p e n g u i n d e v i l

Getting up at 6:30 on Monday morning, it seemed like the perfect time to watch The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. It seems odd that I haven’t watched this already in the years of this blog, because it always feels to me as if I’ve recently seen it. Maybe I’ve just watched it too many times! Of all of the movies carrying the chainsaw brand, this is probably the only one that anyone needed to bother making (yes, part two was overblown enough that it was fun, but just a bit too hokey). Admittedly, the most recent one that I’ve actually seen is 1990’s Leatherface: The Saw is Family, but that was so embarrassingly bad that it turned me against part 2, which I had previously liked. The new ones? No go.

avoid hitchhikers outside of texas slaughterhouses?

There are a couple of odd things that come up right off the bat. In the opening narration, the narrator (yes, John Larroquette) refers to their trip as idyllic. Driving across Texas in the summer heat to see if your grandfather’s grave was one of the ones that has been burgled at the old cemetery hardly sounds like an idyllic summer afternoon drive. And of course the title. As everyone has seen this movie, I don’t feel like I’m giving anything away to say that the title is a bit misleading. Only one victim in this movie is killed by chain saw, not much of a chain saw massacre. It begs the question, where the name? Well, I figure that they finished the movie and sat around one night trying to think up neat names. Maybe if I could ever get around to watching special features I would know.

too close for comfort

The story of 4 cool kids and a disgruntled, wheelchair-bound brother, who have come to these parts to see if their grandfather’s corpse was one of the victims of a recently discover spree of grave-robbing. Since they’re in the neighborhood, they decided to go and visit grandpa’s abandoned house. One of the friendly locals advises them not to, but they do anyway, which turns out to be a bad idea. As we all remember from Scooby Doo, a van load of teenish kids are too curious for their own good, especially without the dog to get them out of jams. The neighbors that they end up encountering are a three generational household of men who make a killer barbecue and are really better left alone, as they have very, very bad habits. Though it is well known to have taken its idea from Ed Gein’s activities, the household stuff is where the Gein really comes through, and it is all pretty great. taking about using every part of that which you slaughter. They really take it to heart!

The movie really benefits from its low-budget and that gives it a very strong air of reality as in, if you wanted a pile of bones, you went out and got a bunch of bones and piled them up. It’s all quite convincing. The action is great too, if you can handle what seems to be endless screaming during the last part of the movie. Though I love grandpa and I love when Leatherface slams his metal door, the best parts are when the father (a brilliantly perfect Jim Siedow, reminding me of someone my mother might have dated) drives Sally out to the house in his pick-up… And the ending. Which is so fantastic there are hardly words to describe its glory! But the movie is one of the most perfect films of all time. Tobe really got everything right in this, his almost-first effort, and at over 30 years old, this movie still more than holds its own.