We recently saw Benedict Cumberbatch return as Doctor Strange in the trailer for Spider-Man: No Way Home, but the Sherlock actor is also set to explore his villainous side in upcoming Netflix western The Power of The Dog.
The Piano director Jane Campion's first feature in 12 years, the movie follows a misanthropic rancher named Phil (Cumberbatch) who takes it upon himself to torment his brother's (Jesse Plemons) new bride (Kirsten Dunst) and her teenage son Peter (Kodi Smit-McPhee).
For reasons known only to himself, Phil decides to take Peter under his wing, but is this a change in attitude, or simply another plot designed to bring the family misery?
The trailer doesn't give much away (the synopsis does a much better job), but Cumberbatch exudes menace as he whistles his way through some stunning shots.
Severe, pale-eyed, handsome, Phil Burbank is brutally beguiling. 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, revelling 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?
Based on Thomas Savage's book of the same name, The Power of the Dog enters limited theatrical release on Nov. 17, before hitting Netflix on Dec. 1.