The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

In director Tobe Hooper's exploitative, low-budget (reportedly 150,000ドル) seminal, hand-made cult horror film - it was one of the most effective, box-office successes of the 70s, earning 30ドル.9 million at the box office (domestic); the grindhouse horror classic, a real rural nightmare, was originally shot in 16mm, giving it a raw, documentary feel. The horror flick deeply divided critics - some praised it for its depiction of deprived, 'off-the-main-highway' rural America and the social effects upon its people. Others deplored it for its effective yet mindless slasher mentality. It was banned twice in France for five years - for potentially inciting violence, and for 25 years in the UK.

It became the 70's most controversial cult horror film and the precursor of later slasher films, yet it had less gory chainsawing scenes than might have been expected - usually beginning with Leatherface (the chain-saw killer) jumping out of the shadows.

Hooper's notorious, skillfully-directed first film with an unpleasant, R-rated story-line about a terrorized group of teenagers, was loosely based on the true crimes of grisly, notorious 1950s Wisconsin serial killer and skin-fetishist Ed Gein, as was Hitchcock's Psycho (1960), Three on a Meathook (1972), Deranged: Confessions of a Necrophile (1974), and Jonathan Demme's The Silence of the Lambs (1991). It went on to inspire two of the longest-running and most successful horror franchises in cinematic history, Halloween (1978) and Friday the 13th (1980). [Note: See Filmsite's Three Greatest Horror Film Franchises.]

Its tagline: "Who will survive and what will be left of them?" hinted at the massacre to follow, although it was fairly bloodless, surprisingly. There were no close-ups of the fatal blows, bashings, hackings, and impalements, and it was more foreboding than exhibiting real violence.

The lead horror character, chain-saw toting, human skin-mask wearing Leatherface (Gunnar Hansen) was part of a crazed, inbred family of psychopathic cannibals who ran a human meat-packing plant; Leatherface was both repulsive and muscular, in his Grand Guignol pursuit of victims -- five young hippie Texans (including Marilyn Burns as victimized Sally) to butcher with a power tool. The perpetrators of the gruesome slaughters were a family trio of unsympathetic, cannibalistic, homicidal, ex-slaughterhouse workers/fiends.

There were numerous sequels (prequels, remakes, etc.) to the original 1974 Texas Chain Saw Massacre film, stretching almost 50 years!, with many non-continuous plot lines and creative connections between the films:

1. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)
2. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986), also directed by Hooper, a very dark comedy starring Dennis Hopper and Bill Moseley; the sequel was set twelve years after the events of the first film
3. Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3 (1990) (aka Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III), directed by Jeff Burr, starring Viggo Mortensen and Kate Hodge; it was a direct sequel to the original that ignored the previous film
4. Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation (1994) (aka The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre), directed by Kim Henkel and featuring future stars Matthew McConaughey and Renee Zellweger; in the earlier series of films, this was the last sequel to the original 1974 film
5. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003), a gore-fest remake or reboot from producer Michael Bay, with Jessica Biel as one of the terrorized teenagers; the most successful of all of the films so far at 80ドル.5 million (domestic), on a budget of 9ドル.5 million
6. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning (2006), producer Michael Bay's prequel or origin film to his rebooted 2003 remake and another direct sequel to the 1974 film, starring Jordana Brewster, Matt Bomer and Doira Baird, and set in the year 1969; it was originally rated NC-17 until cuts reduced it to an R-rating
7. Texas Chainsaw 3D (2013) - directed by John Luessenhop; the Leatherface franchise received a face-lift (or another reboot) with the production of this 7th installment of the original; it was a direct sequel (that ignored all the other sequel films); the homicidal maniac Leatherface was portrayed by Dan Yeager, with Alexandra Daddario as his victim Heather; the film featured cameos of previous TCM actors, including Marilyn Burns (Sally in the original), John Dugan (Leatherface's grandfather), and even Leatherface (Gunnar Hansen) himself
8. Leatherface (2017), a prequel to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974) and Texas Chainsaw 3D (2013)
9. Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2022), a sequel, with events occurring 50 years after the timing of the original 1974 film, and released directly to Netflix without a theatrical release

