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Last House on the Left
Rogue Pictures


6.7

based on 26 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 10 votes
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MPAA RATING: R for sadistic brutal violence including a rape and disturbing images, language, nudity and some drug use

Starring Tony Goldwyn, Monica Potter, Sara Paxton, Garret Dillahunt, Rhys Coiro, Martha MacIsaac, Riki Lindhome, and Aaron Paul

The night she arrives at the remote Collingwood lakehouse, Mari and her friend are kidnapped by a prison escapee and his crew. Terrified and left for dead, Mari's only hope is to make it back to parents John and Emma. Unfortunately, her attackers unknowingly seek shelter at the one place she could be safe. And when her family learns the horrifying story, they will make three strangers curse the day they came to The Last House on the Left. (Universal)

GENRE(S):	Horror \| Suspense/Thriller
WRITTEN BY:	Carl Ellsworth Adam Alleca Wes Craven (earlier film)
DIRECTED BY:	Dennis Iliadis
RELEASE DATE:	Theatrical: March 13, 2009
RUNNING TIME:	100 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips

Hinges on humiliation and vengeance, which makes it like most other modern horror titles. Its focus on sexual assault, however, puts it in a different, more primal league.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker

Iliadis is more visually sophisticated than Craven was in 1972 and works hard to sustain the mood and tension while still hitting the audience with blunt scenes of wincing violence. (It gets grisly and grotesque enough for gore hounds.)

Premiere Olivia Putnal

The storyline was actually believable, surrounding a family willing to do anything to save one another. A horror film turned feel-good.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Stephen Cole

Horror fans anticipating grisly laughs are in for a jolt. Because the new Last House, though terrifying, is never, ever fun.

New York Post Kyle Smith

A warning: One scene in the middle is almost outrageously cruel and graphic. If you're the type of person who has to be reminded, "It's only a movie," stay away. This is the most depraved and dreadful piece of screen horror since last year's "Funny Games."

San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub

The remake of The Last House on the Left breaks the template, taking the 1972 original into an interesting new direction, with bold camera angles, good actors and a script that heaps on just as much character development as carnage.

New York Magazine David Edelstein

There's a huge change that turns the nihilistic carnage of Craven's original into something suffused with old-fashioned family values, so that we can relax and enjoy watching the bad guys get beaten, skewered, dismembered by garbage disposals, and tortured with microwave ovens.

The New York Times Jeannette Catsoulis

Replacing the earlier movie's more depraved sequences with sustained tension and truly unnerving editing, the director proves adept at managing mayhem in cramped spaces.

The Hollywood Reporter Michael Rechtshaffen

Adheres sufficiently closely to the original template so as not to offend purists and manages to pack an intensely visceral punch of its own, most effectively in the extended setup.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Look at the performances. They're surprisingly good, and I especially admired the work of Monica Potter and Tony Goldwyn as the parents of one of two girls who go walking in the woods.

Philadelphia Inquirer Tirdad Derakhshani

The best in the latest crop of slasher remakes. Admittedly, that is faint praise.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

The wheels fall off toward the end but, until that point, Illiadis does an excellent job of generating and maintaining an intense sense of dread.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

The remake is plenty scary, though any moral inquiry into the cost of revenge seemed to fly over the heads of the screaming, laughing crowd I saw it with.

Washington Post Mike Mayo

In the end, like virtually every other remake that has been released recently, it's polished and predictable.

TV Guide Jason Buchanan

The result is a glossy, engaging suspense film that jettisons much of its predecessor's sadism and subtext in favor of crowd-pleasing revenge violence.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

Like the current hit "Taken," Last House 2009 packs a vicarious jolt that might feel cathartic to certain moviegoers.

Variety Dennis Harvey

If the original could be accused of having a real point (even a subtext), the uninspired redo has none whatsoever.

Village Voice Nick Pinkerton

This new House tries to sustain a grave, heavy sense of threat. It fails, through its villainy.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

It's now a straight-up crime and retribution flick, capped off by the dumbest wolf-feeding coda a 13-year-old ever dreamed up.

Film Threat Pete Vonder Haar

The rape scene is, admittedly, as brutal as any I've seen in recent memory, but much of what Iliadis shows us is a direct riff on the original.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Audiences with a brain cell left have only one choice: Look for the first exit on the right.

USA Today Claudia Puig

Not only is it plodding and completely predictable, the carnage is rendered slowly and quasi-reverentially, making the whole brutal experience come off like torture porn.

Los Angeles Times Mark Olsen

A shockingly mundane disappointment taken on its own and a deeply misguided refraction of the original.

New York Daily News Joe Neumaier

One sickening piece of garbage.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

This remake is merely vile (and dull).

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

It's a gore sundae with an S&M; cherry on top.

The average user rating for this movie is 6.7 (out of 10) based on 10 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Chad S. gave it a3:
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.

s z gave it a1:
Biggest disservice to humanity... wow, what has happened to film making? outrageous. Movie shows how callous we have become as a species. I am deeply ashamed to be to be part of the human race. Violence and sex and descpicable hatred towards women is not my idea of a good film. Only the most utter idiot with a negative IQ, and personality disorder of a sociopath would actually enjoy this.

jason gave it a10:
This movie is absolutely the most intense and brutal thing Ive ever seen. At the same time it is entirely believable. Its not really a horror movie but a really intense drama. The acting was prefect, every actor just displayed crazy depth of emotion. Although if you cant tolerate serious rape/death scenes then this isn't the movie for you.

Andrew O gave it a10:
I don't understand why this score is so low. I thought LHOTL was a great movie, superior to all modern horror flicks. It was the most intense movie, and it was beautifully shot. See it!!!

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Last House on the Left Rogue Pictures

Last House on the Left
Rogue Pictures