My Newsday Insider movie review of THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT!

Read my Newsday Insider movie review of THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT!

(Yeah! Got it published on the Newsday website! lol )

http://www.newsday.com/services/site/newspaper/ny-insider-moviereview-lasthouse,0,5928708.htmlstory <-- here's the link!


REVIEW BY KAREN BENARDELLO OF HICKSVILLE:

Just when horror movie fans were hoping to see the last of the recent remakes of iconic classics, studio company Rogue Pictures released the latest rehasing of one of the scariest films to date-"The Last House on the Left." Unlike most of the other remakes, which often times can instead pass as sequels, this movie, which stars Tony Goldwyn, Monica Potter, Garret Dillahunt and Sara Paxton, stays true to the original, while updating the storyline just enough from the 1970s to the present day to leave its audience wondering how safe seemingly innocent-looking strangers really are.

However, before "The Last House on the Left" hit theaters, its superstitious release date of Friday the 13th seemed to be its only advantage. Rogue Pictures, which is a subsidiary of Universal and primarily releases horror movies, including "The Return," "The Hitcher" and "The Strangers," hired Dennis Iliadis as the movie's director, even though he has only directed one movie before. Trying to break into mainstream movies, it was questionable whether Iliadis could positively distinguish this version of "The Last House on the Left" from other 1970s and '80s remakes, including "Friday the 13th," "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" and "The Hills Have Eyes" (which, along with the original "The Last House on the Left," famed horror director Wes Craven directed). However, Iliadis did well bringing this updated version of "The Last House on the Left" to life, as it focuses on the Collingwood family's struggle with dealing with the death of son Ben.

Surviving child Mari travels to the family's vacation lake home in the middle of nowhere with her parents Emma and John for the summer, and on the first night, asks to go visit her friend Paige at the store she works at in town. While Emma is at first hesitant to let her drive into town alone, as Ben died in a car accident, John ultimately convinces her to let Mari go. While at the store, Paige and Mari meet fellow teen Justin, who convinces them to go back to his motel room to smoke marijuana with him.

Once there, Mari and Paige meet their untimely demise as Justin's father, uncle and friend come back after escaping from the police. Justin's father becomes upset he made the first page of the newspaper, and believing Mari and Paige will call the police, he takes them into the woods to kill them. Later in the night, Justin and his family unknowing take refugee from a rain storm at the Collingwood house, and when Mari's parents realize who their guests really are, they begin to torment and attack them.

While the remake slightly alters details from the original, the updated version of "The Last House on the Left" is still terrifying, especially when the Cullingwoods' fight their daughter's attackers. For example, the scene where John injects Justin's father with something to paralyze him from the waist down, puts his head in the microwave and turns it on shows to what lengths a father would go to protect his daughter. While the majority of the actors are unkowns, except for Potter, who starred in such movies as "Saw" and "Along Came A Spider," and Paxton, who starred in "Sydney White" and TV's "Summerland," their acting showed they put time and effort into researching and studying the minds of their characters. Even though anticipated movies often thrive on the big-name actors the studio hire to draw in money, the excitement over the original movie seemed to draw in fans, as it made an estimated $14,658,000 during its first weekend. Contrastingly, the 1972 original earned an estimated $3.1 million during its entire box office run, which, adjusting for 2009's inflation, would be approximately $16,468,225.

While "The Last House on the Left" remake is a must-see for avid horror fans, parents of young children shouldn't let them see it, as they might find it disturbing, since it contains some nudity, a rape scene, profanity and extreme violence and blood throughout. The only things adults will find disturbing is the fact that no one actually says the Collingwood house is the last house on the left, despite it being said in the trailers, and the fact that the house looks nothing like it does on the theatrical poster.