THE HILLS HAVE EYES (1977) but not a twisted soul

Posted by Daniel Metz

My first experience with the original Wes Craven hillbilly movie was pleasant if a bit of a let down. I love The Last House on the Left. A lot. Hills Have Eyes is like Chitty Chitty Bang Bang compared to that twisted freakfest. Nevertheless, there are some profoundly wonderful things about Craven’s second film.

First and foremost, I have to say this one thing: The Hills Have Eyes is basically a dog movie. The film is punctuated by moments of canine antics and heroism. Were it not for The Beast, and to a lesser extent Beauty, the film would be a much darker film. Everyone would be dead, and the astral mutants would still rule the wastelands.

She kinda looks pissed.

One standout aspect of this film is the leading lady Brenda Carter, played here by Susan Lanier. Lanier went on to do absolute nothing with her career, but that doesn’t mean she didn’t shine in this film as a Bardot-like ingenue who goes through more personality changes than a Jim Carey character.

She starts as a firecracker bitch who thinks everyone in the world is a creep. That keeps up until she gets raped by one of the freaks. She then converts to a typical catatonic rape victim who only musters the vocalizations of terror and irrational shrieks. Moments later, when the proverbial going gets tough, she turns to a survivalist, thinking up elaborate schemes that involve wire and automobile rims.

The best thing in the movie, of course, is the way the freaks talk about this baby they stole. The dad keeps referring to it as a “tenderloin baby.” They’re gonna eat that baby!

This obviously isn't in the movie, but that guy is one of the canibals, and he is holding a baby. It's too good an image not to use.

The Mise-en-scène really is terrific here. The desert is shot with a dry hotness that can only be described as desertlike. No, but seriously, it’s pretty good. The mutants are especially well designed, from the animal-hide doors to necklaces of bone, the disgusting scar make-up to the tooth bracelet. By the way, why would someone wear a tooth bracelet?

Seeing this film, I was overwhelmed with the idea (not the first time I’ve had it) that there is something really special about these 1970s, low budget horror films. Like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, The Last House on the Left, Night of the Living Dead (I know that’s late 1960s, but it fits what I’m talking about), Black Christmas and others, this film has a rawness to it that can only be described as amateurish. I mean that entirely as a compliment.

This unsophisticated image is scarier than anything fancy cameras and CGI can muster

The poor film stock, no frills cinematography, and simple scenarios make these films scary because of an almost documentary urgency that they seem to possess. They are films made from passion, but not the way 1990s indie films are personal or passionate. They are the personal creations of freakazoids (like myself) who just want to make a movie that’ll scare their parents and disturb the neighbors. You gotta love that.