I was initially appalled and shocked when I found out a while ago that someone was remaking Wes Craven's nasty little 1972 movie LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT (which is, itself a remake of the extraordinarily good Ingmar Bergman film THE VIRGIN SPRING which you can find on the Criterion Collection's DVD series in a pristine print). Craven's film is one of the few rape/revenge movies that never really sat so well with me. I'm not sure why, as it follows the same formula as all the others like it. I think perhaps the thugs in LAST HOUSE are just a little too brutal, too heinous, and - ultimately - far too realistic. I always keep thinking while watching it, "Real people do these terrible things in real life. It really happens." It's not quite a movie when it feels that gritty. The original film is more like a fictional documentary. I do know that Craven initially planned it as a hardcore pornographic film. So the rape would not have been simulated. I don't think I could have stood something like that, and I'm glad the man eventually came to his senses.
All that being said, I completely forgot about the impending remake. But I guess Alexandre Aja's remake of Craven's THE HILLS HAVE EYES (which I actually thought was a really great remake as far as remakes go) made so much cash, that it was only a matter of time before LAST HOUSE moved on up.
You can now view the trailer online and, I have to admit that it looks pretty good, if a little too sanitized. All the faces in the new version (like the countless other remakes of 70s horror films) look too pretty to be real - everyone in this looks like a model - even the baddies. Aside from that, though, they punch it up to make me wanna buy a ticket and walk into the theater. Perhaps they improved the movie. Perhaps not. The real problem I have with the trailer is that it takes you through each step of the movie, plot-point to plot-point so that you don't really even need to see it. What's the point of a trailer like that? People who haven't seen the original don't even need to see the remake now that they've seen the remake's trailer. Sheesh. I mean, the movie, in all it's incarnations, always had an interesting bait-and-switch plot, and they just went and gave every twist of it away in the damn preview.
Hollywood sucks. Perhaps that's my point.
Or maybe my point is that it's a really cool trailer, giving away the entire movie nonwithstanding.
Or maybe my point is that they really didn't need to remake the remake of The Virgin Spring in the first place because - really, didn't we say all we needed to say with The Virgin Spring, The Last House on the Left, I Spit On Your Grave, Thriller: A Cruel Picture, Death Wish, The Brave One, Kill Bill, Baise-Moi and et cetera et cetera? The list goes on and on. Rape/revenge movies have been done to death and they're either brutal or entertaining in a trashy way, but usually nothing more than that, give or take an IRREVERSIBLE which was actually both brutal, trashy and - surprisingly - thought provoking.
Unless you're going to say something new or interesting, why bother anymore, Hollywood? The answer to that question is: because audiences will keep lining up to see the same old shit over and over again because that's what they want. And Hollywood is ultimately about making money.
And I guess I'll be lining up for the LAST HOUSE remake, too, so I'm no better than the people I'm ranting and raving about, am I?
I'm one contradictory and conflicted movie-loving idiot, huh?
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