argely spurred by Malaya, I took her to see the remake of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre on opening day, in October of 2003. It wasn't great, but it wasn't awful either. We saw it, we didn't want our money back, but we didn't have any desire to get the DVD either.

I wrote the original review (seen below) before I started using my categorized rating scale, so I'm adding it in now (July 2004) when this review page is being created. I've not seen the movie since the first time, but I don't think my feelings towards it have changed much, so these scores should accurately represent my initial reaction to the film.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
Script/Story: 6
Acting/Casting: 6
Action: 4
Horror: 6
Eye Candy: 7
Fun Factor: 4
Replayability: 4
Overall: 6

It's not bad, and there are some nice touches, but I'm mostly grading this as a horror movie. It's not really worth a 6 compared to movies in other genres that I've given 6s to, but it's not bad, for a cheesy horror movie.

October 18, 2003

Malaya and I saw the Texas Chainsaw Massacre on opening day, since we like action/horror/slasher movies, and since the the trailer was pretty good. I didn't expect it would be scary, since I can't remember being scared by a movie (or book, or TV) since I was about 12.  It's not that I think it would be unmanly or anything, it's just that I don't get scared by entertainment.  Excited and thrilled on occasion, but never frightened.

What I hope for from a horror film is to see some really cool stuff.  It can be gory or imaginative or gruesome or suspenseful, but I want it to be arresting, both visually and emotionally.  That sensation seems to be coming less and less often in movies of late, at least for me. This summer, I've seen The Italian Job, Pirates of the Caribbean, Matrix 2, Freddy vs. Jason, Underworld, Terminator 3, Kill Bill, and a few others I'm sure I'm forgetting now, and aside from a few large scale explosions in T3, and some of the long tropical paradise ocean shots in Pirates, I can't remember any really "holy shit, would you look at that!" scenes in quite a while.

There weren't any in Texas Chainsaw Massacre either, but I did appreciate a few of the gory moments, and some of the set design and action sequences were pretty good.  It did a decent job of avoiding some of the stupidest horror movie clichés (no women ever ran from a killer only to trip over their own feet and twist an ankle at the first opportunity) and had a few surprises and twists.

I was disappointed in the plot; it did far less build up and suspense than the trailer leads you to believe, and very few of the killings are stylish or shocking.  Mostly they're predictable and seemingly-inevitable. There's no "oh, my ankle, it's twisted!" stupidity, and none of the characters do anything unbelievably stupid, along the "There's a serial killer around, so it's shower time!" cliché, but they aren't real bright either.

The actual killer was pretty unimpressive, IMHO.  Just another huge guy in bulky clothing with a sharp object.  Basically Jason with a different mask, and a monster collecting fingers and making masks from human faces is just not shocking anymore, not after Buffalo Bill did it so touchingly and creepily in Silence of the Lambs.  What I liked best were the sets and the creepy hick town characters, all of whom were as weird or weirder than the actual murdering chainsaw guy himself, in their own perverse ways.  The old house on the hill was great, the sun-dappled forest was nice, the creepy cellar was good, the rotting old house full of pigs was cool, the painstakingly-applied scary decorations were nice (and I wanted a lot of them for my Halloween tree) and so on.  I suppose I'm saying that the whole atmosphere was the best part, even if they did end up having a chase scene in a big factory, just like every other action movie made in the last 100 years, and even though the night was able to descend almost instantly and torrential rains came and went in minutes, depending on the needs of the plot.

So it wasn't really bad, but I have to admit to being bored at times, and admit that neither Malaya or I were ever the slightest bit scared.  I won't say it sucked, but I can't really recommend it, nor can I argue with reviews like this one.

With its psycho ''Leatherface'' Hawkins (Andrew Bryniarski), the new version departs from the original but remains indistinguishable from ''Urban Legends: Final Cut'' or ''Jeeper Creepers 2,'' browsing the same retail outlet that every other slasher flick has for 15 years. A sky tinted the color doom? Check. A filthy, dilapidated manor full of unwashed freaks and pet pigs? Check. Severed baby-doll heads strategically placed by the industrial sewing machine? Check. Editing that cuts faster than the killers? Check.

So it's not good, but it's got some creepy stuff, good sets, and serviceable acting.  It's never original, but I wouldn't go as far as Ebert did, since he just loathed and was depressed by it, and gave it zero stars, and made comments like this one:

The new version of "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" is a contemptible film: Vile, ugly and brutal. There is not a shred of a reason to see it. Those who defend it will have to dance through mental hoops of their own devising, defining its meanness and despair as "style" or "vision" or "a commentary on our world." It is not a commentary on anything, except the marriage of slick technology with the materials of a geek show.

There is a controversy involving Quentin Tarantino's "Kill Bill: Volume 1," which some people feel is "too violent." I gave it four stars, found it kind of brilliant, felt it was an exhilarating exercise in nonstop action direction. The material was redeemed, justified, illustrated and explained by the style. It was a meditation on the martial arts genre, done with intelligence and wit. "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" is a meditation on the geek-show movie. Tarantino's film is made with grace and joy. This movie is made with venom and cynicism. I doubt that anybody involved in it will be surprised or disappointed if audience members vomit or flee.

No one in the audience I saw it with vomited, though a couple of people walked out about 2/3 of the way through it, for unknown reasons.  The most memorable audience reaction was a loud woman behind us, who cheered whenever the psycho with the chainsaw raced into view and began slashing at the air with his power tool. She also laughed like a hyena whenever anything gruesome happened, a reaction I shared with her.  I can appreciate a really nasty thing, like someone's leg being sawed off, then after they are carried down into a cellar and hung up on a hook having their ragged stump cauterized with a handful of rock salt and some butcher paper, for instance.  If you can't, then this movie really isn't for you.

I didn't get any larger message, but then I didn't think it was trying to comment on anything. It was a slick movie with some slightly-interesting characters in a horrible situation with a bunch of weird freaks and one killer.  The director set the tops spinning, and let us watch them bump into each other and fall down. More would be nice, but who goes in to a remake of an old slasher movie expecting anything new? It's a horror movie, not a research paper.

The overall Rotten Tomatoes score is not good, with just 35% of reviewers liking it, but that's about par for the course for a horror movie. Most critics aren't going to like it, and you probably know if you will or not, based on your past movie experiences. 

It also sounds like the original was far better, as is the case for 99% of remakes. I've never seen the classic original, but I'd bet it's one of those, "Great, if you can get past the cheesy amateurishness of all movies made before about 1985, in comparison to the slick modern films we see today..."

If I ever see it I'll let you know.

All site content copyright "Flux" (Eric Bruce), 2002-2007.