Spoilers!! "Last House On The Left" is best described as inconsistent. The movie is based on an incredibly ambitious and intellectual idea (which is quite amazing if you consider the background of it) but it can't quite deliver on that promise. I think in many ways it has more in common with psychological drama than horror movies and if I had to think of a movie "The Last House On The Left" reminds me of I have to say Clockwork Orange comes up in my mind, not "Nightmare On Elm Street" or other famous horror movies. Alex and his gang never got up to acts of violence quite as depraved as those acted out by Krug and his gang but both gangs share this anarchic sense of vicious brutality for the sake of it. Of course TLHOTL is not nearly as good a movie as the Clockwork Orange, in fact, TLHOTL is a rather badly crafted movie. But nevertheless both are pieces of the very specific "Zeitgeist" of the early 70s.
The movie is not nearly as good as it could or maybe even should be though. Mainly because it is, as said at the beginning, quite inconsistent.
The movie can be easily divided into three sections, the beginning which sets up the events to follow by displaying the "peaceful suburban lives" of the victims and also the crude existences of Krug and his gang. The beginning is unfortunately marred by bad editing and a bad script which leads to two things: 1) you dont really get to know the girls and the family of Mari well enough to really create conventional drama in the rest of the movie 2)it actually does help in setting up the criminals to be quite weird oddballs which is in my view helping the realism of the movie's middle part quite a bit.
The middle part is the strong point of the movie and it's here where the movie earns its accolades. This middle part begins with the two girls falling into the hands of the Krug gang in New York City and depicts the humiliation, psychological and physical torture, raping and eventual killing and mutilating of the girls in woods which are located near the house of one of the victims. This part is quite disturbing to watch as it lets you take a rather good peek into the abyss of human cruelty. Even the often maligned score can be creepily effective here as the soft sound of an acoustic guitar accompanies scenes of human tragedy. I have to say this part is by far the most chilling depiction of sex crimes I have seen yet in movies.
The thugs arent in any way depicted as special, clever, tough or crafty, they are shown as lowlife failures, clumsy and simple, their viciousness shown only by their actions not their pose. The movie spends quite a lot of time with them, the focus is as much on them as it is on the victims which gives us a sense of disgusting intimacy with the killers. The movie offers us no real motivation for the acts of the killers, their crimes are commited for no specific reason or rather reasons deeply embedded in their disturbed psyches which arent shared with the viewers. This look on the killers is more realistic and more disturbing than the super killers we usually are confronted with in horror movies and thrillers. The victims are portrayed fairly well too. Phylis is the "rough girl" of the two and consequently follows one path possible to victims of such a crime - defiance and resistance. Mari, the daughter of our avengers-to-be, is the "soft innocent girl" and generally acts more submissively and mostly pleads to the criminals. The victims arent particularly smart or strong, they arent depicted as overly weak or stupid either, they just act as one could reasonably expect normal girls to act in such a terrible situation. The suffering of the victims is depicted as intimately and harshly as the behavior of the killer. Everything here feels very immediate and I think it's that and the realism provided by the banal way in which both killers and victims are portrayed what makes this part so disturbing to watch. Dont expect cinematography at its best here either though, it's a sloppily made movie throughout and while interestingly and possibly unintentionally it adds a lot to this part, it also subtracts a lot from the movie as a whole.
The end depicts the gang of killers ending up at the home of Mari's parents who unsuspectingly let them in thinking they are salespeople. The parents discover what happened to their daughter and her friend and extract revenge on the killers and kill them in grotesque fashion (one gang member has his penis bitten off by the mother of the victim, Krug is killed by the father with a chainsaw, the female gang member's throat is slit by the mother,the demented junior member of the gang is forced to commit suicide by Krug in a rather bizarre twist). Being the ending this obviously is a core of the supposed message of the movie but one has to admit that it's butchered by a horrible script and it has to be said that this movie would probably make a better impression if it ended once Mari has been killed. The actions of the parents and their motivations are badly explained and generally the movie is just going through the motions here to get to an end, there is little drama, little psychology and, as a total contrast to the middle part, very little intimacy in this part. This is a part of the movie where a better script could've worked wonders and you can see that Craven didnt really think of it as a potential masterpiece or even a proper drama at any point (or else he would have given this part more attention when writing the script). This ending however is at least honest to its intentions as it does not glorify these revenge killings in any way, the viewer is not inclined at all to cheer for the parents on their revenge killing spree. However it also totally fails in depicting the process of law-abiding good-natured citizens turning into brutal killers which is somewhat essential to make the story work.
Before I come to a conclusion I may add that there are parts throughout this movie which show two bumbling cops blundering their way through the countryside. These parts are embarrassingly trying to be funny and it's incredibly difficult to see why they are in this movie at all. I do think the idea of depicting incompetent cops does have a potential role in the story. When cops are shown to be idiots then one layer of our traditional sense of security is removed, we realize that law and order are not factors we can count on in this scenario. However these cops here are portrayed in such a corny over the top way, one feels reminded of bad British slapstick comedy of the 60s which removes any sort of serious purpose these scenes could have and since they arent funny they dont work as "comic relief" either.
I shall conclude that "The Last House On The Left" supposedly tells us a story about the futility of violence and how violence itself has a dehumanizing effect on those who exert it. But I have to say that it fails in bringing that point across consistently and that's probably why you have to say the movie falls short of its ambitions. Much of the movie is incredibly corny, there is bad acting and a bad script. As a low-budget movie it's not overly well shot either. One has to say that as a "rape revenge" drama it is a failure as the revenge part is just bad. It works much better as a rape drama and indeed it is the disturbingly realistic depiction of the victims' humiliating ordeal starting with their apprehension in NYC and their brutal deaths in those woods which redeems this movie. It's a harsh and blunt look at the human abyss and as such it is not only disturbing but also valuable to those fascinated by human depravation (and I suppose judging by the popularity of books, shows and movies relating to serial killers and other psychopaths that basically means all of us).
