The Last House on the Left (1972)
Country: US
Technical: col/1.33:! 91m
Director: Wes Craven
Cast: Sandra Peabody, Lucy Grantham, David Hess
Synopsis:
A teenage girl on a night out with a friend falls foul of a 'family' of sex criminals just out of prison. They subject their captives to an ordeal of rape, humiliation and torture before killing them. They then take refuge with the parents, having broken down nearby, and are butchered in turn.
Review:
This notorious film made at the height of America's disaffection with itself has had more column inches spouted on its account than most other once so-called video nasties. Most of it has been pretentious claptrap about whether the film is transgressive or conservative, sadistic or reactionary etc., as if a film as cheap and tacky as such a venture could be anything but a scurrilous piece of exploitation. True, the violence is repellent and there is no sense of triumph in retribution; true, the sociopaths are painted as more than simply cyphers and do show signs of disgust in their acts; but a story like this, for all that it has the same premise as The Virgin Spring, is bound to draw viewers for all the wrong reasons nonetheless. Cf. I Spit on Your Grave, which drew similar controversy.
Country: US
Technical: col/1.33:! 91m
Director: Wes Craven
Cast: Sandra Peabody, Lucy Grantham, David Hess
Synopsis:
A teenage girl on a night out with a friend falls foul of a 'family' of sex criminals just out of prison. They subject their captives to an ordeal of rape, humiliation and torture before killing them. They then take refuge with the parents, having broken down nearby, and are butchered in turn.
Review:
This notorious film made at the height of America's disaffection with itself has had more column inches spouted on its account than most other once so-called video nasties. Most of it has been pretentious claptrap about whether the film is transgressive or conservative, sadistic or reactionary etc., as if a film as cheap and tacky as such a venture could be anything but a scurrilous piece of exploitation. True, the violence is repellent and there is no sense of triumph in retribution; true, the sociopaths are painted as more than simply cyphers and do show signs of disgust in their acts; but a story like this, for all that it has the same premise as The Virgin Spring, is bound to draw viewers for all the wrong reasons nonetheless. Cf. I Spit on Your Grave, which drew similar controversy.
Country: US
Technical: col/1.33:! 91m
Director: Wes Craven
Cast: Sandra Peabody, Lucy Grantham, David Hess
Synopsis:
A teenage girl on a night out with a friend falls foul of a 'family' of sex criminals just out of prison. They subject their captives to an ordeal of rape, humiliation and torture before killing them. They then take refuge with the parents, having broken down nearby, and are butchered in turn.
Review:
This notorious film made at the height of America's disaffection with itself has had more column inches spouted on its account than most other once so-called video nasties. Most of it has been pretentious claptrap about whether the film is transgressive or conservative, sadistic or reactionary etc., as if a film as cheap and tacky as such a venture could be anything but a scurrilous piece of exploitation. True, the violence is repellent and there is no sense of triumph in retribution; true, the sociopaths are painted as more than simply cyphers and do show signs of disgust in their acts; but a story like this, for all that it has the same premise as The Virgin Spring, is bound to draw viewers for all the wrong reasons nonetheless. Cf. I Spit on Your Grave, which drew similar controversy.