THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
There is always that one house in the neighborhood people want to avoid. In some cases, it can be The Last House on the Left.
PLOT
The 1972 film follows Mari Collingwood who plans to go out to a concert on her 17th birthday with her best friend Phyllis Stone. They first take a pit stop to buy some weed, only to be lured by a gang of recently escaped criminals convicted of rape and murder: Sadie, Fred ‘Weasel’ Podowski, and their leader Krug Stillo who controls his heroin addicted son Junior. Once they trap them, they gang rape Phyllis. By next morning, Mari’s parents Estelle & John grow worry that she never came home, resulting in reporting the police of her absence. The torture doesn’t stop as the gang take the girls to the woods. They force Phyllis to pee her pants before forcing her and & Mari to perform sexual acts on each other. Phyllis tries to run away for help, but they catch up to her and fatally stab her. Mari tries to convince Junior to let her go but before he can make a choice for himself, the group returns with Phyllis’ hacked off arm. Krug ends the torture by shooting her near a lake only after mutilating and raping her. With their car, the gang make haste to the home of the Collingwoods, posing as traveling salespeople after changing their bloody clothes into believable attire. Estelle lets them stay the night, but the gang don’t realize the couple are Mari’s parents until they settle in her bedroom. As Junior goes through withdrawal, he openly regrets what he took part of. When Estelle checks on him, she sees him wear the same peace symbol necklace she gave her daughter before she left. She later finds their bloody clothes in their luggage and overhears them talking about disposing the body. She quickly tells her husband this and they rush to find their daughter’s body in the woods, vowing revenge for what was done to her. The couple quickly takes action by pretending to seduce Weasel, only to make him bleed to death by biting off his penis. John arms himself with his shotgun and starts shooting at the others. Krug is able to escape to the living room to try overpowering him. Junior tries to stand up for himself, but his father manipulates him to shoot himself which he does. When Sadie makes a break for it and gets out of the house, Estelle reaches her and slits her throat. The film ends with John killing Krug with a chainsaw just as the police arrive.
THOUGHTS
Wes Craven’s films are known to be shocking, but I just should’ve known his directorial debut started the trail. From the trailer alone having to tell you in advance that this is only a movie sets the tone on how graphic of a story we’re gonna witness. With Craven’s own editing technique and Victor Hurwitz’ cinematography, every violent turn that is taken is so raw and personal because this is the director’s way to tell us exactly how depraved humanity was at the time of its release and how it is now. It’s all so realistic because there isn’t really a thing about it where you can say it’s staged and if it’s that real, you’re doing your job in shocking us all. The depravity is shown through the vile, villainous gang that commit shown horrific acts. Although Marc Sheffler showed regret through Junior who had no control of his life from the moment he was born, it was the core three adults that are remorseless from start to finish. David A Hess, Fred Lincoln & Jeramie Rain are so equally great at being bad through the roles of Krug, Weasel & Sadie because they ensure to let us know these characters enjoy every second of pain they inflict. That’s where you are stunned on what happens to poor Mari & Phyllis because Sandra Cassell & Lucy Grantham approach them as young girls that just wanted to have harmless fun only for them to walk into danger. It is incidents like this where parents have the right to be overprotective when children & teens go out without adult supervision. Having said that and witnessing such carnage, you already know revenge is guaranteed to be justified. Cynthia Carr/Eleanor Shaw & Gaylord St James/Richard Towers do a great job in depicting Estelle & John as casual parents who didn’t overthink on what would go wrong because they trusted their daughter to be safe, which is why they’re in more shock than the audience when losing the one they cared and loved more than anything. Their act of revenge was justified because they couldn’t wait for proper authorities to handle the situation. And if their daughter plus her best friend didn’t have a chance to fend for themselves, there is no deserving reason for the perpetrators to get the same. With that being said, the last 10 minutes of unrestricted revenge was so satisfying to witness because sometimes playing fire with fire is what’s needed to succeed in personal goals/matrers. Since we don’t know what happened after the police arrived, I hope the found evidence benefits the Collingwoods benefits them on being excused. If they don’t though, it would only remind us how twisted society is. In short, The Last House on the Left is a gripping horror film for making sure you’re uncomfortable throughout. If that is your preference, see this as soon as possible.
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