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The
Last House on the Left
Probably the most realistically horrifying film I have ever seen, Wes Craven and Sean Cunningham's "The Last House on the Left," while overlooked, is an important step toward the slasher subgenre. Gruesome acts abound throughout the film, including rape, murder, physical abuse, emotional abuse, and just about everything else imaginable. The power of these scenes are undeniable; I have a hard time getting some images out of my head. It is loosely based on the Ingmar Bergman film "The Virgin Spring," in which a girl is murdered, her parents unwittingly harbor the fugitive killers, and the parents eventually learn the truth and brutally murder the criminals. Echoes of "Psycho" abound, and this film is echoed in "Evil Dead 2" and other movies. An important film in terms of overstepping the boundaries of horror filmmaking, but not something to revisit very many times. |