Hey folks, Harry here... a little more than 24 hours till we do the Austin TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE premiere with R. Lee Ermey and if you were concerned about Mr. Beaks' obvious planted review... ahem... here's another look at TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE with some spoilers, but no major ones. Take it away, ZeMightyJedd....
Harry, Mori:
My name is ZeMightyJedd. I last wrote to you about a year ago when I lived in Washington, DC and caught a test screening of Solaris. Well, I now live in Los Angeles, and I have just arrived home from a press screening of Texas Chainsaw Massacre. I am really tired, so please forgive me if my thoughts are a bit rambling.
Wow. Wow. This movie really did exceed expectations and kick some major ass! I’ve seen Cabin Fever and 28 Days Later, but this is the horror film of the year, hands down. Like many, I was DREADING this remake, but I am now a total supporter. A few quick points to make: No, I am not a plant. Yes, I love all sorts of horror movies. Yes, I love the original TCM and have seen it several times. No, I have never seen any of the sequels.
Let’s jump right in. I will try to set things up without providing too many spoilers. When the film starts, John Laroquette’s narration gives us the same sort of introduction that was provided in the original. However, he points out that this remake is based on information that has only just become available. A nice touch is that we are immediately shown some dated police film footage of the Hewitt household, the crime scene where the infamous “massacre” takes place. This “recovered footage” sets the mood perfectly, especially as a cop points out grizzly fingernail scratches on a wall and a clump of hair where a victim’s head was smashed into a staircase. However, before we can learn too much from this police footage, the film jumps right back to the beginning of the actual story.
Five kids are in a van, heading towards Dallas for a Lynyrd Skynyrd concert. Nice. They have just driven north from Mexico, where, unbeknownst to our heroine Jessica Biel, her friends have bought 2 pounds of marijuana. When Jessica finds out, she is pissed. This plot point kind of annoyed me—it didn’t add much to the story, and it seemed a bit clichéd. At this early point, I was worried that this movie was going to suck. Moving on.
The kids pick up a hitchhiker (well, not really a hitchhiker, more of a dazed wanderer). This is where things get good, as the plot veers off on a totally unexpected path from the original TCM. Without giving too much away, please let me stress that the hitchhiker in this film fills a completely different role than the one in the original TCM. Also, the hitchhiker’s appearance quickly leads to a gnarly camera move that will make you want to puke and cheer at the same time. It brought about roaring approval from our audience. You’ll know it when you see it. It is truly one of the coolest shots in any horror film. Ever.
Pretty soon, things start going really poorly for our van of stoners. Someone is dead. They are stuck in the middle of nowhere. The locals are all deranged. The kids have to call the police, but they have a piñata full of weed.
Then R. Lee Ermey arrives.
Holy shit! Ermey is the true star of this film. He is frightening, powerful, intense, and funny as hell. Needless to say, his appearance only marks the true beginning of the kids’ troubles. Within no time we meet Leatherface and the rest of his crazed family. Let me just say that this film really succeeds at making Leatherface a true killing machine. Andrew Bryniarski does an incredible force-of-nature job in filling Gunner Hansen’s big shoes. Unlike other cinema monsters who seem to just lumber around, Leatherface manages to come across as both a huge, hulking brute and a nimble, quick-footed hunter.
Well, as you can guess, one by one the kids are picked off. The director manages to incorporate ideas from the original and yet create set-pieces all his own. I was pretty bummed that this film did not include a version of the “family dinner” scene from the first TCM, but maybe this is a blessing, as that scene could hardly be improved upon. We do get to spend more time with Leatherface’s family, and we even get to learn some of their motivations for killing and skinning people. As I wrote earlier, I have never seen any of the TCM sequels, so I don’t know if these explanations for the family’s killings were created by the writer of this remake, or if they were supplied in the previous films.
Throughout the movie, there are some top-notch frights. I have definitely jumped at a scary moment in a horror flick before, but this was the first movie that caused me to yell out loud—3 times!!! Well, I didn’t really yell, but I did gasp things like, “Holy shit!” and “Sunuvabitch!” To me, that is quite an accomplishment on the part of director Marcus Nispel. Also, the ending is really cool. It doesn’t have a crazy twist or anything, but it ends on a perfect, foreboding note.
Okay, some minor complaints. I felt that Nispel relied on too much fast-cut editing and shaky camera footage for some of the horror scenes. For example, in the scene where Leatherface chases Jessica Biel up a staircase, the camera waves around so much that we have no idea how she escapes. One moment Leatherface is upon her with a chainsaw, then we see the camera jump around a lot as they are presumably struggling, and next thing we know she has escaped and is at the top of the stairs. Several scenes were like this. To me, this type of technique is lazy. Also, I wasn’t a big fan of all the foggy night scenes in the woods. Sure they were scary, but fog is also a cliché of horror films, and one thing that I admired from the first TCM was the fact that many of the scariest scenes took place right in the daytime. The fog took me out of the movie and made me want to chuckle.
This film had a much higher production value than the original TCM, which initially worried me, as the low budget feel of the original added to its seeming realness. However, once I got over the higher quality cinematography, as well as the frightening score, I found that both served the movie just fine.
Many horror fans will want to know about the gore. Well, it is a mixed bag. There are definitely times where Nispel chooses to leave things up to our imagination. However, there are also several noticeably disgusting scenes. I found the mix to be advantageous, for I often feel that movies with too much gore can cause the audience to become numbed to it-- this film definitely keeps us on our toes. Rest assured, we do see limbs sawed off, heads blown apart, and plenty of hooks, blood, and chainsawing, but things never get ridiculous.
Speaking of gore and the ridiculous, nice cameo, Mr. Knowles.
The acting is excellent. Ermey definitely steals the show, but all of the kids handle themselves perfectly. I believed that they were scared out of their minds, and that’s all that is important. Leatherface’s relatives are all suitably disturbing. Each and every one of them makes you lose your appetite. Biel does a great job of screaming, crying, and acting tough, all at the appropriate times. She also looks incredibly hot, even when drenched in blood, but that really shouldn’t surprise anyone.
I have to get going, but I urge all AICN readers to give this flick a chance. I will definitely see it again, and I take back all the times that I cursed New Line for agreeing to this remake.
Your friend,
ZeMightyJedd
