The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
Directed by Tobe Hooper
Written by Kim Hinkel and Tobe Hooper
1974/US
IMDb page
First viewing/Amazon Prime rental
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Jerry: That’s the last goddamn hitchhiker I ever pick up.

That Marilyn Burns may be the best screamer in the history of movie screamers.

Five teenagers travel to back-of-beyond rural Texas to look into the reported desecration of a grandfather’s grave. They find the grave is intact and go looking for the old family place.  Before they find it they pick up a Hitchhiker.  Shortly thereafter they learn he is a homicidal maniac.  They are able to eject the Hitchhiker from the van but catch up with him at the gas station, which just so happens to be out of gasoline.  We learn that the Hitchhiker’s family are all in the meat businesses from the slaughter house to the diner near the gas station.  Furthermore, they occupy grampa’s house.

The teens are lured to the place, which is disgustingly dirty and decorated with furnishings made with animal hides and bones.  Closer examination reveals that some of these objects are from human remains. Then the teenagers are introduced to Leatherface and his chainsaw.

I can definitely understand why this film is on The List.  It challenges the formerly unspoken limits of horror in so many different ways, blending disgust with effective scares. Actually, it may be the most horrifying movie I have ever seen. There’s also a nice grisly wit to it.  It did exactly what it set out to do, so I guess it’s a 10/10 in that regard.  But on my “do I want to see more of this kind of thing” scale it get’s a “not really”.