![]() It speaks volumes when the viewer is hoping for a main character death not because they’re hungry for gore but because it’s for the best. (That the film is also said to be a commentary on and reflection of issues like Watergate and the Vietnam War somehow make Grandpa and company even more sinister.) THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE is a deeply troubling work populated by characters so demented and beyond being functional humans that the viewer wishes the hammer strike to Sally’s face would have killed her so she wouldn’t be subjected to the carnage any longer. The quality of the film is questionable (the acting and camerawork as a whole is amateur), but its effectiveness is not. Some of these make THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE not only fall under the exploitation genre, but rank as one of the most memorable. THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE is spilling with effective touches, like the gritty, raw look (the budget limited the stock to 16mm) and the opening narration that suggests the story is true (“The film which you are about to see is an account of the tragedy which befell a group of five youths…The events of that day were to lead to the discovery of one of the most bizarre crimes in the annals of American history.”) before they became clichés and lost all of their power. Also within the house are the hitchhiker, a gas station owner (Jim Siedow, who would reprise the role in THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE 2) and Grandpa (John Dugan, who would also cameo in THE NEXT GENERATION), who isn’t the kind that pulls quarters out of your ear. The man with the saw is Leatherface (Gunnar Hansen, whose status in the genre would be secured in just his first moments onscreen), who wears a butcher’s apron and a mask made of human flesh. Going by the title, we know a bloodbath is about to occur: the first victim is whacked with a mallet the second is hung on a meat hook (but not before discovering a room filled with bones and caged chickens) soon enough, the chainsaw comes into action. The group stops at a farmhouse in the middle of nowhere, which turns out to be one of the most disturbing and unsettling locations in horror cinema history (it has since been turned into a restaurant). And because the more the merrier, the gang picks up a hitchhiker (Edwin Neal, who would later play Lord Zedd on MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS), who proves handy with a pocket knife and serves as an indicator for what’s to come. Partain, who would have a cameo in TCM: THE NEXT GENERATION) and three friends, Jerry (Allen Danziger, 1969’s EGGSHELLS), Kirk (William Vail, POLTERGEIST) and Pam (Teri McMinn, who has since appeared in only two other movies), are on a road trip. Sally (Marilyn Burns, who passed away just a month before the film’s official 40th anniversary), her brother, Franklin (Paul A. Tobe Hooper’s THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE is one of those. There are those that completely change the game. There are those that are retreads of everything we’ve seen before. There are sequels out for a quick buck while the brand is still hot. There are horror movies that come out and vanish from our conscience immediately after the opening weekend numbers come in.
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