The movie is not nearly as good as it could or maybe even should be though. Mainly because it is, as said at the beginning, quite inconsistent.
The movie can be easily divided into three sections, the beginning which sets up the events to follow by displaying the "peaceful suburban lives" of the victims and also the crude existences of Krug and his gang. The beginning is unfortunately marred by bad editing and a bad script which leads to two things: 1) you dont really get to know the girls and the family of Mari well enough to really create conventional drama in the rest of the movie 2)it actually does help in setting up the criminals to be quite weird oddballs which is in my view helping the realism of the movie's middle part quite a bit.
The middle part is the strong point of the movie and it's here where the movie earns its accolades. This middle part begins with the two girls falling into the hands of the Krug gang in New York City and depicts the humiliation, psychological and physical torture, raping and eventual killing and mutilating of the girls in woods which are located near the house of one of the victims. This part is quite disturbing to watch as it lets you take a rather good peek into the abyss of human cruelty. Even the often maligned score can be creepily effective here as the soft sound of an acoustic guitar accompanies scenes of human tragedy. I have to say this part is by far the most chilling depiction of sex crimes I have seen yet in movies.
The thugs arent in any way depicted as special, clever, tough or crafty, they are shown as lowlife failures, clumsy and simple, their viciousness shown only by their actions not their pose. The movie spends quite a lot of time with them, the focus is as much on them as it is on the victims which gives us a sense of disgusting intimacy with the killers. The movie offers us no real motivation for the acts of the killers, their crimes are commited for no specific reason or rather reasons deeply embedded in their disturbed psyches which arent shared with the viewers. This look on the killers is more realistic and more disturbing than the super killers we usually are confronted with in horror movies and thrillers. The victims are portrayed fairly well too. Phylis is the "rough girl" of the two and consequently follows one path possible to victims of such a crime - defiance and resistance. Mari, the daughter of our avengers-to-be, is the "soft innocent girl" and generally acts more submissively and mostly pleads to the criminals. The victims arent particularly smart or strong, they arent depicted as overly weak or stupid either, they just act as one could reasonably expect normal girls to act in such a terrible situation. The suffering of the victims is depicted as intimately and harshly as the behavior of the killer. Everything here feels very immediate and I think it's that and the realism provided by the banal way in which both killers and victims are portrayed what makes this part so disturbing to watch. Dont expect cinematography at its best here either though, it's a sloppily made movie throughout and while interestingly and possibly unintentionally it adds a lot to this part, it also subtracts a lot from the movie as a whole.
The end depicts the gang of killers ending up at the home of Mari's parents who unsuspectingly let them in thinking they are salespeople. The parents discover what happened to their daughter and her friend and extract revenge on the killers and kill them in grotesque fashion (one gang member has his penis bitten off by the mother of the victim, Krug is killed by the father with a chainsaw, the female gang member's throat is slit by the mother,the demented junior member of the gang is forced to commit suicide by Krug in a rather bizarre twist). Being the ending this obviously is a core of the supposed message of the movie but one has to admit that it's butchered by a horrible script and it has to be said that this movie would probably make a better impression if it ended once Mari has been killed. The actions of the parents and their motivations are badly explained and generally the movie is just going through the motions here to get to an end, there is little drama, little psychology and, as a total contrast to the middle part, very little intimacy in this part. This is a part of the movie where a better script could've worked wonders and you can see that Craven didnt really think of it as a potential masterpiece or even a proper drama at any point (or else he would have given this part more attention when writing the script). This ending however is at least honest to its intentions as it does not glorify these revenge killings in any way, the viewer is not inclined at all to cheer for the parents on their revenge killing spree. However it also totally fails in depicting the process of law-abiding good-natured citizens turning into brutal killers which is somewhat essential to make the story work.
Before I come to a conclusion I may add that there are parts throughout this movie which show two bumbling cops blundering their way through the countryside. These parts are embarrassingly trying to be funny and it's incredibly difficult to see why they are in this movie at all. I do think the idea of depicting incompetent cops does have a potential role in the story. When cops are shown to be idiots then one layer of our traditional sense of security is removed, we realize that law and order are not factors we can count on in this scenario. However these cops here are portrayed in such a corny over the top way, one feels reminded of bad British slapstick comedy of the 60s which removes any sort of serious purpose these scenes could have and since they arent funny they dont work as "comic relief" either.
I shall conclude that "The Last House On The Left" supposedly tells us a story about the futility of violence and how violence itself has a dehumanizing effect on those who exert it. But I have to say that it fails in bringing that point across consistently and that's probably why you have to say the movie falls short of its ambitions. Much of the movie is incredibly corny, there is bad acting and a bad script. As a low-budget movie it's not overly well shot either. One has to say that as a "rape revenge" drama it is a failure as the revenge part is just bad. It works much better as a rape drama and indeed it is the disturbingly realistic depiction of the victims' humiliating ordeal starting with their apprehension in NYC and their brutal deaths in those woods which redeems this movie. It's a harsh and blunt look at the human abyss and as such it is not only disturbing but also valuable to those fascinated by human depravation (and I suppose judging by the popularity of books, shows and movies relating to serial killers and other psychopaths that basically means all of us).