Last House on the Left

Alternate titles : Krug and Company, Grim Company, The Mens Room,Sex Crime of the Century, Night of Vengeance

Tagline : "To avoid fainting, just keep repeating, it's only a movie...only a movie...only a movie."

Horror Director Wes Craven's debut film, centre's around young Mari Collingwood (Sandra Cassel), who is celebrating her 16th birthday by going to see a rock concert with her friend Phyllis (Lucy Grantham). On their way, they call in at a nearby flat hoping to score some dope, only they find they've been tricked, and the occupants are not really interested in selling drugs.

They turn out to be 4 escaped criminals. Krug Stillo (David Hess), his girlfriend Sadie (Jeramie Rain), son Junior (Marc Sheffler) and accomplice Fred "Weasel" Podowski (Fred J. Lincoln) who've just broken out of jail and are looking for some fun and excitement of their own.

Having held the girls hostage overnight, they're then loaded into the boot of their getaway car and driven into the countryside, where they are marched into the woods and subjected to various indignities and torture. Phyllis is instructed to "piss her pants", then strip off with Mari and start "making out" together. Krug and Weasel then take to torturing the two girls with knives, before finally being raped and shot.

But when their getaway car breaks down, they are forced to call in at a nearby house for help. As it turns out, the place actually happens to belong to Mari's parents, who agree to let them stop over till the local garage opens in the morning. But upon discovering who these people are and what they've done to their daughter and friend, they decide to exact an equally brutal and bloody revenge on the killers, with shotguns, chisels and chainsaws.

Produced by Sean Cunningham, who went on to Direct Friday the 13th, this is not the sort of film you would expect either of them to be associated with, but what is particularly odd is that the vile scenes of torture and humiliation are bizarrely offset by some rather inappropriate "jolly" sounding country and western music, along with some comedic scenes of 2 goofy cops, who spend most of the film wandering through the woods after their police car runs out of fuel.

Banned in the UK for many years as a "Video Nasty", if you enjoy exploitation pics, or are interested in seeing Cravens earlier works before he turned mainstream, then I would recommend it to you. But don't expect to see buckets of blood and gore (of which there is very little). The film is not really deserving of it's infamy.

Overall Marks : 6/10.

Terrifying Trivia

• The film Claims to be based on a true story, however it was actually a reworking of the short story "The Virgin Spring" by Ingmar Bergman.
• The film marked the Directorial debut of Wes Craven, who went on to direct the successful "The Hills Have Eyes", before achieving worldwide recognition with the hugely popular "Nightmare on Elm Street" and "Scream" trilogy. The film also marked Sean S. Cunningham's first foray into horror film making, who went on to Direct "Friday the 13th". Steve Miner, who also worked on some of the earlier "Friday the 13th" films also helped out with the production on this.
• Lead Actor David Hess, who played Krug, also provided the songs for the film's soundtrack. Having previously worked in the music industry and even written songs for Elvis Presley.
• The film was submitted to the BBFC for a cinema certificate in 1972, but was rejected. The film was later released onto UK video in the early 80's, which was uncut in terms of violence but missed out the scene of the 2 cops trying to hitch a ride on a chicken truck, whch was cut so the film would fit onto a 90min tape. This video was subsequently listed on the governments "Video Nasties" hitlist and prosecuted for being obscene, and so was withdrawn.
• Fred Lincoln, who played "Weasel", went on to be a Director of pornographic films, and had over 300 titles to his credit when he finally retired in 2006.
• The Sheriff's deputy was played by Martin Kove, who went on to play Detective Vic Isbecki in the popular 80's cop show "Cagney & Lacey" as well as starring in a string of popular action movies, most notably "Rambo - First Blood Part 2" and "The Karate Kid" films.
• The US R rated release was VERY heavily cut, which missed out most of the violence and sexual activity. A supposedly uncut release was available in the US by Vestron video although this still missed out a lot of footage compared to the current Disc releases. There is apparently, quite a bit of footage missing from all current releases, but as no fully complete prints still exist, the current Disc releases are as complete a version that were ever likely to see.
• The boy with the balloon, that Krug pops with his cigar, was played by Wes Craven's son Jonathon.
• The film was re-submitted for a UK cinema certificate in 1999, but was rejected again after the distributors refused to make cuts. The film was subsequently screened at special horror festivals around the country, where permission had been obtained from the local councils. The film was then submitted for a third time in 2001, which faired much better and the censors agreed to pass the film with 4 minor cuts totalling 16s. But the distributors decided to appeal against this. Unfortunately they lost and the BBFC subsequently increased the number of cuts required to 31s after the appeals committee raised objections about how little they were insisting on cutting (so much for trying). The full uncut version was finally passed in 2008.
• An alterate cut of the film, entitled "Krug and Company" circulated on bootleg tape in the Mid-80s, which shortened some of the gore and sexual violence, but had some extra scenes where the parents find Mari still barely alive. Some outtake footage of the intestinal pulling scene turned up in the pseudo documentary "Confessions of the Blue Movie Star" which was distributed by the same company that produced "Last House on the Left".
• Sean Cunningham had planned to do a sequel in the mid-80s entitled "Last House on the Left Part 2". Danny Steinman, who directed "Friday the 13th Part 5", was attached to direct. But despite taking out numerous trade adverts, the project never got off the ground.

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