TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE
This sensational, extremely influential, 1974 low-budget horror movie directed by Tobe Hooper, may be notorious for its title, but it's also a damn fine piece of moviemaking. And it's blood-curdling scary, too. Loosely based on the true crimes of Ed Gein, the original Jeffrey Dahmer, Texas Chainsaw Massacre follows a group of teenagers who pick up a hitchhiker and wind up in a backwoods horror chamber where they're held captive, tortured, chopped up, and impaled on meat hooks by a demented cannibalistic family, including a character known as Leatherface who maniacally wields one heck of a chainsaw.
The movie's powerful sense of dread is heightened by its grainy, semi-documentary style-- but it also has a wicked sense of humor . Sure, it may not be for everyone, but as a landmark in the development of the horror/slasher genre, it ranks with Psycho, Halloween, and A Nightmare on Elm Street. The very definition of horror-suspense, if you've not seen this 1974 classic by Tobe Hooper - go watch it now. However, the story is pretty irrelevant here, as Hooper's skill of building a sense of impending doom and despair from the first frame, are what make the film. Crafted with incredible set pieces and featuring one of the longest 'female in peril' chase sequences recorded on screen, you won't forget this movie in a hurry! Any horror fan should see this - in fact, most fans of film should watch this one, if nothing else to see just how well a horror film really can be made, without the need for buckets of blood. |
