Last House on Dead End Street

Sound familiar? Last House on... well get that thought out of your head right now. This baby was filmed in the winter/spring of '72-'73 for about $1,500 by Roger Watkins. The name is a "cash-in" title given to the film years later by the distribution company who finally put it out in the late '70's. There is no house; there is no dead end street, but there is insane nihilism, and scenes which leave you in awe of the films brilliance. Unfortunately the distribution company also decided to hack up the director's cut of the film, which Watkins admits may have been self-indulgent at roughly 3 hours long. That version of the film, under the title "The Cuckoo Clocks of Hell" has yet to be found, but is believed to be somewhere in a film lab in New York.

This movie has been hacked up, there's scenes which don't make much sense, voice overs which seem so out of place, and piss poor dubbing. But, even with all of these strikes against the film being good, it manages to bring to the screen a new level of gritty violence, surreal atmosphere, and a soundtrack that really gets into your head with the use of heart-beats and over-driven organ/choir music. The film is haunting, to say the least.

The story consists of Terry Hawkins, played by Watkins himself, who has just been released from prison. He sets out to gather a group of like-minded individuals who set out to make movies the likes of which have never been seen before. They don't think sex sells anymore, people want something new. Terry decides that in order to make the killings on film realistic, there's nothing better than the real thing. I don't want to give too much away here, but from this point on your about to get mindfucked.

The killings, according to Watkins, were virtually left alone by the distributors of the film. They did happen to cut out one of the murders apparently.. which we only see a flash cut of, in a completely different scene. The power of the film is still there to be seen on your screen. It really is an amazing film. If you have ever seen "Flower of Flesh and Blood", you will notice something very similar, hint hint.

Roger Watkins never ended up with the career that he deserved in the film world. After this movie, he made one more horror film "Shadows of the Mind", and several hard-core pornography titles. In a way, Watkins predicted his own life in "Last House", the seedy underbelly of the movie business, pornography, and an appropriately downbeat attitude are all present.

Barrel Entertainment released this film in a stellar 2-disc edition, and seeing how they dropped off the face of the Earth some time ago I doubt that this baby will ever see a new Region 1 release. I've seen this film go for quite a chunk of change on the web, and I can safely say that it would be worth every penny to pick up. This film is the starting point to an entire sub-genre of films. Just look at the first two Guinea Pig films, the August Underground series, and Tumbling Doll of Flesh to see the influence.

I cannot recommend this movie any more highly. It really is one of the most powerful exploitation/underground films that I have ever seen. If you're like me and you have a taste for off-beat cinema, you owe it to yourself to check this out.