Netflix has finally revealed the official The Power of the Dog trailer for Oscar-winning filmmaker Jane Campion’s upcoming film adaptation, based on a 1967 cult novel by Thomas Savage. Starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Kodi Smit-McPhee, the film is set to premiere in select theaters on November 17, followed by its Netflix debut on December 1.
The video, which you can check out below along with the new posters, highlights the commanding presence of Cumberbatch’s Phil Burbank, a wealthy rancher who’s opposed to his brother’s new wife and stepson. Because of this, he’ll give them both a hard time through rude and indifferent acts that humiliate them.
“Rose Gordon thinks she’s got to adapt. She’s the lady of the house, but Phil’s presence is malignant. When she realizes he’s purposely torturing her psychologically, she is shocked and ashamed to talk to George about it.” pic.twitter.com/cED0djGBhY
— NetflixFilm (@NetflixFilm) November 4, 2021
“Peter Gordon is a very unusual character. He is very creative, very artistic, seemingly extremely sensitive and very devoted to his mother…but like Phil, he has a hidden capacity within him. His inner strength is far greater than anyone had imagined.” pic.twitter.com/RzMvUGSup1
— NetflixFilm (@NetflixFilm) November 4, 2021
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The Power of the Dog is written and directed by Jane Campion, the acclaimed filmmaker behind the 1993 period drama film The Piano. It stars Benedict Cumberbatch, Kirsten Dunst, Jesse Plemons, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Thomasin McKenzie, Frances Conroy, Keith Carradine, Peter Carroll, and Adam Beach.
“Severe, pale-eyed, handsome, Phil Burbank is brutally beguiling,” the official film synopsis reads. “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. He is a cowboy as raw as his hides.
“The year is 1925. The Burbank brothers are wealthy ranchers in Montana. At the Red Mill restaurant on their way to market, the brothers meet Rose, the widowed proprietress, and her impressionable son Peter. 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.
“As Phil swings between fury and cunning, his taunting of Rose takes an eerie form – he hovers at the edges of her vision, whistling a tune she can no longer play. His mockery of her son is more overt, amplified by the cheering of Phil’s cowhand disciples. Then Phil appears to take the boy under his wing. Is this latest gesture a softening that leaves Phil exposed, or a plot-twisting further into menace?”
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The Power of the Dog is a production by See-Saw Films, Bad Girl Creek, and Max Films in association with Brightstar, The New Zealand Film Commission, Cross City Films, and BBC Film. It is produced by Emile Sherman, Iain Canning, Roger Frappier, Jane Campion, and Tanya Seghatchian.
Campion leads a creative team consisting of Ari Wegner (Director of Photography), Grant Major (Production Designer), Kirsty Cameron (Costume Designer), Jonny Greenwood (Composer), and Peter Scibberas (Editor).
