10/1/14 (Part Two): The Buzz is Back

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1980s films, 31 Days of Halloween, abandoned amusement park, auteur theory, Bill Johnson, Bill Moseley, black comedies, cannibals, Caroline Williams, Chop-Top, cinema, Dennis Hopper, Drayton Sawyer, dysfunctional family, favorite films, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, horror, horror franchises, horror movies, horror-comedies, Jim Siedow, Ken Evert, Leatherface, Lou Perryman, Movies, radio DJs, roadside chili, sequels, Texas, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Texas Ranger, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, Tobe Hooper

As a general rule, there are two ways to approach sequels: filmmakers can take the “more of what they liked” approach and…well…give their audiences more of what they liked the first time. On the other hand, sequels can be conceived as continuing segments of an interconnected story (ala Jackson Lord of the Rings trilogy). The problem with the first method is pretty obvious: the more photocopying you do, the worse the reproductions become. If “Film X” was good, more of the same (Film X #2) should (theoretically) be just as good: if Film X #36 is just the same as the previous 35 editions, however, what’s the point? Despite how much you much may have enjoyed a particular film, would you really want to see the same basic movie all over again with minor tweaks? This, of course, becomes a bit of a moot point for anyone who grew up on ’80s slasher films: despite the fact that very few of these films were directly related, almost all of them managed to seem like generic sequels/copies of the others…call it guilt by association.

The flip side to that argument, however, is what I like to call the “Peter Jackson argument”: does every film need to be split into three equal parts? Trilogies have a long history within the film world but how many legitimate sequels are really necessary? Even something like the Hatchet series, which manages to keep a central narrative thread running through all three (at this point) entries begs the ever-important question: how much do we really need to know about a maniacal killer? There’s a tendency to want to do lots of “world building” in modern films, expanding simple ideas into full-blown mythos that rival the likes of anything Lovecraft or King could imagine: the idea behind this seems to be that “one and done” films miss a ton of marketing/box office potential…what good producer wants to be responsible for passing up all those easy ducats?

By taking one look at the above poster-art for Tobe Hooper’s direct sequel, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986), it should be pretty easy to see that neither direction really appealed to the horror auteur. While the original 1974 film was a lean, mean, claustrophobic and ultra-low budget chiller about a group of friends being summarily ground up by a rampaging family of Texas cannibals, the poster for the late-’80s sequel directly references the previous years The Breakfast Club (1985) (Leatherface as Judd Nelson? Talk about inspired casting!). What gives?  A majority of film-goers and horror fans seemed to cry foul at the film, citing its tongue-in-cheek vibe, heavy-duty ’80sisms and dearth of legitimately sweaty scares as reasons to confine the film to the dustbins of history. Is TCM 2 really that bad? Was it the beginning of the end for the fledgling TCM franchise in the same way that the horrendously lame Hellraiser 3 (1992) should have killed off that series? Absolutely not. In fact, at least as far as my humble little opinion goes, I daresay that not only is Hooper’s sequel a fantastic film, in its own right, it’s a more than worthy followup to its iconic forefather. Stick that in your pipe and smoke it, naysayers!

My main problem with sequels is the inherent wheelspinning involved: not only do sequels inevitably rehash some of the same setpieces/beats from previous entries but they often, by necessity, need to rehash the same plot points (as audience refreshers, if nothing else). In a way, it’s like a champion mountain climber continuously conquering the same craggy peak: the first time you do it, there’s a genuine sense of accomplishment and wonder. The tenth time you do it, however, it probably feels an awful lot like clocking in for a day at the office. Since the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) was already one of the most notorious, intense and unrelenting films around, how could the filmmakers possibly top it without resorting to completely over-the-top overkill? There is, literally, no way to strip the narrative down any further than the original: the film is already primal enough as it is. Faced with the prospect of making a pale imitation of an accepted classic, however, Hooper took the unexpected turn of making the exact opposite kind of film: rather than stripped-down, drab and serious, Hooper made the follow-up loud, brash, rude, colorful and kind of goofy. More of the same? Not on your life, buddy!

