Film Analysis: The Last House On The Left

Superior Essays
Horror movies are not the movies that are going to win awards. They 're not the movies that are going to get big budgets. Most important, however, they 're not the movies that will garner the most fans. It 's a genre of films that constantly finds itself trying to be legitimate in the eyes of critics and academics, yet the majority continue to dismiss the films as nothing more than an easy way to make money at the box office. It 's not often that a horror movie is released that is undeniably important to cinema. This is what separates The Last House on the Left from its ' peers. It 's a film that is revered as one of the most important films in the horror genre and is credited with changing the genre forever. It 's the foundation of Wes Craven …show more content…
He would go on to be regarded as one of the most prolific horror movie directors of all time, bringing iconic horror movie villains, such as Freddy Krueger and Ghostface, to the big screen. The Last House on the Left, however, would be more than just a stepping stone for his career, but also launched Sean Cunningham’s career. Serving as a producer for the film, Sean Cunningham would go on to create the Friday the 13th franchise, which he continues to oversee today. It’s fitting that both would go on to have prominent roles in horror considering the effect The Last House on the Left had on the genre. The film is regarded as one of the original films to give rise to the horror exploitation genre, as well as fright films. These two genres joined forces in the 1980s and helped launch the slasher film’s popularity, a genre that both Craven and Cunningham would find their success in (A Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday the 13th, …show more content…
By design, the film is a b-movie, so the cast consists of unheard actors, even at the time of filming. However, none of the actors would go on to have major careers in film, with some, such as Lucy Grantham, not having any other acting roles again. The stark contrast between the futures of the actors and Craven and Cunningham helps add to the realism for viewers today. When the film was released in 1972, it was expected that no one would know these actors. However, in 2016, viewers still don’t know these actors outside this role, making the brutal death scenes in the film seem like it could truly be the death of some of these actors, even if we know it’s not. By having a cast of that continues to be unknown, viewers are able to still get lost in this film and it’s heightened

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    The film Hearts and Minds is a documentary made by Peter Davis in 1974 to portray America’s unethical involvement in Vietnam and examine the opinions of many by showing interviews and vivid footages. The film focuses more on those who were against the war than those who supported it. For the U.S. all that mattered was the victory. However, those who were opposed to the war felt that there was no right or reasonable justification for their actions. The real issue illustrated by the film was whether the U.S. wanted to protect the country from communism or to manifest its greatest power in the world by winning another war.…

    • 735 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Dumb Blonde Essay

    • 1421 Words
    • 6 Pages

    The genre of horror films has evolved into an existence that would have once come across as sadistic and unoriginal to the people of the early twentieth century. Horror enthusiasts Mary Shelley, Bram Stoker, and Edgar Allen Poe would cringe in their coffins at what has come to the genre they influenced, perfected, and created for the world to experience. What once used to be a never ending, bloodcurdling screaming celebration has since turned into horror flicks that now seem to be more comedic than terrifying and result in audiences often becoming disinterested. In earlier generations, actors and actresses were forced to investigate and research information that could be used to heighten their performances. Today, living actors have since…

    • 1421 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The House We Live In has many talking points that involve race. It demonstrates how the institutions and policies in the United States created disadvantages at the detriment of other races. This film showcases how Caucasians used establishments and created policies to benefit and create power for themselves while causing other races drawbacks. The film covers immigration, the lower working class under industrialization, laws and court, and housing. All of these areas and how race played a role in society as we know it today.…

    • 1326 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The film updates the story with twentieth-century protagonists challenging neo-colonialism. By casting an American Black actor as Idi Amin, the last King raises unsettling issues about Black identity, Afro-Diasporic sentiment, and racial ventriloquism that harks back to Hollywood’s days of Blackface minstrelsy. Racism in Western popular culture has not been uncontested, and in recent years well organized and successful protests have risen up in various forms against corporations, athletic organizations, and other purveyors of racialized popular media, however, for as many successful protests, decades long battles continue today to end the dehumanizing portrayals of marginalized groups in the United States. People begin by focusing on some recent…

    • 177 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    The Town Film Analysis

    • 747 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Is it possible to consider that cop can be considered to be the bad guy in a gangster movie? It is possible like for the movie called the ”Town“ that show a movie about a group of gangster that committed a crime in robbing a bank and held a employee from the bank as hostage in order to escape. The problem is that employee was held hostage from the bank became a witness and was dating with one of the member that was from the group of gangster that committed a crime in robbing a bank. The witness was being suspected in being accomplice and was forced to cooperate with the cops in order to arrest the gangster that committed the crime to prove the witness’s innocence. The irony of this movie named ”Town“ had cops as a bad guy in the film and I plan on rooting for the bad guy.…

