Something Else: The Texas Chain Saw Massacre

Random thoughts of random lengths on random films. 

Directed by Tobe Hooper
Written by Kim Henkel
Starring Marilyn Burns (Sally Hardesty) and Gunnar Hansen (Leatherface)
Cinematography by Daniel Pearl 
Edited by J. Larry Carroll
Released in 1974

When I sat down to watch The Texas Chain Saw Massacre for the first time a few weeks ago, I expected a standard slasher film. What I got instead was something else entirely. The film walks a tightrope between dead teenager movie and experimental nightmare (think Eraserhead or Tetsuo: The Iron Man), falling definitively into the latter during its brutal final third.

Immediately, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, establishes a total sense of dread that it maintains for its entire runtime. An ominous, elaborate voiceover details the case of the eponymous murder spree. The screen cuts to black for an unbearable length  of time. Eventually, rustling sounds are heard, a camera flashes multiple times, slowly unveiling a grisly something. In blinding sunlight, a horrific human effigy is revealed. The credits roll as close-ups of sun spots dance in the background. The film revels in random shots of things like the sun, the moon, and spider nests, giving it an abstract feeling of doom. And, it beats The Wild Bunch for the honor of being the dirtiest, sweatiest, and hottest piece of work ever put to celluloid.

There are strange undercurrents of sadness and humor to the film as well. The central family is forced out of work when air guns are introduced at the slaughterhouse. The dark joke of the film is that they immediately switch to murdering people. What else are they supposed to kill? It's hard to call Leatherface a villain. There's a childlike logic to the way he attempts to play dress-up and defends his house by thunking any and all intruders over the head with a hammer.

Who will survive and what will be left of them? serves as the tagline for the film. You would be hard pressed to come up with something more catchy and fitting. The answer? One girl and not much. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre finishes with a final girl segment common to slashers, but subverts that cliche by ending on a note of pure nihilism. Sally, drenched in blood, laugh-screams as she is driven away, an image that will be seared into my brain for the rest of my life.