The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003)
Review by Siko Mike
Five young friends are driving through Travis County, Texas on their way to Dallas for a concert. The group sees a young teenage girl walking alongside the dirt road all scratched up. They give the girl a ride, but as soon as the girl gets in the van she starts crying. She freaks out as they pass a meat company and they stop the van. The girl tells them that they are all going to die and reaches under her skirt pulling out a gun. Before the friends can stop her, the young girl puts the gun in her mouth and pulls the trigger causing her brains to splatter all over the back of their van. The friends seek help at a local farmhouse where they in counter a chainsaw wielding maniac who wears his victim’s faces as masks and is known by the name Leatherface.
I actually saw Tobe Hooper’s original Texas Chain Saw Massacre only a few months before I discovered that it was being remade. After viewing the trailer, I was very excited to see this movie. As it turns out, I was a bit disappointed at certain areas but did however enjoy this movie. The original had a very sunny and warm lighting, but this film, directed by Marcus Nispel, was a lot darker. The lighting was dimmed down where the only real color that was visible was blood red. I thought this technique worked a lot for the film. The major thing that I liked about this remake is that it wasn’t shot note by note like the remake of Psycho was. This TCM film didn’t even have the same characters as the original except for Leatherface.
The thing that I thought was kinda funny with the kids is that four of them reminded me of four of the kids from the original. Andy resembled the character of Kirk, Morgan resembled Jerry, and Pepper reminded me somewhat of Pam, and Erin reminded me a little bit of Sally in the original film. I’m probably one of a few that caught this similarity. I liked how they switched the psycho hitchhiker from the original with an escaped victim of Leatherface and his demented family. The settings in this remake were incredible, including the Hewitt home, the Crawford Mill, and the barbecue/gas station. Character development was present in this film that made you care for these kids. One scene in particular makes you feel especially bad for the character when something drops out of their pocket when Leatherface is killing them.
Now as for the villains, Leatherface is one of my favorites. He is very different from Tobe Hooper’s Leatherface considering this one is pissed off and ready to fuck some poor son of a bitch up with his toy! My second favorite villain is Sheriff Hoyt who was played perfectly by Mr. R.Lee Ermey!! This guy was the most sadistic relative of Leatherface’s that I have ever seen in any of the TCM movies! He was rude, a smart ass, disgusting, violent motherfucker! “Oh, she’s kinda wet down there. What have you boys been doing with this dead body anyway?” Come on, as sadistic as this guy is he still makes you laugh just as much as he makes you hate him. Then you have the old woman who works at the barbecue store and is Leatherface’s mom. Another favorite villain of mine was old Monty who is the old, crippled guy in the wheelchair with the cane. He is a mean and creepy guy. “You’re so dead, you don’t even know it!” This guy gave me the fucking creeps!
The special FX were done very well with not a lot of blood but plenty to make things effective. I also loved how they switched the meat hook scene around. Instead of the girl like in the original, it is one of the guys who gets stuck on the hook. Another main difference is that the house doesn’t have bones and skin lying around it. The terrifying shit is located in the basement of the Hewitt home. I liked how they still had the sliding door like in the original but instead of leading to the kitchen it leads to the basement. We also get introduced to a child that is supposedly Leatherface’s newphew, but is not psycho like his family and helps Erin escape from his uncle. They also through in two ladies living in a trailer near the house that are still kin of the Hewitt family.
I loved that this remake was very different and put Leatherface in a better light than the pathetic TCM: The Next Generation, which almost destroyed the iconic horror villain. The only complaints that I had with this remake was that there was no cannibalistic/psychotic dinner scene like in all of the other TCM movies and no half dead Grandpa! Those two memorable things were not put into this very good remake, which brought it down a bit for me. That was the major scene that I was waiting to see, which was how the dinner scene was going to be. Other than that, the story was close to the source material, the characterization was good, the setting was great, the lighting was fantastic, gore was alright, and the acting was good. I have watched Jessica Biel grow as an actress and this is my absolute favorite film that she has done. Mike Vogel did a great job as Andy who was believable. Erica Leerhsen did a fairly good job as Pepper even though I liked her better in Wrong Turn 2. Jonathan Tucker and Eric Balfour both did good jobs with their characters of Morgan and Kemper. My absolute favorite actors in this film though were R.Lee Ermey as Sheriff Hoyt and Andrew Bryniarski was marvelous as Leatherface. To me, he was the best Leatherface since Gunnar Hansen’s original performance.
Another thing that was interesting about the remake is that Leatherface is given a real name (Thomas) and an explanation was confirmed on why he wears other people’s faces. In this version, not only is he mentally challenged like in all the other films but he was also born with a skin disease that deformed his face. One reason confirmed on why this guy started killing was being tormented by kids growing up, yet a lot of it has to do with his family that we already knew from the original classic. These explanations did not ruin the character, but gave us a little more insight on the new Leatherface. Getting to the final comment, which is the chainsaw. My favorite scenes with the chainsaw were where Leatherface bursts through the front door with the chainsaw and when he jams the saw through the top of the van!
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake was an entertaining film that brought the terror of the original through a new light. The first time I saw this film was in the theater on opening night. The whole back row behind me was all girls and when Leatherface came out from behind that sliding door running that chainsaw…popcorn went flying and the girls behind me started screaming their fucking lungs out! That, my fiends, is a very fun theatrical experience that I will never forget and proves Leatherface has made a marvelous return to horror cinema.
The Saw is Family once AGAIN!
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