    • 747 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    It is not uncommon for newly graduated college students stepping into the world to experience a heavy dose of reality. It also is not unusual for college students to feel an overwhelming sense of loneliness when faced with reality. Directed by Mike Nichols,” The Graduate ”, a film that observes a newly graduated college student, Benjamin, played by actor Denis Hoffman, dealing with reality and all of the disconnection it might come with. By highlighting and focusing on Benjamin’s social behaviors, his personal affairs, and his way of living “The Graduate” showcases a theme of not just loneliness but instead something far more torturous: isolation.…

    • 960 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Full House Film Analysis

    • 1762 Words
    • 8 Pages

    Full house is a family show that demonstrates many variations of relational communications. When we analyze the relationships with in this big family you start to see the themes that were discussed in the beginning of this paper. I chose this film to analyze these themes because they are a blended family with various dimensions. For example, the characters Jessie and Joey are involuntary family, they are not biologically related. They became family because they were living with each other and were sharing the same family roles.…

    • 1762 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Triumph of the Will (1935) and Olympia (1936) are German propaganda films, directed by Leni Riefenstahl. Leni Riefenstahl was a German film director and propagandist for the Nazis. The films were created by Leni Riefenstahl in order to deliver the Nazi propaganda messages to the viewers and glorify Adolf Hitler as the savior of Germany. Also, the films were created because both films document the early days of the Nazi Party and its leader’s moments so that future generations could go back and see the power of the Nazi Party. This paper will explain how the director has used Nazi propaganda strategies in these films to deliver their propaganda messages.…

    • 1004 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The Abject In Horror Film

    • 1365 Words
    • 6 Pages

    The slasher film to some viewers has been written off and categorized as a film not worth watching. Typically viewers decide that this genre may be too violent, graphic, or misogynistic. However, slasher films, like many horror movies, may offer a commentary on society or the human condition. An approach to understanding such films is through the concept of the ‘abject’. It is the disturbance of boundaries that threaten things such as an individual’s identity or societal order Abjection describes our reaction to the threat of borders that are meant to protect the individual.…

    • 1365 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Sinister Film Analysis

    • 827 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Despite its perfect casting and attention to detail, Sinister’s predictable plot falls short in inducing fear into its audience. The most important aspect of a horror film is whether or not it evokes fear from its audience. Unfortunately, Sinister fails to produce the hair-raising, nail-biting, and heart-pounding content that horror movie junkies crave. One thing that adds an eeriness to the…

    • 827 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    During this time, you saw the first movies from big names like Steven Spielberg with Jaws, Brain de Palma with Carrie from the famous novel from Stephen King. Then later came the independent films like Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Halloween 1978. After the success of the Halloween movie studios backed slasher films like Friday the 13th in 1980 and Nightmare on Elm Street in 1984. In the 1980’s came new technology, with special effects that brought horror into a new level. Now with latex, foam and animatronics movies like Alien, The Thing, An American Werewolf in London and Howling now could be seen in full color close-ups.…

    • 1000 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The sudden twist in movies have people at the edge of their seats and filled with excitement. Horror movies give one a sense of danger and fear without actually putting the viewer in any actual danger. Sometimes people want a pessimistic film that explores the darker side of human nature. A film to where it does not always have a happy ending. Horror films sometimes take individuals to another reality in their own world.…

    • 824 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    First, think of all the horror films you have heard of or seen: A Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th, Chucky. The majority of horror films are predictable (Carroll 97). Slasher films are especially predictable: run, scream, die, in no particular order. If you read this guide then you are not going to do that. I assure you.…

    • 1145 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Drugs, greed, hookers, and a giant scam. This would be an accurate way to summarize the "professional" life of Jordan Belfort also known as the "Wolf of Wall Street". Mr. Belfort, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, is the main character in the film The Wolf of Wall Street, a film by Martin Scorsese based on the real life memoir of Jordan Belfort. He is a man consumed in himself and Scorsese makes his viewers want to embody his lifestyle. So how was he able to present and glamorize a life filled with all of this sin?…

    • 754 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Syifa Afiah 016201400164 The Wolf of Wall Street is a 2013 American biographical black comedy film, directed by Martin Scorsese. The screenplay by Terence Winter is adapted from the eponymous memoir by Jordan Belfort and recounts from Belfort's perspective his career as a stockbroker in New York City and how his firm Stratton Oakmont engaged in rampant corruption and fraud on Wall Street that ultimately led to his downfall. Leonardo DiCaprio (who also produced the film) stars as Belfort, with Jonah Hill as his business partner and friend Donnie Azoff, Margot Robbie as his second wife Naomi Lapaglia, and Kyle Chandler as Patrick Denham, the FBI agent who tries to bring him down. Rob Reiner, Jon Bernthal, Jon Favreau, Jean Dujardin, Joanna Lumley, and Matthew…

    • 807 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays