i watched Straw Dogs and The WIld Bunch close to a decade ago at this point. even as a teenager / early 20s guy, Straw Dogs in particular made me want to puke with how misogynistic it is. have always avoided his films since then.
this movie has a real “looseness” to it that i remember from The Wild Bunch, almost an outsider quality; a slight degree of incompetence. in a lot of ways, this movie reminded me of a jean-luc godard film. in particular the scene between benny and his love interest under the tree, which just went on for way too long. i liked that; i also did enjoy the depravity, the unhingedness of the film. it felt like the kind of movie godard would have made in his “Weekend” era, if he were american (less culturally and formally refined).
the rape scene was still pretty fucked up. i thought it was major sus that he had the character start to get into it and participate in it.