LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT--THIS IS GONNA SCAR! THIS IS GONNA SCAR FOREVER!
Written: Mar 14 '09 (Updated Mar 14 '09)
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Product Rating:
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| Bang For The Buck |
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Pros: Uh, the soundtrack? Sara Paxton
Cons: Super violent! Nasty streak of gratuity
The Bottom Line: Wes Craven puts his stamp of approval on this remake of LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT, an exercise in ultraviolence that may have been served better if not so gratuitous
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| jarvococker's Full Review: The Last House on the Left |
Wes Craven, who directed the original "Last House on the Left," famously walked out of a screening of "Reservoir Dogs." As an audience member, he took offense to the sequence where Mr. Blond tortures the cop. The irony is that Craven's own film featured a scene where a character is savagely gutted to the point where her attackers fiddle about with her entrails. Almost four decades on, what's a filmmaker of such squeamish mettle and unquestionable moral airs to do but...executive produce a remake of his ultra violent debut? The symbolic about face, seemingly to cash in on the orgy of horror film remakes invading multiplexes, smacks of the utmost hypocrisy.
Okay, so maybe the fact that integrity isn't Craven's strong suit--having dished out the rights to "The Hills Have Eyes" and "Nightmare on Elm Street"--isn't all that shocking. What comes as a bit of a surprise is that this remake of THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT isn't nearly as awful as Rob Zombie's white trash upgrade of "Halloween" or last month's putrid mash up of "Friday the 13th." Written by Adam Alleca and Carl Ellsworth and directed by Dennis Iliadis, the film remains horrifically violent, but wrapped around a tiny germ of a story, however morally negligible, to involve audiences who can stomach the depraved, onanistic nihilism on display. Having said that, the filmmakers' almost comic insistence on cheapening the events with gratuitous flourishes (Completely unnecessary, extreme closeups of a young woman's chest and panties while dressing, for example) threaten to turn LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT into what pessimistic audiences already may suspect it of--a cheap exploitation remake purely for exploitation's sake.
The conventional story is left relatively intact. Mari Collingwood (Sara Paxton) is a typical seventeen year old, only this time boosted by competitive swimmer instincts and a past family tragedy (Otherwise how will audiences feel any sympathy when she's raped later on?). Mari's coached by her mum Emma (Monica Potter). Her dad John (Tony Goldwyn of "Ghost" fame) is a doctor. Mari accompanies her parents to their vacation home out in the middle of scenic nowhere ("My hydrangeas came back!" Emma muses with upper class smugness). Things take a turn for the almighty worse when Mari drives out into town to hang out with her friend Paige (Martha MacIsaac). They cross paths with a morose looking chap named Justin (Spencer Treat Clark) who invites them back to his hotel to sample some weed.
Justin is morose for a reason. He's the spawn of a just busted out of prison sociopath named Krug (Garret Dillahunt). Krug's intimidating partners include a girlfriend named Sadie (Riki Lindhome) who likes undressing in front of strangers and Frances (Aaron Paul). When Krug and co. interrupt the ganja festivities, it becomes clear they have no intention of ever letting Mari or Paige leave alive. A drive into the less auspicious mountains ends disastrously when Mari improvises a getaway that wrecks the car. This leads to a more sanitized--if no less utterly repellent--reckoning of the sequence described in the opening paragraph (Which begs the question--what's waiting decades to do a remake with a bigger budget if you lack the balls to better the gore?). Leaving Mari and Paige for dead, Krug and co. hitchhike to the nearest shelter in the midst of a storm which--get this--just so happens to be the Collingwood estate. The final act of LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT explores what happens when the placid John and Emma discover the fugitives they're housing buggered their little girl. Hint--it's not pretty.
Predictably, what passes for acting in LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT is lopsided. Dillahunt, Lindhome and Paul are saddled with such one dimensional characters--the manifestation of EVIL--that they're barely worth talking about. To be charitable, they play unbridled maniacs quite well, except I didn't buy the desolate tear that plops down Sadie's cheek after the repulsive events that befall poor Mari for a minute. Of the Krug lot, Clark's flashes of weak, conscientious objection fare the most effective.
Paxton, Potter and Goldwyn have more substantial roles to play, and they rise above the horrid material they must wallow in. A major narrative change is that Mari survives her brutal onslaught this time around, and while this concludes film in a faux happy ending, it does provide the film one of its more harrowing highlights--Dr. Collingwood discovering his daughter has been molested. Goldwyn's oh so brief allowance of emotional despair is rather memorable.
One of LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT's everlasting water cooler points is its incessant violence. Director Iliadis doesn't shirk from the more graphic elements of his film's predecessor, which makes the recent "Friday the 13th" (Or "Watchmen," for that matter) seem rather cartoonish in comparison. If the intention of Iliadis, in sequences such as the horrid centerpiece where Mari and Paige sadly get theirs, is to brutalize his audiences with bravura displays of cinematic realism, then that's fine. Sequences such as this should justifiably leave viewers squirming in their seats. Moreover, this makes John and Emma's retribution all the more legitimate. Having said that, how does this justify sequences such as the one where Dr. Collingwood repairs Frances' broken nose, in which the camera delves but inches away as the doctor stitches the criminal's torn snout? Such instances make the strong case that Iliadis is trying to provoke just for the sake of it, which sabotages the film's impact, and purpose, tremendously.
Some viewers may walk away from LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT disturbed by the revenge exacted by Dr. Collingwood and his wife. If so ask yourself--were you then equally appalled by the revenge elements of "Kill Bill" (Which I loved by the way) or "Death Wish" or "Straw Dogs" (Another domestic rip it up by Peckinpah hailed by some as a masterpiece)? In retrogade films of such flimsy social significance as this, the thin motivations of characters such as Dr. Collingwood and his wife are completely justified. There's a nervous tension wrought throughout scenes where amateur avatars of violence like Dr. Collingwood attempt to exact a most horrowshow comeuppance that's deliciously palpable. Does that make an audience member sadomasochistic? Hey, they bought the ticket! LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT is a curiously wretched display of screen carnage that's a little too infatuated with trumping it's violent agenda for its own good.
Recommended:
No
Movie Mood: Scary Movie
Film Completeness: Looked complete to me.
Worst Part of this Film: Ending
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jarvococker
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Member: marcelo deugarte
Location: bethesda, md
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And the hand that rocks you cuts you up like lyrics of your life.
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