Bad Movie Logo
"A website to the detriment of good film"
Custom Search
HOMEB-MOVIE REVIEWSREADER REVIEWSFORUMINTERVIEWSUPDATESABOUT
Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.
Did you miss your activation email?
March 28, 2024, 04:54:53 AM
713324 Posts in 53055 Topics by 7725 Members
Latest Member: wibwao
Badmovies.org Forum  |  Movies  |  Good Movies  |  The Last House on the Left 2009, better than the original « previous next »
Pages: [1]
Author Topic: The Last House on the Left 2009, better than the original  (Read 2521 times)
vukxfiles
Bad Movie Lover
***

Karma: 27
Posts: 784


« on: July 09, 2010, 07:32:22 AM »

Now I watched The Last House on the Left remake, and I'm able to analyze the differences and choose which version is IMO better, and I choose the remake. Here are the reasons:

*Spoliers*

1. The original is not serious because it mixes dark humor with serious subject matter. It used background music that seemed out of place, and because of this it leaned more towards the exploitation genre than horror. The remake, however, isn't funny at all and maintains an attitude suitable for the subject matter. This serious and dark atmosphere makes the story only more terrifying and realistic.

2. The villain characters at last have a much more realistic personality. Junior seems much more plausible, he is no longer controlled by his father because of a drug addiction, but instead he fears his father, yet isn't brave enough to face him. Because he isn't an addict, he can make a chioce to leave the "family" behind, and it is referenced that he maybe tried to kill them but couldn't do it. Francis , the uncle, now looks much younger and isn't as quiet as his character in the original. Sadie isn't sexually-crazed as her original character, and is much more believable. Krug's personality didn't change much, but now he has a bit more boss-like serious attitude.

3. In the original, Junior loors the girls into the family's "hideout", with the intention of letting them be humiliated and raped. In the remake, the girls drive him to the hideout in order to get some pot, and because they stay there trying to have some fun, the rest of the family comes back and is surprised by their presence. This gives even more good points to Junior's personality, because he didn't intentionally introduce the girl's to the family.

4. In the original, the girls are taken to the woods for the purpose of being humiliated and raped. In the remake, they were being taken probably to another town, so the family can change thir resting place and not be caught. They would have probably been kept or "disposed of", because of the family's fear that the girls might give away their whereabouts. This makes the "family" a much more believable and serious criminal group, because they because don't waste their time with devious sex acts. They are not as deranged as they were in the original. The girls are only taken to the forest because they try to escape and cause the car to crash into a tree.

5. The time spent in the forest wasn't for satisfying perverse urges, but to commit their little revenge against the girls and dispose of them. They weren't made to do perverted thins, like pee in their pants or kiss eachother, like in the original. Krug killed Paige and raped Mari out of anger. The rape scene, unlike in the original, is now very tough to watch and is no laughing matter. After the rape, Mari hits Krug in the head with a rock and tries to escape, but in the original Krug just let her escape and shot her to death once she was in the lake.

6. I remember the reason of the family coming to the parent's house was because police found their car parked near the woods. In the remake, their car was crashed and a rainstorm started, also the uncle had a broken nose, giving them no other option than coming in the house for shelter.

7. In the original, the parents found their dead daughter after searching for her in the woods, which is very unplausible since the forest is huge. Here, the daugher, still alive, crwls to her house and her parent's discover her. The father, being a doctor, tries to do everything in his power to keep Mari alive. He also discovers she was raped by examining her. I prefer the idea of Mari surviving.

8. The revenge in this version is more plausible and emotional. In the original, I remember the father making an electric booby-trap, which seemed like I was watching Home Alone. The mother have fellatio and bit off the uncle's genitals, and the father in the end used a chainsaw to kill Krug. This all didn't use any emotion at all, and made the parent's intentions look more like serial killer urges than revenge. Here, in the remake, the methods are more plausible, and since the parent both participate in all 3 killings, you can feel the emotional attachment between them. The uncles death is more plausible because the mother didn't take things to the extreme, like her character did in the original.

9. Junior doesn't die. In the original he killed himself after his father persuaded him into doing that. Here, he confronts his father and actually tries to shoot him, only unsuccessfully. He also helps the parents with their revenge, probably out of his own dislike towards the villains. He finally joins Mari and her parents as a possible new family member. Through the movie, Mari's mother treated Junior as her own child, probably because of the death of her son a year before.
Logged
zombie no.one
Frightening Fanatic of Horrible Cinema
****

Karma: 666
Posts: 5111


Oookaay...


