Lawn Dogs

Sam Rockwell has been had. He lit up the screen in "Box of Moonlight," is a major player in the upcoming "Midsummer Night's Dream," and yet he didn't get equal billing for screen time in either of those films. What gives? In "Lawn Dogs" Rockwell is stunning as the lawn boy who accepts a little "rich" girl as a friend and gives her a new view of the world. The movie is rich in atmosphere and color. The central Southern United States has rarely appeared so docile and yet so menacing. Every time I thought I knew where "Lawn Dogs" was going...it pulled another pleasant surprise. Mischa Barton is amazing as Devon Stockard, the little girl with more on her mind than selling cookies. This is truly one of the best American films of the 90's. If you like off-beat slices of America with a twisted view, then "Lawn Dogs" is the best movie you'll see in a long time. It is quite simply full of the magic, menace and imagination alive in the heads and hearts of little girls...about to become young women. Oh yeah, and give Sam Rockwell his due!

From the picture on the cover (see the picture on the main details page!) and reading the back of the video jacket for this movie, I expected this to be a film about suburban wives sleeping with the hired help. Nope. It's a movie about a slightly sick [in the mental and physical sense] young girl [about 10 or 11 years old?] who befriends one of the guys hired to mow the lawns in her gated community. While the guy is reluctant at first, the friendship that forms between them is actually fun to watch. That's what makes the movie interesting. But while the end has to do with the class system talked about on the video jacket, this is a story about the girl and her "lawn dog" friend, with the parents and their repressive lifestyle being almost incidental to the story until the end. This is an interesting movie to watch, but I wish the people who write the blurbs on the video jackets would actually WATCH the movies once in a while.

Trent is a young man living in a trailer in a wooded area beyond the suburbs. He makes a living cutting the massive lawns of the populace of a gated suburb village. He befriends a young girl from within the suburb, who herself has some stability issues, despite being only 10 years old. The two build a friendship despite the resentment towards the `white trash' Trent from within the suburb,

I didn't know what this film was about before I sat and watched it, reading the plot summary in the tv guide as the title sequence began, I wondered if I would bother, but I'm glad I did. The film works on several level – the most apparent of which is the simple story of a friendship that is threatened. This part works well as the friendship never seems forced and, although the spectre of sexual tension is there (in Trent occasionally feeling uncomfortable), it is not a strand that is actually part of their relationship.

This all works well due (in most part) to two great performances from Barton and Rockwell. Barton shows amazing maturity and ability to carry the role off without it being like many child stars (where it is clear they are forcing everything). Rockwell meanwhile is a mass of subtleties and little touches that make his character likeable.

However this part wouldn't work as well if it weren't for the wider theme of the trash being poorly treated by the smugger middle classes. This theme creates the reason for the threat to their friendship (more or less) but it also serves as a humbling attack on a class that lives a selfish, scared life behind gates with private security guards. Such places are increasingly common in America and this film is clear as to their effect on both those inside them as well as the wider community of America. Although it keeps a gentle tone for the most, the film depicts those in the suburb as selfish, aloof and fearful. Even more condemning about this depiction is that it never feels like they have been exaggerated or monsterised in any way!

The script is well written and certainly makes the actors jobs a lot easier – certainly Barton benefits from great dialogue and character development. Rockwell meanwhile benefits more from direction as much of his best work is not dialogue based. McDonald, Quinlan and McGill all do solid work in support. The end of the film is a little worrying as it appears to veer off at a tangent, but the final sentiment is beautifully presented and encouraging (albeit due to a child's apparent naivety).

Overall this is a lovely film that I'm very glad I watched. About more than just an adult/child friendship, this film is moving and involving in both it's core plot and it's wider themes.

Sam Rockwell is one of those actors who, no matter what role he's playing, is totally natural. He's immediately likable. I've always been a big fan of his, and up until yesterday had never before seen Lawn Dogs, one of the earliest films wherein he has a bigger role. He's very quietly, calmly good in it, and even in the scenes where he's playing and goofing around with Mischa Barton and it seems awkward, he maintains a pure, natural presence.

Lawn Dogs says something important about the most generic slice of American life, the geometrically shaped and calculated life in the suburbs. The film doesn't unmask it. Cleverly, it maintains that quiet, perpetually sunny, middle-of-nowhere feeling of a classic subdivision, and then displays a sad and maddening scenario of misunderstanding in a closed-minded, insular neighborhood and the hauntingly realistic characters. There is a bit of animal violence in this movie, but it's played out in a tautly spare way that's just as frustrating as vain, judgmental people and matter of the rest of the film.

Lawn Dogs is a refreshing sort of film. The relationship between Rockwell and Barton is heartwarming and broadly, gently natural. It's good to experience a story that altruistically communicates the genuine existence and state of mind that is often questioned and often misunderstood.

This superb film, directed by John Duigan, the gifted director of THE YEAR MY VOICE BROKE, is about a friendship between a young girl (Mischa Barton of "The OC") and a free-spirited young, adult man (Sam Rockwell).

It's self-aware enough to acknowledge the inherent sensitivity of its subject matter, but it doesn't cave into conservative conclusions about how such a relationship ought to be portrayed.

At heart, LAWN DOGS is about trust, not the death of innocence or the festering political correctness all around us that sees danger in every unconventional relationship. It does touch on the subject of sexual abuse, but it doesn't come at it from the angle you'd suspect...and that's the whole point, isn't it? Sexual abuse, for the most part, usually visits as someone you've known well enough to trust completely.

Beyond its politics, this is a unique, bracing fantasy that is more European than American (or Australian) in its view world both morally and visually. The climax is an unexpected treat and its moral resolution arrives just in the nick of time.

Sumptuously photographed and written with great intelligence by Naomi Wallace, it dares to be erotic, provoking, unconventional and incisive.

Don't pass it up if you get an offer.