The Last House on the Left (2009 remake)

THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT (2009 version)

I won’t compare and contrast this project with the original 1972 version, as I don’t remember that one too well (I’ve only seen it once, and that was eight years ago).  On its own terms, the 2009 incarnation of The Last House on the Left is chock full of suspense & tension and follows a sympathetic family through a night of hell. 

In the first half, a 17-year-old swimmer named Mari heads to an isolated vacation home with her parents (John and Emma).  Once there, Mari takes the family’s vehicle into town to meet up with her friend Paige, who works in a general store.  A customer there overhears Paige ask Mari if she still smokes pot.  The customer (Justin) mentions that he has some high-quality marijuana back at his motel room.  The girls end up smoking with him back at the room, where they are caught by Justin’s father (a dangerous criminal named Krug), Justin’s uncle (Francis), and a woman named Sadie whose relation to the others I did not glean.  The three adults (who weren’t supposed to return to the motel so soon) are upset because there’s a story on the front page about how Krug escaped from police custody.  Mari and Paige offer to leave without telling anyone anything, but Krug and his gang want to take no chances, so they kidnap the girls and steal Mari’s car.  Mari and Paige make a concerted effort to escape from the moving vehicle, which results in Krug crashing the car deep in the woods.  Krug and his gang (without the assistance of Justin) stab Paige, and then Krug rapes Mari in what I perceive as the most brutal assault sequence ever put to film.  Mari hits Krug in the head with a rock and sprints to a lake, where she swims for her life.  Krug shoots Mari, and one bullet catches her.

In the second half, Mari’s parents become the proactive characters.  They hear a knocking at their door and find Krug, Justin, Sadie, and Francis outside.  The criminals pose as a family out on a fishing trip that had an auto accident.  John and Emma unknowingly welcome in those who just brutalized their daughter and killed Paige.  I’ll say no more lest I spoil the taut and effective final fifty minutes or so of this well-constructed and convincingly-acted project.     

The unique structure of this tale impressed me: few stories can switch protagonists midstream and work well.  There’s an unsettling realness to the whole affair – when John and Emma realize that Mari has been raped, for example, they react in a psychologically-believable way.  Hats off to the entire creative team behind the 2009 version of The Last House on the Left – they have achieved that rarest of feats, crafting a remake that is more effective than the original.