« Reply #1 on: July 09, 2010, 08:36:07 AM »



1. The original is not serious because it mixes dark humor with serious subject matter. It used background music that seemed out of place, and because of this it leaned more towards the exploitation genre than horror. The remake, however, isn't funny at all and maintains an attitude suitable for the subject matter. This serious and dark atmosphere makes the story only more terrifying and realistic.


This is actually why I prefer the original. If you're talking plausibility, then the remake is probably more watertight, but I have to say the remake didn't do much for me. Found it a bit flat in places. The original is kind of all over the place but I think it works better as a piece of entertainment. I could understand why someone might prefer the remake though, as the reasons you state are all valid. I suppose it comes down to personal taste of what you find appealing in a movie, at the end of the day.

On a side note, one of the things I like about the original is the way the backing music is often Krug on his guitar singing about what's happening in the movie. It doesn't take itself too seriously as a film, but obviously it did provoke a very serious reaction from critics etc. because of the subject matter.
Logged

The Mandela Effect is a Mandela Effect
vukxfiles
Bad Movie Lover
***

Karma: 27
Posts: 784


« Reply #2 on: July 09, 2010, 08:47:39 AM »

The acting and music in the rape scene of the original made me laugh out loud. If you can recall, after Mari is raped she takes her clothes, and there's some ballad in the background that gives a kind of feeling like the producers are trying to say "she wasn't satisfied".

It's maybe good that the two versions differ, if someone wants dark humor and camp-value, they should watch the original, if someone wants real horror and suspense, they should watch the remake.
Logged
Flick James
Frightening Fanatic of Horrible Cinema
****

Karma: 489
Posts: 4642


Honorary Bastard of Arts


« Reply #3 on: July 09, 2010, 10:44:28 AM »

I appreciate your take, vukxfiles. It's pretty solid. I did like the remake, but I too prefer the original. It was very low-budget, so they just used stock music and made some poor choices, but probably didn't have much available to them. The original portrayed 70's teens, so it was more appropriate for the time. I grew up as a child in the 70's with three older sisters, and the casual fascination with promiscuity was a real thing then, and was captured pretty well in the attitudes of the two girls. Also, the actions of the criminals is a little more a sign of the times as well. The bad guys in the remake do what they do because it's necessary. Criminals have to be much more careful now than then. The bad guys in the original do seem a bit shallower caricatures, but people could get away with more then, plus, it's a b-movie from the 70's, I mean, come on.

Anyway, you've done some solid work in your analysis. I like both, but I'll side with the original.
Logged

I don't always talk about bad movies, but when I do, I prefer badmovies.org
Pages: [1]
Badmovies.org Forum  |  Movies  |  Good Movies  |  The Last House on the Left 2009, better than the original « previous next »
    Jump to:  


    RSS Feed Subscribe Subscribe by RSS
    Email Subscribe Subscribe by Email


    Popular Articles
    How To Find A Bad Movie

    The Champions of Justice

    Plan 9 from Outer Space

    Manos, The Hands of Fate

    Podcast: Todd the Convenience Store Clerk

    Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!

    Dragonball: The Magic Begins

    Cool As Ice

    The Educational Archives: Driver's Ed

    Godzilla vs. Monster Zero

    Do you have a zombie plan?

    FROM THE BADMOVIES.ORG ARCHIVES
    ImageThe Giant Claw - Slime drop

    Earth is visited by a GIANT ANTIMATTER SPACE BUZZARD! Gawk at the amazingly bad bird puppet, or chuckle over the silly dialog. This is one of the greatest b-movies ever made.

    Lesson Learned:
    • Osmosis: os·mo·sis (oz-mo'sis, os-) n., 1. When a bird eats something.

    Subscribe to Badmovies.org and get updates by email:

    HOME B-Movie Reviews Reader Reviews Forum Interviews TV Shows Advertising Information Sideshows Links Contact

    Badmovies.org is owned and operated by Andrew Borntreger. All original content is © 1998 - 2014 by its respective author(s). Image, video, and audio files are used in accordance with the Fair Use Law, and are property of the film copyright holders. You may freely link to any page (.html or .php) on this website, but reproduction in any other form must be authorized by the copyright holder.