A similar text-crawl to the first film reminds us of the situation behind the original and informs us that the current narrative takes place 12 years later…bringing us, of course, square into the magical ’80s. The action kicks off when a couple of shitty high school guys dick around with the wrong sinister black truck and end up pissing off the Sawyers. As Leatherface (Bill Johnson) is standing atop a moving vehicle, chainsawing one asshat’s head in half, diagonally, the other one is on the phone to a call-in radio show. The soon-to-be ex-douchebags happen to be on the air with DJ Stretch (Caroline Williams) at the time and the intrepid DJ ends up recording the incident. Enter former Texas Ranger Lefty Enright (Dennis Hopper, chewing up scenery and spitting out hot rivets like a Warner Bros. cartoon), who just so happens to be Sally and Franklin Hardesty’s uncle. Sally, we’ll remember, was the original film’s Final Girl and sole survivor, while poor Franklin was the mopey, wheelchair-bound guy who got gutted by a rampaging chainsaw. Seems that Lefty has spent the past 12 years tracking down their killers and, after examining the “accident scene,” has determined that the chainsaw-wielding cannibals are up to their old tricks again. We know that Lefty is right, of course, since we’ve previously gotten a look at a familiar face: Drayton Sawyer (Jim Siedow), the insane cook from the original film, is back as a highly respected member of the local business community and frequent winner of the chili cookoff: “The secret’s in the meat,” he smirks, and we know he ain’t lyin’.

Lefty convinces Stretch to play the tape on the air, despite the protests of her second-in-command/not-in-this-lifetime-suitor L.G. (Lou Perry): Lefty’s plan to draw out the Sawyers is successful, since Stretch ends up with a couple of late-night visitors at the radio station: Leatherface and Chop Top (Bill Moseley). When Lefty is late to protect her, Stretch ends up having to fend off the killers on her own. During their interaction, however, it appears that Leatherface has taken a shine to her…at least, if his grunting, pelvic-thrusting and phallic chainsaw movements are anything to go by. When L.G. returns from a coffee run, he gets unceremoniously pummeled by insane Vietnam vet Chop Top (“Incoming mail!,” he shrieks, splatting L.G.’s noggin into paste in the process) and dragged off to the Sawyer’s secret underground lair (handily located beneath an abandoned amusement park, natch). Like any faithful friend would do, Stretch follows after him, rescue on her mind. For his part, Lefty heads to the amusement park, as well, albeit for a slightly different reason: he’s packing multiple chainsaws and fully intends to smite the heathen Sawyers with a combination of God’s wrath and a little good, old-fashioned extreme bloodshed. As Lefty runs around, sawing support beams in half and attempting to, literally, bring down the house, Stretch must sneak into the proverbial lion’s den and save her friend…or whatever’s left of him. In the process, Stretch will need to become what she struggles against: Hell, truly, hath no fury like a DJ scorned. In the unforgettable words of the original: who will survive…and what will be left of them?

There are a few very important things to keep in mind while watching TCM 2. First of all, the film is just about as different from the first film as possible, despite the fact that both were directed and conceived by Hooper. As mentioned above, the original TCM is almost like a photo-negative of the ultra-colorful sequel. Secondly, the film does function as a direct sequel, even if some of the specifics and timeline events get a little screwy. Drayton, for the most part, is a direct continuation from the first, as is Leatherface (albeit in much more of a “horny teenager” mode here) and Grandpa (Ken Evert). Chop Top, however, is a new construct, although he serves a similar function to Edwin Neal’s hitchhiker in the original. Since Chop Top was never mentioned in the original film, whereas the hitchhiker is never mentioned in the sequel, it’s not much of a stretch to imagine that it’s supposed to be the same fellow (how he survived the Black Maria running over his skull at the climax to the original is a good question, although his metal head plate actually seems to answer this pretty tidily, numerous references to Vietnam notwithstanding). This is all just a long-winded way of saying that TCM 1 and 2 actually fit together pretty well, drastic difference in tone aside. It’s not a perfect fit, mind you, but there’s more of a sense of continuity between these two film than in many more “legitimate” sequel situations.