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• the film opened with a sober voice-over narration (by John Larroquette) of a scrolling statement, about how a group of five Texas youths met a tragic end on "an idyllic summer afternoon"; he described how the events of that day led to the discovery of "one of the most bizarre crimes in the annals of American history, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre" [Note: The statement claimed that the events of the account were true, but in fact they were not based on a true incident.]
• August 18, 1973 - after a series of flash photos of close-ups of decaying body parts, a Texas radio station reported on a grave-robbing crime spree that had prompted a grand jury investigation; unknown vandal assailants had recently been desecrating graveyards in a remote rural section of Muerto County, Texas (in the town of Newt); the decomposed bodies (from at least a dozen empty crypts) had been set up and displayed as a "grisly work of art" - in strange 'sculptural' or 'scarecrow' poses
• a small group of five young hippie Texans would soon become innocent victims - they were enroute in a green 1972 Ford Club Wagon van to the possibly-vandalized grave plot of grandfather Hardesty, but upon their arrival at the cemetery found that the grave-site had been untouched
• the five main characters were:
  • Sally Hardesty (Marilyn Burns), cute dirty blonde
  • Franklin Hardesty (Paul A. Partain), Sally's brother, an invalid paraplegic who was wheelchair-bound, fat, and sadistic
  • Jerry (Allen Danziger), Sally's boyfriend, the van's driver, curly-haired with glasses
  • Pam (Teri McMinn), Sally's best friend, an astrology and horoscope nut
  • Kirk (William Vail), Pam's easy-going boyfriend, slightly bearded

• after visiting the gravesite, while on their way to the abandoned Hardesty homestead, they passed a large cow farm and cattle slaughterhouse (noted by its "stench"), prompting Franklin to describe how his Grandpa had sold his cattle there, and his uncle worked in a slaughterhouse in Ft. Worth; he gruesomely told how cattle were killed in the historic past (with a sledgehammer): ("It usually wouldn't kill 'em on the first lick. I mean, they'd start squealin' and freakin' out and everything, and they'd have to come up and bash 'em two or three times, and then sometimes it wouldn't kill 'em. I mean, they'd skin them sometimes before they were even dead"); and then he enthusiastically claimed that the cattle were now humanely shot in the skull with an air-gun!
• in the intense heat, they picked up a scary and weird-looking, skinny long-haired hitchhiker (Edwin Neal) - later revealed to be Leatherface's brother; he explained that members of his family had all worked at the slaughterhouse in the past or currently: "My family's always been in meat"; Franklin quipped: "A whole family of Draculas"; when asked about the modern air-gun technique, he claimed that the brutal sledgehammer method was the preferred way: "The old way with a sledge. See, that was better. They died better that way"; to shock the teens, he shared grotesque Polaroid photos of dead cattle while excitedly telling how all of their body parts were used to make "head cheese" ("They don't throw nothin' away") and were processed with skinning or scraping, dissection, and boiling
• the hitchhiker further alarmed everyone by grabbing Franklin's pocket-knife and proceeding to self-mutilate himself by cutting the palm of his hand; then he snapped a Polaroid photo of Franklin and invited them for dinner after taking him to his house; they rejected his proposal, as well as his demand that Franklin buy the photo for 2ドル dollars ("You can pay me now"); he went into a retaliatory mad rage when told no; he burned the photo (by lighting gunpowder on it) and then deeply slashed Franklin on his left arm with his own straight-edged razor; the group reacted and abruptly pushed him out and ejected him from the van on the roadside, but he was able to smear the blood from his hand on the side of the van; Pam read some ominous horoscope predictions for both Franklin's and Sally's signs
• they pulled into a local run-down service station run by an Old Man (Jim Siedow) - the Gulf gas station proprietor, who told them that he was out of gas; he suggested that they await a delivery of gasoline from a tanker-truck; he advised that they avoid visiting the old, two-story abandoned Hardesty rock house: ("the old Franklin place"), due to hostility toward strangers in the area: ("Those things is dangerous. You're liable to get hurt....You don't want to go foolin' around with other folks' property. Some folks don't like it, and they don't mind showin' ya"); he offered to sell them BBQ sandwiches and urged them to stick around, but they ignored his warnings
• once the group was about to depart for the Hardesty house ("Grandpa's place"), Sally noticed blood smeared on the side of the van: ("That guy smeared blood all over the van"); outside the deserted-looking clapboard home, Franklin commented on its dilapidated appearance: ("It looks like the birth place of Bela Lugosi"); the entire group observed the blood-stains on the van; Jerry joked that it looked like "the mark of Zorro - he's gonna get ya"
• except for Franklin who trailed behind and had difficulties getting around in his wheelchair on the ground floor, the rest of the group viewed the home's second floor; Sally recalled staying in one of the rooms as a child: "This is my room. I got to stay here one time when I was eight years old"
• Franklin directed Pam and her boyfriend Kirk to the location of a trail to a watering-swimming hole; after they left, Franklin was disturbed by the sight of a pile of skeleton bones and feathers from an animal on the floor, and hanging above was a crude wind-chime or mobile made of bleached bones
• after finding only a dried-up creek bed, Pam and Kirk were diverted as they began searching for the source of a droning or humming sound from a gas-powered electricity generator; Kirk thought that they might be able to purchase some gasoline; they found the source of the motor noise outside a barn next to a metal-roofed shed covering numerous rusted-out vehicles; Kirk called out toward the barn: "Hey, hello in there! Is anybody here?"
• they walked over to a larger, old and weathered farm-house with a front porch; Kirk knocked on the front door of the farmhouse, again inquiring: "Hello, is anybody home?"; he looked down and discovered a human tooth, and scared off Pam by showing it to her; he decided to investigate the interior of the house as Pam waited outside on a wooden swing
• in the following shocking sequence and most indelible scene of the film, he entered the unlocked front door as he kept calling out for anyone to answer, and warily entered the dark interior; at the end of the hallway, he saw an open doorway beyond which was a red-colored wall covered with animal skulls and bones (viewed with two jump-cuts); after he heard squealing pig noises, he approached the doorway and was immediately and surprisingly attacked by a lunging Leatherface who stepped into view; he was wearing a butcher's apron and a stitched, human-skin mask; Kirk was clobbered in the head (twice) with a large mallet or sledgehammer - his legs jerked and twitched during a wild convulsive seizure and spasm as he was dragged into the killer's lair - and its sliding steel-metal door was forcibly slammed shut

