HOUNDDOG is a film which ambitiously attempts to be 'heartfelt' and 'honest', but ends up foundering in cliché. The film is a Female Coming Of Age story set in the rural poverty of 1950's era American South. Dakota Fanning plays Lewellen, a scrappy preteen who grapples with her nascent sexual identity by mimicking the pop-swagger of Elvis Presley. She lives in a rundown shack which she shares with an ineffectual and alcoholic father. And, just down the holler lives her bible-thumping grandmother. Neither of these characters provide any realistic parental guidance or authority. The plot unfolds through a series of events which are not so much 'foreshadowed' as 'telegraphed'. In spite of her hardscrabble existence, Lewellen remains upbeat and optimistic, until she is raped by a local teenager. Then, she becomes withdrawn and comatose, discovers the healing nature of The Blues, and is saved by Stranger Lady. Along the way she encounters many snakes, idyllic swimming holes and halcyon copses, a wise and caring black man, a puppy, and more and more snakes. The character of Stranger Lady (who is Lewellen's aunt) is played by Robin Wright Penn, and is one of the relative high points in the film. Dakota Fanning's performance comes off as a bit empty, however one can see that she is destined for far better roles than this one. In the end, HOUNDDOG is revealed as sepia tinged hokum which does nothing to advance the Southern Gothic Genre, or provide any new insight into the sexual awakening of adolescence.
