Review of The Last House on the Left (2009) by Chads. — 15 Mar 2009

There's no virgin spring, but this remake of a remake has a virgin swimming pool, and a virgin lake. [***SPOILER***] This teenaged swimmer must have one hell of a regimen to survive what she survived.

Mari(Sara Paxton) is raped, shot at, and crawls home in the rain with a bullet lodged in her body. For all intents and purposes, Mari needs to stay dead, in lieu of what happens to Mari's attackers.

What Mari's parents do to the rapist and his colleagues violates the spirit of the maxim "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth". By keeping Mari alive, the parents' vengeance is robbed of its righteousness and purpose; by keeping Mari alive, the parents end up looking like sadists.

Since "The Last House on the Left" lacks the good sense to keep the logic of the Wes Craven original intact, why not break the mold irreparably and let Mari be more pro-active; why not let the girl go after her own attackers? Not only because she was brutally raped, but also because she has to share her victimhood with a guy.

Competing for the audience's sympathy, this reboot has a hireling, the rapist's son, whose suffering is concentrated over a longer period of time than Mari, so therefore becomes the real subject of the film.

When will the cowering son face finally up to his intemperate father? "The Last House on the Left" wants to have it both ways: to be an exploitation movie with a happy ending like some studio flick.

Within the film's outward appearance of graphic violence, drug use, and sexual deviancy, beats a tame PG-13 heart.