• a bit later, Pam was impatiently curious about why Kirk had disappeared, so she also entered the farmhouse; she stumbled into a dark side room where she observed piles of decaying remains of feathers and bones (animal and human) on the floor, and animal skins, bones, leathery skin, and wood that were fashioned into furniture; a live chicken inside a small bird-cage clucked loudly; human skulls hanging from the ceiling and placed around the room were in unusual poses or positions; she began to gag and vomit and then scream and fled to the front porch after the metal door slid open and she was chased by Leatherface onto the front porch; he snatched her and dragged her - as she was kicking and screaming and vainly trying to fight him off - back down the hallway and into his butchering back-room
• Leatherface lifted Pam the air, where she was spiked and impaled in her upper back and spine with a large shiny and curved meat hook; she was compelled to watch Leatherface start up his roaring, gasoline-powered chain-saw to begin butchering and dismembering Kirk before she was placed in his lair's deep freezer
• back at the exterior of the Hardesty homestead as the sun was setting, Sally and her boyfriend Jerry were concerned about Kirk's and Pam's long absence; while searching for Kirk and Pam, Jerry was also lured to the farmhouse by the sounds of the gas generator; after he cautiously entered the front door after no one answered, in the back-room (where the sharp meat-hooks were hanging vacant), he heard thumping noises coming from a large chest or storage freezer; inside, Jerry discovered a deep-frozen, half-dead Pam who spasmed, thrashed around and lunged to free herself
• suddenly, the monstrous figure of Leatherface again appeared and bludgeoned Jerry's head with a sledgehammer; he then forced Pam's body (in its death throes) back into the freezer and closed the lid; now confused by the continual stream of strange visitors to the house, Leatherface raced to the window and looked outside - providing the film's first close-up of the deranged character
• now that it was dark outside and a full moon was visible, there were only two of the original five left - Sally and her scared, wheel-chair bound, whiny brother Franklin who were waiting at the van; once they realized Jerry had taken the van's keys with him, they decided they had no other choice but to make their way with a flashlight through the woods in the direction of the farm-house; as Sally struggled to push her brother's wheelchair and they both noisily yelled out "JERRY!", Leatherface assaulted them and slaughtered the helpless Franklin by applying his roaring chain-saw to his stomach; the terrified Sally fled in the darkness into the thorny brambles, vines and underbrush and cut herself up; she unknowingly entered the farmhouse - not knowing that it was Leatherface's residence; he was in fast pursuit after her with his roaring chain-saw
• as the madly-screaming Sally (now the sole survivor) raced toward the house, she yelled out: "Help me, help me!"; she entered and slammed the front door before bolting it shut, and then ran up the stairs into a second-story bedroom; in the dimly-lighted room with bare light-bulbs, she came upon two shriveled figures in rocking chairs facing each other: a weakened, withered, vampiric and patriarchal Grandfather (John Dugan), and a second dessicated, obviously-dead, rotting older woman (presumably his wife), seated next to a stuffed dog

