2. The Hills Have Eyes (1977)
The upper crust Carter Family are travelling through California. They want to visit a silver mine that they were given as a silver wedding anniversary. An hysterical old man at a petrol station tells them not to go there, but of course our intrepid family ignore him and end up with a broken car in the middle of nowhere. They end up in the hands of mutant, redneck cannibals who survive in the barren area by preying on unsuspecting families like the Carters. After a night of extreme violence at the hands of the cannibal family (who are all named after planets), the remainder of the Carter family decide to take revenge on the rednecks which leads to even greater bloodshed. Definitely one of director Wes Craven's better efforts, The Hills Have Eyes features one of the scariest redneck families in the history of cinema. They are apparently based on the Sawny Bean story - Sawny was the head of an incestuous cannibal family in Scotland in the 15th/16th century who killed over 1000 people. The tale may be apocryphal, it may be based in fact - nobody really knows but it is a darn good story. Papa Jupiter, Mama and their three sons are some of the most sadistic rednecks you could hope to meet. I find it interesting that Craven reprised the same notion of revenge against the bad guys that he had in Last House on the Left with the Carter family thinking "To hell with this" and kicking cannibal redneck ass. The desert has never seemed so sinister and Craven takes his time to build up to the explosion if violence that engulfs the film in the end. It is very raw, low budget film making which captures the antics of some rednecks you would want to stay well away from. Evil rednecks like those in Deliverance are bad, but cannibal rednecks who are after your flesh are even worse.