Even in this day and age, people still complain of how Hollywood doesn’t do enough to warn them of how infinitely disturbing certain movies are. Regardless of the specific descriptions the MPAA lists in an R-rated movie such as graphic violence, nudity, blood, and gore, many still insist more needs to be done to warn audiences, and that’s even though they were warned extensively beforehand. Heck, you can have the whole movie spoiled for you when you visit its Wikipedia page as it often contains a plot synopsis of everything which happens. Regardless, parents still drag their children to movies they have no business watching at such a tender age just because they won’t spend the money to hire a babysitter.

I bring this up because the trailer for the 1972 exploitation horror movie “The Last House on the Left” does what most trailers these days never bother to do; warn prospective audiences of a seriously disturbing motion picture which will arrive in a theater near them very soon. The narrator speaks ominously of how the house rests on “the very center of hell,” and the musical stings are enough to send shivers down the spines of the most jaded filmgoer. And of course, there is the line of, “To avoid fainting keep repeating, it’s only a movie, only a movie, only a movie.” These days, this refrain may seem laughable, but when it comes to this cult classic, this is a really good piece of advice to keep in mind.

It’s a relatively short trailer, but it shows how Wes Craven, who made his directorial debut with this one, shot “The Last House on the Left” in a documentary style to where it felt like we were watching something real and not staged. The only actors we see here are Sandra Cassel who played Mari Collingwood and Lucy Grantham who portrayed Phyllis Stone. These characters are put through absolute hell, but we do not see the full extent of their hell in the trailer. Instead, we get glimpses of the pain and torture they are put through, and it forces us to imagine the worst things they have been forced to experience. For myself, this trailer made me infinitely intrigued to check this movie out as it seemed like the kind most audiences would be quick to avoid. Having seen it, I can assure you this is not the easiest cinematic experience to sit through in the slightest, and you have to give credit to those who put this trailer together as even they were more than willing to make this point very clear to even the most adventurous of movie goers.

I love how “The Last House on the Left” trailer does an effective job of warning its prospective audience about how disturbing a movie this will be for them. These days, I tempted to think any studio releasing it would be much more focused on starting a cinematic universe regardless of its highly disturbing material. Just think of what could have been: “The Next to Last House on the Left,” “The Last House on the Right,” “The First House on the Left,” “The Last House to be Demolished on the Left,” etc. The possibilities may be disturbing, but they are also endless.