The third and most important thing to know about TCM 2 is that the film is an absolute blast, almost the complete antithesis to the original’s unrelenting tension. In certain ways, the sequel serves as a sly commentary on the original film: people thought they saw more blood in the original than they did, so Hopper drowned the sequel in outrageously gory setpieces. The original film had a modest, claustrophobic feel, so the sequel feels expansive and expensive. The original was so serious that any attempt at humor felt less like gallow’s humor and more like the rope: the sequel has one goofy setpiece after another (my absolute favorite being the one where Leatherface accidentally chainsaw’s Chop Top’s head, destroying his favorite hairpiece in the process: “You ruined my Sonny Bono wig, you bitch hog!”

Indeed, TCM 2 ends up being a perfect combination of Hooper’s harrowing aesthetic from the first film and the over-the-top atmosphere of most ’80s horror films: everything is blown up to ludicrous proportions here. One of the best examples of this notion in practice is the difference between the Sawyers’ lairs: the farmhouse from the first film will forever stand as a feverish nightmare, while the abandoned amusement park set from the sequel is an eye-popping, Christmas-light-bedecked marvel. For Pete’s sake: TCM 2’s lair features a skeleton riding a bomb, ala Slim Pickens from Dr. Strangelove (1964): it really doesn’t get cooler than that, folks.

Whereas the first film made subtle references to the tide of modernization being responsible for the Sawyers’ situation, the sequel is much more explicit about this. In a film filled with plenty of delicious irony, one of the neatest tidbits is the notion that one of the cities biggest pillars of industry, Drayton Sawyer, is actually the insane head of a secret cannibal family: those damned capitalists! There’s also plenty of rich material evident in things like Chop Top’s plans for his own amusement park (“I’ll call it…NamLand!”) and scenes like the one where Lefty tries to use a disembodied skeleton arm to lift Stretch from a trapdoor, only to have the arm break off at the wrist and send her tumbling down. For all of its sustained carnage, TCM 2 is actually a very funny film.

Which is not, course, to say that it isn’t also 100% a horror film. The opening setpiece, featuring Leatherface riding a moving truck while “wearing” a corpse like a costume, as Oingo Boingo’s “No One Lives Forever,” plays on the soundtrack is a real showstopper, as is the bit where he comes rampaging out of a pitch black room. There’s one scene involving skinning a body that’s more extreme than anything hinted at in the first and Chop Top’s pursuit of Stretch through the compound and up to a hidden aerie is alternately thrilling and nail-biting.

While the film is much more over-the-top than the first, no of the acting manages to seem out-of-place. In particular, Moseley does a career-defining turn as the crazed war vet: the scene where he uses a hanger to scratch the flaking skin on his head, before eating it, is by turns repulsive and awe-inspiring. There’s never a point where Moseley appears to be acting: rather, it seems like they recruited the role from a local loony bin, which is the highest compliment I can pay something attempting to portray “pathologically crazy.”

Truth be told, I unabashedly love The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2. It may not have the same sweaty relevance as the original film but it’s exceptionally well-made, features tons of great practical effects, some stellar villains and amazing set-pieces galore. If there are some elements that fall completely flat (Leatherface newfound sexual interest in Stretch is awkward and never explored to any reasonable measure, although it does although Moseley to prance around shouting, “Bubba’s got a girlfriend…Bubba’s got a girlfriend!” at one point), there are countless other elements that hit the bullseye. I can only assume that folks don’t like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 because it’s so tonally different from the first one. In my mind, however, that’s one of the film’s biggest charms: Hooper could have gone “cookie-cutter” but he went outside the mold and I think we’re all the richer for it.

Even though the Texas Chainsaw Massacre franchise would sputter to a finish with a couple lame sequels and a 2000-era reboot, nothing could ever tarnish the undiluted majesty of the first two films. The original film is and always will be one of my favorite movies: depending on my mood, the second one is, too. If you consider yourself a fan of the first film but have avoided the second like the plague, do yourself a favor: hold your nose, if you have to, but dive right in. I’m more than willing to wager that you’ll come to love it, too, as long as you keep an open mind. Proving that there’s always an exception to the rule, Hooper’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 is almost as strong, although in completely different ways, from the first film. Besides, how could you possibly pass up a chance to watch Dennis Hopper have a chainsaw duel with Leatherface? The answer, obviously, is that you can’t.

