Wes Craven's THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT was one of the first in a very long tradition of exploitive films that were labeled as horror but weren't. This film is not particularly exploitive (at least when compared to later examples of the genre), but it isn't scary either. I'm not a huge fan of horror, but this fails as a film for any genre (or none).
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This really doesn't even pretend to be a horror film. It's a very dated tragedy/drama about two girls who are kidnapped, abused, and murdered by a group of criminals who are eventually murdered by the parents of the victims.
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Throughout the film, there are no shocks, no creepy music or photography, nothing even resembling horror. What the viewer gets instead is nudity, blood, sadism, dismemberment, violence, and a soundtrack composed entirely of really bad folkish 70s songs. THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT was cheaply made, so it's lacking in the technical aspects and does no wonders in the artistic ones.
It was based on THE VIRGIN SPRING by Ingmar Bergman, which I haven't seen, but it's got to be better than this. This is a drama about senseless murder that isn't character oriented enough to justify its approach and is simply too exploitive to be taken seriously. The conclusion is gory stuff, but it isn't enough to turn this into the "horror classic" it's been hailed as.
I don't know how Wes Craven ever managed to have a career after this. A semi-sequel called THE HOUSE ON THE EDGE OF THE PARK was made six years later with one of the same actors and is actually slightly better than this. If you want to see an early Wes Craven film, THE HILLS HAVE EYES is better than this (don't expect THE GODFATHER, though). If you want good horror, don't see this. THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT is no more than a weepy video-nasty with a bad score.
-POSSIBLE SPOILERS-
This really doesn't even pretend to be a horror film. It's a very dated tragedy/drama about two girls who are kidnapped, abused, and murdered by a group of criminals who are eventually murdered by the parents of the victims.
-END SPOILERS-
Throughout the film, there are no shocks, no creepy music or photography, nothing even resembling horror. What the viewer gets instead is nudity, blood, sadism, dismemberment, violence, and a soundtrack composed entirely of really bad folkish 70s songs. THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT was cheaply made, so it's lacking in the technical aspects and does no wonders in the artistic ones.
It was based on THE VIRGIN SPRING by Ingmar Bergman, which I haven't seen, but it's got to be better than this. This is a drama about senseless murder that isn't character oriented enough to justify its approach and is simply too exploitive to be taken seriously. The conclusion is gory stuff, but it isn't enough to turn this into the "horror classic" it's been hailed as.
I don't know how Wes Craven ever managed to have a career after this. A semi-sequel called THE HOUSE ON THE EDGE OF THE PARK was made six years later with one of the same actors and is actually slightly better than this. If you want to see an early Wes Craven film, THE HILLS HAVE EYES is better than this (don't expect THE GODFATHER, though). If you want good horror, don't see this. THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT is no more than a weepy video-nasty with a bad score.