Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake

Cafe Society
1

The movie’s been out for two weeks now, I’m suprised I haven’t seen a thread on this (I may be blind and just missed it, it’s been known to happen).

Anyway, I saw the remake before I saw the original, and I liked it. I recently watched the original and realized that the two are, indeed, two entirely different movies, but it still had it’s moments. It completely ignored the whole cannibalism aspect of the original, which is where the true terror came from, and nothing in it was nearly as nerve-racking as the last 20 minutes of the original (grandpa looking like a suckling baby was just disturbing as hell). Still, though, I liked it.

It was definitely more graphic than the original, but I didn’t think it pushed the envelope too far. I really liked the opening and closing with the police film footage, I thought that was a great way to introduce and close the film. That’s one thing I felt the original lacked was a decent ending. It just…ended! It was nice having a bit of a conclusion to the film, something nice to just wrap it all up. And I definitely liked the masks leatherface wore. The little “background” story about him was new, but I liked how they just simply mentioned it, almost in passing, and didn’t put too much emphasis on it.

I know people hate remakes because they often just bastardize the original (I, personally, am dreading the upcoming Dawn of the Dead remake), but despite the tearing away from the original, I though this movie was a good scary movie in it’s own right and worth consideration. It was a hell of a lot better than that Texas Chainsaw Massacre: the Next Generation shit that came out a few years ago). Anyone else have any thoughts/critiques?

2

Haven’t seen the remake, but I did just watch the original on DVD and it was a lot better than I had remembered. The documentary about the making of the film isn’t very well made, but parts of it are hilarious. Just a note about the original ending- they shot the last sequences on the heroine’s last days, but lost the footage or something went wrong and they had to do it again. Up until this point, she (the actress, not the character0 had almost broken an ankle, had a soiled rag from godknowswhere stuffed in her mouth, been left strapped to a char that had fallen mistakenly, cut up by trees, constantly referred to by the crew as ‘the girl,’ etc. So, apparently, that hysterical laughter of hers, all done during the reshoot, wasn’t very hard to draw out of her.

3

Saw the movie Saturday night with some friends.
It was an okay movie, although I’m not really a fan of slasher flicks. The one thing I did think was that it lacked tension.
A couple things seemed muddled, also, but nothing horribly so.
While the police tape exposition was nice, it was part of the reason for the lack of tension. By explaining within the first 2 minutes that 5 youths died, there was really no “Oh my god, who will survive?” feeling. Also there was no feeling of tension because Leatherface basically just tore after people with his chainsaw, not really the usual jump out from the shadows silently thing you see in most horror movies.
All in all, an okay remake. Not a total fuck up.

4

RE: The original ending, I have to say watching Leatherface spinning around with his chainsaw while the sun rose (Set?) was a great shot. Unnerving.

So they dropped the cannibalism bit?!?! Well what the hell is the reason these guys kill the teens? What is the point of the meat hooks?

Feh… remakes.

5

Well, the remake still had Leatherface spinning around with his chainsaw as she drove off, and it was pulled off better in my opinion. More of a “last scare” kind of tactic, but well done. In terms of the way they ended this one:

The movie openned with the same voice over from the original, just with something that looked like stock footage of old news reels and police file footage. After that, it showed scenes from an officer investigating the house and moving down into the boiler room. Then, it went into the story. After the girl drives off, they cut back to the footage of the officer moving into the boiler room, and as he pulls back a curtain, he’s hit by something, the cameraman is knocked to the ground, you hear the chainsaw, and catch a blur that freezeframes. Then the announcer talks about how this is the only existing photograph of “The man known as Leatherface.”
Again, it gave some closure (aside from the fact he’s still on the loose), and just worked a little better in my opinion)

You know, I just put a big block there, so get ready for a few more spoilers without them (not too telling, though). Without the cannibalism plot, they reverted to a typical “tortured child” reasoning. Apparently, Leatherface was stricken with some sort of skin disease as a child that left him horribly mutated. There’s a scene where he’s making a new mask, and removes the one he’s wearing to reveal he’s got no nose. Not overly grotesque, and it’s a side shot, so it gets the point across without being too creepy. The rest of the family is just as fucked up as him, and feels he’s justified in killing people for all the hardship and ridicule he had to face. There’s also a small little subplot about how they murdered a family and kidnapped the baby as one of thier own, so of course, the lead has to rescue the child, but even that’s kind of done as a “Oh yeah, the kid” way, so as not to make her seem too heroic.
Basically, it’s just the family was fucked up and crazy. Especially the “Sherriff,” who was a wonderfully crazy fuck of a character. As for the meathooks, well, Leatherface did skin his victims, and seeing as they lived in a slaughterhouse region, I guess it just seemed the easiest, most efficient way.

As for Silly Duck’s comment about the lack of tension when it came to the kids getting bumped off, I take it you haven’t seen the original. I was greatly suprised with how quickly and simply they just took people out in that film. The first girl’s death was rather crazy because of her discovery of all the furniture and bones, and there was some chase, but that was nothing compared to the second guy’s chase scene and capture in the remake. Not to mention the guy who got picked up by the Sherriff. I found that to be really fucking nerve racking and creepy. In the original, the only one to give real tension was the main character, which again, was driven home in the last, most terrifying twenty minutes of the film. The remake had a bit more to offer in my opinion, but that’s just me.

6

I’m assuming that is John Laroquette’s voice in the ad on TV? He was the narrator in the original, did they reuse the actual narration or record it again?

7

I’m sure that Laroquette actually re-did it, as he also narrated the new conclusion. Good for him!

Also, props to R Lee Ermey as the crazed Sheriff.

I did wonder why they changed the family’s name to Hewitt when TCM2 gave it as Sawyer, then it occurred to me “HEW IT! D’OH!”

Of course the family structure was different. It was OK, but damn I miss the Plate-headed, hand-cutting guy & the bossy older brother who ran the business! (I’d have cast R Lee as the latter).

8

Yeah… Like I said, not a fan of the slasher flick. Mostly just went to see this one cuz my friends wanted to…