 

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10/1/14 (Part One): Meat Is Murder

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1970's cinema, 31 Days of Halloween, Allen Danziger, auteur theory, cannibals, cinema, classic movies, co-writers, cult classic, dysfunctional family, Edwin Neal, favorite films, feature-film debut, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, Gunnar Hansen, horror, horror films, horror franchises, iconic villains, isolated estates, Jim Siedow, John Dugan, John Larroquette, Kim Henkel, Leatherface, Marilyn Burns, Movies, Paul A. Partain, Sally Hardesty, Sawyer family, Teri McMinn, Texas, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Tobe Hooper, William Vail, writer-director

A text-crawl and voice-over narrator informs us that the story we’re about to see is true. As we stare at the black screen, the high-pitched, eerie whine of a camera flashbulb, followed by a split-second flash of light, illuminates extreme close-ups of what appear to be rotted body parts. We can hear muffled talking but there’s no way to pinpoint what’s going. As we gradually come to make sense of an overheard radio broadcast that mentions grave-robbing, the image fades into a shot of a recently disinterred body, posed jovially on a tombstone like a Halloween decoration ready to greet trick or treaters. We then smash cut into the opening credits sequence which consists of blown-out, blood-red images of body parts and out-of-focus solar flares, as crashing cymbals and insane percussive elements provide the score. Welcome to a perfect vision of Hell: writer/director Tobe Hooper’s landmark feature debut, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974).

40 years to the day that it was first unleashed upon unsuspecting audiences, TCM has lost absolutely none of its horrific, spellbinding power. Although filmmaking technology has grown by leaps and bounds in the four decades since its creation, modern films would be hard-pressed to approximate even one-tenth of the raw, visceral, feral power that this ultimate “meat” movie still possesses. Hooper’s TCM is a film that would not only come to define and revolutionize its era but would leave a lasting mark on the entirety of the cinematic horror genre. Like Romero’s legendary Night of the Living Dead (1968) would do six years before, TCM took traditional notions of fright cinema into the woods and shot them in the head, leaving the bodies to be reclaimed by the soil. It’s no hyperbole to say that traces and threads of Hooper’s modest little cannibal film can be found running through nearly all of the horror films that followed it, in one way or the other: if nothing else, any horror film that came after was constantly trying to one-up and out-do the sheer intensity of TCM, whether through a heightened reliance on gore effects or by trying to imitate the relentless drive of the film. Despite its endless army of imitators, however, one thing remains abundantly clear: there is no other film quite like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

By this point in time, the basic plot of the film should be just about as familiar as a Grimm fairy tale: five friends, led by Sally Hardesty (the recently deceased Marilyn Burns) and her wheelchair-bound brother, Franklin (Paul A. Partain), head to their grandfather’s old homestead, deep in the isolated heart of rural Texas. Their grandfather was buried in the defiled cemetery that we’re introduced to in the opening and Sally and Franklin want to make sure his body is still lying where it’s supposed to be. Along the way, the happy group stops to pick up a strange hitchhiker (Edwin Neal), a cackling, bat-shit crazy piece-of-work who manages to cut both himself and Franklin before getting bodily ejected from the van. The group are shaken but determined to laugh it off: after all, Saturn is in retrograde and this is just the kind of crazy shit you expect to happen.

After stopping to get directions from an odd but friendly gas station owner (Jim Siedow) who sees them off with the classic horror movie warning to be careful since “old houses are dangerous and you might get hurt,” the group heads over to the dilapidated farmhouse. As Franklin, Sally and her boyfriend, Jerry (Allen Danziger) poke around the old place, Pam (Teri McMinn) and Kirk (William Vail) head out to find the local swimming hole. Turns out that the swimming hole is all dried up but the couple hear the sounds of a gas-powered generator and see a windmill poking above the nearby trees: a quick peek reveals another farmhouse, albeit in a seemingly worse state of repair than the old Hardesty place. After curiosity gets the best of them, Pam and Kirk decide to do a little trespassing and check out the hidden homestead. They need gas for the van, after all, and there’s obviously someone living there since the generator is running. As Pam pokes around outside, Kirk lets himself into the dark, stuffy farmhouse, slowly roaming down the long, central hallway. As he looks around, Kirk steps straight from reality into a living nightmare…and horror movie history.