• as Sally descended the stairs, she ran right into Leatherface who had just finished chain-sawing his way through the front door; as he came after her, she reversed herself and raced up the stairs again, panicked, and shattered glass as she jumped out of the second floor window, picked herself up, and ran in the dark to the gas-station; as Leatherface narrowed the distance between them and threatened to slice her up, she tried the main office door but it was locked; she burst through the door of an adjoining cook shed where the elderly station owner was standing inside the door - he had undoubtedly heard her screams
• although she was hysterical, she blurted out that a crazed killer had murdered her brother Franklin and boyfriend Jerry; the Old Man assured her: ("There's nobody out there now") and promised to help her, by driving her to a nearby town to phone the police; while he left momentarily, she stared in fascination at the glowing red fire in the smoking pit where large chunks of meat and ropes of sausage hung (BBQ for customers); in the background, a radio played a weather and news report about tampered burial crypts at the Muerto County Cemetery, where a dozen graves had been robbed and body parts had been removed from some of the corpses
• the Old Man returned with his pickup truck, a canvas gunny-sack, and some heavy rope; realizing that she had been betrayed, Sally fought him off with a large butcher knife that she had grabbed, but he struck her with his broom and knocked the knife from her hands; he proceeded to beat her and knock her unconscious, then bound her hands behind her back and gagged her, and placed the sack over her head; he put her on the floor of the passenger side of his pickup, and drove her back to the farmhouse
• on the side of the road illuminated by his headlights, the Old Man saw the hitchhiker; he stopped his truck, called him a "half-wit" and a "nap-haired idiot" - and soundly beat him with his broom-stick and criticized him for desecrating and vandalizing the cemetery graves; the hitchhiker jumped in the back of the truck for the short ride to the front of the farmhouse; to her horror, Sally soon realized that Leatherface (the hitchhiker's brother), the Old Man, the Grandfather, and the hitchhiker were all members of a deranged clan of captors, who were responsible for robbing graves, murdering and eating people; in the butcher room as the hitchhiker was maniacally tying the gagged Sally to a chair and removing the sack from her head, she screamed when she recognized him
• in the concluding lengthy, sickening and chaotic dinner scene that lasted for the entire night, Sally was bound and gagged at the clan's dinner table where she was held captive and tormented during the beginning of their cannibalistic meal - feasting on human blood; Leatherface attended, wearing women's clothing and garish make-up, as did the Grandfather (who had been brought down from upstairs); Sally's finger was cut and served as a bloody appetizer for the Grandpa; she watched in horror while being restrained, as she saw him suck on her wounded finger; it caused her to faint

• hours later after Sally revived and regained consciousness, she was still seated at the end of the table and tied down; when her eyes focused, she was looking directly at the feeble Grandfather in front of her slouched at the other end of the table; she screamed and struggled to free herself, as the three ghastly males around the table, for "fun," screamed and howled back at her ("like a pack of hounds"); she begged for mercy from the Old Man: "Please. You can make them stop....Oh, please, you can't let them kill me"; she also begged the hitchhiker: "I'll do anything. Anything. I'll do anything you want"; the gas station owner was designated as the cook ("I just can't take no pleasure in killing"), but the slaughter of the dinner's main course was specifically reserved for the Grandfather

• the feeble Grandfather, who had infamously worked in the meat-packing slaughterhouse in the old days wielding a large sledgehammer ("He's the best...the best killer there ever was"), was given a small hammer to strike a lethal blow at Sally's head: ("Let's let him have a whack"); Sally was promised it wouldn't hurt: ("Why, it never took more than one lick, they say. Why, he did 60 in five minutes once...Now, now, don't you cry none. Old Grandpa's the best. It won't hurt a bit"); she was untied from the chair, and forcibly brought over by the hitchhiker to the other end of the table, to kneel in front of the old Grandpa with her head over a large metal bucket; everyone cheered: ("Hit that bitch. Hit her, Grandpa!"), but the elderly man was too weak to do any harm and repeatedly dropped the hammer
• during the scene, the hitchhiker became frustrated with the Grandfather's failed efforts, and as he let go of Sally to grab the hammer: ("Give me the hammer. I'll get her"), Sally took the opportunity to escape being killed and cannibalized; she plunged through a glass window and frantically ran down the farmhouse road, while being chased by the two brothers - the knife-wielding hitchhiker and the chain-saw swinging Leatherface
• as the hitchhiker threateningly grabbed at Sally's hair and slashed at her with his switchblade, he was caught off-guard and gruesomely run over by a semi-truck on the main road; with a bloodied face, back and arms, Sally screamed at the horrific sight as his body was crushed by the huge truck tires; the semi-truck pulled over and the driver helped Sally to climb into the red cab, as Leatherface approached with his churning chainsaw; Sally escaped out the other side of the cab with the frantic driver who helped her to get away and defensively threw a huge wrench at Leatherface and struck him in the head; wounded and stunned by the blow, Leatherface dropped the saw and sliced his right leg

• the terrified truck driver fled on foot, leaving Sally with no other alternative but to hail a ride from the driver (Perry Lorenz) of a passing pickup truck; she jumped into the bed of the small truck, and as the vehicle pulled away, a bloody and deranged-look appeared on her face; she laughed hysterically and hyperventilated at the spinning and twirling Leatherface, who - in the golden light of dawn - flailed and swung his buzzing chainsaw through the air in a frustrating, exultant dance