Texas Chainsaw Massacre - Tanya's alternative Review

[Guest Tanya]

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)

 

Directed by: Tobe Hooper

 

Marilyn Burns as Sally Hardesty

Allen Danziger as Jerry

Paul A. Partain as Franklin Hardesty

William Vail as Kirk

Teri McMinn as Pam

Edwin Neal as Hitchhiker

Jim Siedow as Old Man

Gunnar Hansen as Leatherface

 

Well since this is a horror classic i thought i would review it. I first saw this film in 1994 when i was only 14, after years of searching for a copy i brought one while i was in america with my Mum got home got it converted to pal and bobs your unkle a copy of the film i always thought would be the most gory scary horror film i would ever see and was i right???

 

well..........................

 

The story starts off on the texas highway with Sally(good looking girl) and her invalid brother Franklin and their friends Jerry, Kirk and Pam(even better looker, nice legs!) in there van traveling accross country to check on Sally and Franklin Grandfather's grave since there have been a lot of grave robbings in the town which he is burried.

 

Anyway along the way they stop at a gas station to pick up some gas and food, which the food is actually parts of body's but we don't find that out till later, then we meet the hitchhiker who basically scare's the crap out of them and marks the Van with his own blood.

 

Then when they get to the Grandfather's house when they need to borry some gas or something they go to the house next door and one by one they get killed by a man named Leatherface, who kills them by either hanging up Pam on a meat hook and we get a close up of her legs YAY! while she watches her boyfriend get hacked up with a chainsaw or one of them gets smacked in the head with a hammer.

 

Then when Leatherface comes after Sally and Franklin , he cuts off Franklins arms with the chainsaw and chases Sally through the woods, she gets back to the gas station where she finds the old man who she saw earlier and he turns out to be nasty and on side with leatherface and he knocks her out and kidnaps her.

 

She wakes up at the family home with the old man, Leatherface(wearing the face of her brother) the hitchhiker and..... Grandpa we see Sally go almost insane during the next 10 minutes with Grandpa trying to hit her in the head with a hammer repeatedly untill she brakes free and dives through a window where we get the show down in the road with a passing truck driver running over the hitchhiker and Leatherface almost sawing his own leg off after the truck driver throws a big spanner at him, and then as Sally gets away she screams worse than Stephanie McMahon till it fades to black and ends.

 

overall while you watch this film, you cannot help but feel the realism. It is almost like watching a documentary. It is relentless and very psychological. Now the sequels are far inferior to this film, please remember that. The original has to be viewed with an open mind. That is what the film does actually, it opens your mind. It shows a different moral structure than we are accustomed to here. It shows what happens when the rules change. There is no fluff here. It comes right out at you and never lets up. It is not a very kind film, but instead it is a wake-up call to reality.

 

I'll give it one thumbs up:xyx for my enjoyment but you may not like how the film looks very dated now and the gore content is pretty much non existant, but i like it any way.

 

let me know what you think of my reviews and give me ideas of what to review.

 

Thanks for reading.

 

Tanya xxxxxxxx

[Guest Dean]

Another great review, just one question is Leatherface played by DDP?

[Guest Latino Reheat]

Nah, Leatherface is too huge to be DDP.

 

I loved the bit when one gets hit on the head with the sledge hammer, cool it was.

[Guest Tanya]

it certanly was!

[Guest Inno]

I met Gunnar Hansen when I worked at FP - I have a little signed Leatherface figure - he signed the apron, and mini poster - he put "You're NEXT!" on the poster...

 

Cool guy, lot's of funny stories about the mask falling off or smelling like fish for most of the film....

[BRM 220]

What happens to the big black fat guy at the end, does he just keep running?

[Guest Tanya]

yes........ yes he does...........he's still running now!

 

by the way his name is Ed Guinn and that is the only film he ever appeared in.

 

shame really.

[BRM 220]

As in ed guin the mass murderer?

[Guest Tanya]

no that's Ed Gein, but close!

[BRM 220]

yea thats him, i prefer peter sutcliffe because he lived near me

[Guest Tanya]

was he your best friend?

[BRM 220]

Nah banged up before i was born, his first murded took place about 5 miles away from where i live. My mum worked over in bradford at the time. The fake ripper said he was going to attack a nurse so they all had escorts to there cars ashe also had the misfortune of examining one of his surviving victims. i've read up on him and find him a very odd intelligent man, and it was only a little error on his mispart that led him to be caught.

[Guest Sasuke]

Lol, Tanya, your review really is alternative....."we get a close up of her legs YAY!". Hehe. I agree that film is kind of dated now but I like the idea if you know what I mean? The idea of letting your imagination take over, it wasn't all that successful for me though.

 

Maybe I'm just a Freddy freak the type who needs to see war and gore. "Carnage, candy, your core audience just expects it."

 

All-in-all though, the film did break new ground upon it's release and will go down in the horror history books, blah, blah, blah. I'll give it a thumbs up because of that.

[BRM 220]

It really would be good in a state of art cinema of today with all the mega pro logic sound imagine the wood scence with that chainsaw buzzing away behind you. Simply fantastic.

[Guest Michaels]

I haven't seen the film but I liked the review, Tanya. You should do a review on "Night of The Living Dead" - not the old one, the newer one.