While the set-up for TCM is pure simplicity, the film is such a powerhouse because there’s so much stuff happening in the margins and within the shadows, little elements that not only enrich the overall viewing experience but help to establish the film as something much more than a low-budget attempt to break into the splatter market. In a nutshell, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is about a world gone mad, a world in which a hundred little oddities add up to a pretty terrifying picture. The Sawyer family may be the easiest example of this but Sally and her friends don’t seem to meet many “normal” folks during their fateful trip: the rednecks at the graveyard are leering and vaguely threatening, the drunk speaks a bunch of mystical mumbo jumbo and the cook’s gas station attendant doesn’t appear to be playing with a full deck. Solar flares…Watergate…grave robbing…genuinely bizarre people…this is certainly not the promised utopia of the ’60s but more akin to time-lapse photography of rotting meat: the promise of blissful unity decomposing into violence, hate and indifference.

While rewatching TCM for what must be at least the 100th time, I challenged myself to imagine what it would be like to see this film all the way back in 1974, perhaps at some out-of-the-way drive-in theater or a grindhouse in Times Square. It’s not easy to forget 40 years of genre static and unnecessary fluff but the reward ended up being particularly rewarding: when I tried to view the film in as cold and clinical a light as possible (attempting to gloss over the fact that I’ve loved it unconditionally for the entirety of my adult life), I found that it still retained every measure of its initial power. I knew the story by heart…every jump scare, every shot, every bizarre and wonderful image…but I still found myself on the edge of my seat, feeling nervous and fidgety. The infamous dinner scene is just as awful today as it was back in the ’70s (or the ’80s, when I originally saw the film). The opening is just as striking, the climax just as awe-inspiring. Unlike other beloved films from my childhood, TCM has lost not an inch of its initial power and allure: if anything, my appreciation for the film grows with every screening.

Why does TCM manage to have so much lasting power when other films of the era feel dated or slight? Chalk it up to a perfect storm of filmmaking: Hooper and his inexperienced crew stumbled their way into perfection, using each and every obstacle and problem as a springboard to something truly unique. This, in essence, is the furthest thing from “by-the-book” filmmaking. As was ably detailed in the excellent documentary, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: A Family Portrait (1988), working conditions on the set were less than ideal: the bones and rotting food were all real, leading to on-set odors that would rival abattoirs, particularly in the scorching Texas sun; Gunnar Hansen was kept separated from the rest of the cast, so as to further the isolation of his soon-to-be-iconic Leatherface character; Marilyn Burns was actually psychologically tortured during the dinner setpiece, placing her terrified reactions in a queasy middle-ground between reality and art; the cast wore the same clothes for the entire shoot, lending everything a grimy, dirty feel. Reminding one of the stories from Coppola’s Apocalypse Now (1979) shoot, albeit minus the drugged-out insanity, actually filming Hooper’s classic seemed to be as much of a physical struggle as surviving the fictional Sawyers.

As a filmmaker, Hooper constantly surprises and impresses with TCM: the set design of the Sawyer farmhouse, on its own, would be enough to secure the film a place in cinematic history but there’s plenty else to extol. Despite the amateur nature of the cast, none of the acting feels awkward or out-of-place. The three villains (Edwin Neal, Gunnar Hansen and Jim Siedow) are pitch-perfect and nuanced: they’re obviously a severely deranged group of sickos but they actors never feel the oversell anything, even when the script is at its most teeth-gnashing. Similarly, the five young friends may not be exceptionally developed characters but they manage to avoid the “Nerd/Jock/Stoner/Cheerleader/Good Girl” stereotypes that have plagued “dead teenager” films pretty much from the get-go.

