Welcome to Knockout Horror. Today we are reviewing recent slasher movie Last Straw. I believe this one had a limited festival release in late 2023 but it is only hitting streaming services in the past couple of months.
The story follows young woman Nancy (Jessica Belkin). Nancy recently discovered that she was pregnant. Suffering from morning sickness and the general malaise that comes from being an 18 year old screw up with no prospects. Nancy is dismayed when her dad tells her she has to work the night shift at the family owned diner. Little does she realise that serving coffee to drunk people will be the least of her concerns as she will soon be in a fight for her life against a group of vicious killers.
The Weakest Horror Sub-Genre?
I genuinely believe that the slasher sub-genre is the weakest in horror. Now, I know that is a controversial statement but, please, hear me out. Decent slashers are extremely rare. Movies like Black Christmas, Halloween and the more recent In A Violent Nature come along once in a blue moon. Even when they do appear, they still rarely hold up against other horror movies, as a whole.
The entire format is too simplistic. It’s too mindless to cultivate strong stories and interesting characters. The formula is too beat and up and played out to provide a capable breeding ground for anything other than mindless kills and horror movie violence. There just isn’t a lot to work with outside of trying to get the fundamentals right. A decent protagonist, interesting antagonist, some decent kills etc.
Now don’t get me wrong, slashers have their place. They make great sleepover movies and are perfect when you don’t want to think too hard about what you are watching. There is little better when you are looking for popcorn horror. But too many movies from the genre are barely watchable while others simply don’t even manage to get the aforementioned fundamentals right. Last Straw falls into the latter category.
Does Everything Wrong
I can harp on about everything Last Straw does wrong but this review would end up extremely long. It, honestly, doesn’t do a whole lot right, at all. Director Alan Scott Neal has really tried to go for a somewhat stylised indie horror aesthetic but it doesn’t feel very genuine. The camera work is antsy; ranging from trailing shots with a handheld camera. To basic shots placing subjects dead centre in a way that, almost, suggests a tape measure was pulled out to insure equidistant gaps on each side of said subject. The picture is very fuzzy and washed out and the editing can best be described as highly erratic.
Sound production is terrible with frequent boosting of vocals leading to ugly hissing and excess of ambient background noise. Voices can be difficult to understand, as well. The soundtrack is horrible. Legitimately, horrible; whatever band they struck a deal with are the equivalent of ear cancer. And I say that as a fan of alternative music and hardcore punk. The only thing worse is the sound of Nancy’s moaning which goes on and on and on, throughout.
Poor Acting and Writing
Acting is extremely subpar with few noteworthy performances. Glen Gould does such a poor job as the Sheriff that I thought he was going to turn out to be a bad guy. His delivery was a complete mess. It was nice to see May’s Jeremy Sisto but his part is a complete afterthought. The script is one of the worst I have encountered in awhile. With zingers such as “stop raping me with your eyes” uttered by a character who wasn’t even looking at the subject to know where their eyes were focused. It’s really bad.
Scares are completely non-existent. The movie abandons its slasher trappings very early on. kills that try very hard to be shocking by alternating between off screen violence and intimately, up close, on screen violence fail at both due to the sheer dullness of it all.
Writer, Taylor Sardoni, clearly struggles with writing for the myriad different personality types here, young women in particular. And while I can applaud the decision to subvert expectation a little somewhere during the middle of the film. Taking the plot in a slightly unexpected, non-linear, direction. This is all too formulaic and predictable to really offer any sort of story related intrigue. It’s very obvious where this one is going and not surprising when it actually arrives there. The only surprise is the ending which is utterly ridiculous and goes way beyond the typical slasher movie farce.
Some Big Problems
It would be remiss of me to not mention the casting of a differently abled person, here, to be used, pretty much, as the butt of a few jokes. I always applaud diversity in casting but to cast someone differently abled and then to have characters insult them, repeatedly, and mock them for their disability is somewhat disgusting. This would be all well and good if it served a purpose but it serves no purpose at all. Amounting to little more than an unceremonious exit and a low brow attempt to affect the audience. Because there was no other way in hell that Sardoni was capable of doing that with this milquetoast story and character line-up.
The biggest issue of all, however, is our protagonist Nancy. Jessica Belkin tries hard but I am not sure if I have ever encountered a more unlikable character in a horror movie in my life. She is crass, rude, obnoxious, needlessly aggressive, ableist, self pitying and, generally, completely detestable. Nancy reeks of “middle aged men writing young female characters” and suffers for the obvious misogyny of the author. This is far too common in horror, lately. Writers are struggling to create enjoyable, relatable, and likable characters and this movie is no exception.
Simply Awful
Nancy is needlessly horrible to everyone around her and, when the situation escalates, we are supposed to root for and relate to her struggle. It is, literally, an impossible task as she is so difficult to care about. Everything going wrong in her life is of her own making so why does the story attempt to make us sympathise with her having an unwanted pregnancy and a job she doesn’t enjoy? That’s life, deal with it or own it.
A scene where she dances around the diner made me cringe right down to my core. It goes on for three minutes; Belkin is a stiff and unremarkable dancer and the whole thing is completely needless. In fact, it actually works contrary to the stress she is, supposedly, facing in life. Why is this such a common trope in horror? The whole genre is becoming increasingly embarrassing as time goes on. This scene adds nothing but awkwardness. Thank God for the fast forward button.
Should You Watch Last Straw?
I thought Last Straw was, to be honest, pretty awful. The thing with slasher fans, however, is that they are an easily pleased bunch. It’s part of the reason that ten or so of these crap movies appear every year. Someone will enjoy this. As it stands, however, lacklustre acting, an awful script, a dull story that is predictable, despite attempting to subvert expectations, offensive character portrayals and the most unlikable protagonist ever are just too much to overcome. If you just enjoy slashers, you might like it, otherwise give it a miss.