campion built a deceptive atmosphere of romance through sexual tension and sensuality. Peter gently caresses a rabbit in front of Phil, then suddenly breaks his neck without a doubt. Now, it makes sense when Peter’s mother asks him to kill three chickens. In earlier scenes too, Peter traps a rabbit and kills it to study it.
Slowly, the rabbit becomes Phil, falling into the trap of Peter as he develops an elevated sense of desire. Perhaps, a romantic attachment towards him. Hoping for a parallel situation, between what happened to him and Bronco Henry. An uncomfortable situation due to age differences, a predatory relationship. A dog and cow relationship. Yet Peter proves that his father is right, that he is strong. Not just strong, but in a weird way.
In that highly sensual well-directed cigarette scene, Peter holds the cig and he passes it to it. Repeatedly. He now controls the game. While Phil creates a rope for him in bare hands, with a rawhide. In the morning, the rope was finished and Phil was feeling sick and eventually died—and the possible cause is Anthrax. It is a disease caused by contaminated animals.
Now, also the hidden and overt stories make sense. The story of a dead body that continuously grows hair—a trans allegory of Phil. The story of King Tut, a king who died at a very young age, probably the age when he was trapped in his obsession with Bronco Henry.
The barn house scene
Phil is the dog, strong and esteemed. Yet as shown, Peter plays with the dog well. Even with Peter’s medical knowledge, he just lets Phil’s hand rot, bleed, and hold rawhides from the skin of the dead animal he found in the middle of his exploration. As he said, he made a new friend and that friend calls him “doctor” ‘cause that is what he wants to become. In the end, he reclaims the gaze as he watches her mom with her lover George framed inside a window. And what is real is that this patriarchal society hurts them all: the effeminate, the closeted, and the woman.