The cinematography is suitably grainy and immediate but there are a surprising number of effective flourishes: a propensity for extreme long shots that helps to make the characters seem tiny against the landscape…twitchy, insane extreme close-ups of Sally’s terrified eyes and that aforementioned opening…the constant smash cuts to the moon and sun (circular imagery is actually pretty prevalent in the film, which also includes plenty of circular flashlight beams, round windows, eyeglasses, etc…). The score (courtesy of Hooper and Wayne Bell) is subtle and unobtrusive but endlessly effective: much of the film takes place with only diegetic sounds and sound effects (crashing cymbals are a popular one) but the creepy score occasionally sneaks in to shake things up. The editing, appropriately frenetic and quick-cut during the action sequences, is still able to allow for more leisurely reveals and creeping atmosphere, when necessary.

As a film, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre contains many of my all-time favorite scenes: Leatherface’s first appearance…Pam discovering the bone room…the dinner scene…Sally’s initial escape…Franklin and Sally trudging through the pitch-black woods, with only a meager flashlight for a guide…Grandpa (John Dugan) constantly dropping the mallet and obscenely waggling his arms and legs like a happy infant…the opening…that amazing finale. Truth be told, the conclusion to TCM may just be my favorite ending to any film, ever (with the possible exception of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (1966), depending on my mood): as Sally escapes into the promise of a new day and whatever remains of her shattered life, Leatherface stands in the middle of the road and spins and pirouettes, swinging his snarling chainsaw around in a perfect fit of what very well might be teenage peevishness. It’s horrifying precisely because it hints at the idea that these human monsters might have as much notion of their evil as kids who burn ants with magnifying glasses do.

Unlike modern films which take every possible opportunity to spin out an “origin” story, Hooper is more than happy to just give us the basics: terrible stuff has been happening for a while, the Sawyer family has “always worked in meat” and the modernization of the local slaughterhouse has left the former employees (Grandpa was always the best cattle killer at the place) disenfranchised and dangerously marginalized. If all you want is a high-octane film about a murderous, cannibal clan, look no further. If you want a sly commentary on how the inevitable march of progress chews us all up and spits us out, look no further: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre delivers on any level.

I’ve seen The Texas Chainsaw Massacre enough, at this point, to know that my love for the film is genuine: as I said earlier, I love it more each year, not less. As someone who watches between 300 (in a bad year) and 700 (in a good year) movies a year, there have been plenty of opportunities for films to vault over TCM. I won’t lie: each year, I invariably see a batch of new films that have “classic” written all over them and several of them have become new “go-tos” for me. In the 20+ years since I first saw the movie, however, I don’t think there’s ever been a horror film that has affected me quite as much as this did. It seems rather impossible to call any film “perfect” but Hooper’s classic is as close to perfect as they come, imperfections included.

While I’ve actually really enjoyed Hooper’s post-TCM career (if nothing else, you really have to admire the breadth of his catalog), nothing, with the possible exception of the much maligned sequel or his sophomore film, Eaten Alive (1977), have approached this magnum opus. While I tend to detest remakes, on principle, I really protested the 2003 remake of TCM for one very simple reason: the film was perfect as it was. With the possible exception of ramping up the gore (despite its reputation, Hooper’s TCM is almost completely bloodless, save for a few choice shots) and introducing “hot young actors,” a remake seemed a complete exercise in futility. After all, how could a sterile money-grab ever compete with the legitimate insanity of the original film? The answer: it can’t.

40 years after its release, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre still stands as a legendary piece of cinematic history. I’m willing to go out on a limb and say that 40 years from now, discerning audiences will still find something to appreciate about the film. I’m assuming that all horror fans have already seen the film but, if you haven’t, there are simply no excuses: this should be as much a part of any cinephile’s DNA as any of the classics, genre or otherwise. In a time when CGI rules the horror roost and films are so self-aware as to be numbing, the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre is that rarest of things: a breath of fresh air. This is a film with a soul and a beating, blood-red heart, crafted by a cast and crew that could have had no idea that their humble little project would be immortal. I’ve loved The Texas Chainsaw Massacre from the first time I saw it: come talk to me on my death-bed and I’m pretty sure I’ll tell you the same thing.