Beukey on Pop Culture

This blog will focus on pop culture, with an emphasis on views outside, overlooked, or ignored by the mainstream. I may veer off-topic. We are all grown-ups, so don't act shocked at occasional bad language. This blog is not the place for those of you who stood in line to see "The Lake House".

Sunday, December 21, 2008

Just In Time For Christmas, I Watch "Last House On The Left"



This movie is the poster child for ugly 70's horror. Whether or not it is the sickest 70's horror movie is another matter, but it's the one everyone will come back to when trying to make a point. This one made it further into the mainstream than any other movie that could be considered "grindhouse".


So I was utterly amazed when Fearnet, which is an OnDemand channel I get that usually shows lame 80's and 90's movies, had this in their queue. It looks like it is part of a Wes Craven month promotion.


I jumped on the chance to watch it, because this movie is never going to be shown on HBO or Showtime, or even Sundance or IFC, the latter of which had a "grindhouse" month promotion and wouldn't touch this.



Last House On The Left had been in the back of my mind ever since I saw part of that horrible Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake, and had heard that someone was going to remake LHOTL.


I watched this with 2 questions in mind.
  1. Is this as horrific as everyone says it is?
  2. Is it possible to remake this movie in this day and age?
"Crude" is probably the best way to describe this movie. It is practically unwatchable, and not because of the content. This movie is crudely shot, crudely edited, and crudely scored. There are jump cuts, scenes shot in daylight that are supposed to take place at night, and scenes that seem to be edited out of order. The low point of this amateur hour is when the father (who is also a doctor) pulls his daughter out of the lake and pronounces her dead, even as she is moving around. I can see part of the reason why this is never on cable is that it barely looks like a real movie. Even a cheapie like my beloved Don't Look In The Basement can manage to edit and score the movie so it looks like it was done by professionals (hack professionals, but that's still a couple of cuts above amateurs). If someone didn't tell you that this was a notorious movie, you would never stick around and watch it.

For something that is supposed to be horrifying, it gets off to an extremely slow start. It also doesn't help that one of the bad guys is played by someone that appears to be channeling Larry Fine, and gives an overly long impersonation of a frog.


But just as I was ready to give up on the movie, something kicked in. When the movie finally gets around to what it's famous for, the amateurness turns into an asset. The film takes on a nightmarish quality in the torture/humiliation/rape/carving/killing scenes. It's not easy to watch. There is no CGI, no stylized quality, no indication that what you're watching is anything other than some disgusting home movie.

And once the girls are dead, it devolves back into a mostly unwatchable mess. There are a few interesting moments (seconds, really), but they are strung out too far. Also, there is a "comedy" plot that seems like it is dropped in from another movie, and detracts from the overall vibe of LHOTL.

I don't suppose there was a market for 10 minute horror movies back then, but this really looks like a short film sandwiched into 60 minutes of padding. Someone should websode this to cut out the beginning, the ending, and the exteraneous shots that are intermixed into the torture scenes. The result wouldn't be pretty, but it would be powerful.

It would be interesting to contrast that 10 minutes of film with a modern counterpart, or, barring that, its non-union Mexican equivalent. To fill that void, I volunteer Hostel 2, which was conviently on cable this week, and was roundly criticized as the death of the "torture porn" movement that overtook horror films a few years ago.

Readers, there is no comparison. I only saw parts of Hostel 2, but I saw all of Hostel, and they are the same movie, except that the girls get it in Hostel 2. Hostel 2 takes the long way to set up ridiculous torture scenes that play out extra slowly so you can wince. But they're not really scary, because everything is telegraphed, and designed to make you jumpy instead of scared. LHOTL is the ultimate "Kids, don't talk to strangers" movie, but the bad guys at least act like how someone would expect a psycho to act. You could never imagine what happened in Hostel 2 happening to someone in real life. But everytime you hear a missing child story on TV, you are hoping that kid is not living out what happened in LHOTL. That is what gives LHOTL its power, and makes Hostel 2 look silly.

This is ultimately what makes LHOTL a movie that cannot be remade. (By the way, it is being remade, but the plot has been changed, and I am sure they will either tone things down, or go too far in the other direction and make things look ridiculous.) Times have changed, and people don't go to see horror movies that look like they could actually happen. There has to be some genuis serial killer, or supernatural force, or dead twin trying to be reborn so people can create a mental safety barrier between the silver screen and real life.

However, they are remaking LHOTL, although in name only. There is only one movie from the 1970's that I think is less out of tune with the way the majority of people think today, and is even more unsuited for a remake that would be faithful to the original.

And if anyone ever does plan a faithful remake of A Clockwork Orange, the social critics will have a field day.