The Humane Vision of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre

I saw Tobe Hooper for the first time Texas chain saw massacre Under the best possible conditions. I was no more than sixteen years old, and I was stranded in my parents’ basement one hot summer night, slowly flipping through channels. I visited IFC (Independent Film Channel) and paused at what appeared to be a documentary. Two hippies – a handsome boy in denim (Kirk) and a pretty girl in red shorts and a halter shirt (Pam) – happen upon a popular-looking house on an abandoned Texas outpost. They’re looking to trade some fuel so they can get their truck full of friends back on the road. It’s the early 1970s, and large groups of aimless young people fill similar vans, all in pursuit of a vague dream of love and freedom far from the stifling familiarity of their parents’ homes.

The two climb the porch steps and approach the front door. In a bold move, Kirk plucks a human tooth from the floor and hands it to his girlfriend: “I’ve got something for you, Pam.” A cry of disgust: “Let’s go!” Retreat to the rocker in the front yard.

After his repeated knocks went unanswered, Kirk entered the house. A massive figure wearing a butcher’s apron and a mask made of human skin appears on the horizon. Today, Leatherface needs no introduction, having become a true symbol of backwoods carnage. However, to my wide-eyed sixteen-year-old, this hulking frame and grotesque monstrosity was alien, a masterful combination of the comical and the malicious. What was I watching? And who was behind the camera, watching all this chaos with clinical detachment? Texas chain saw massacre It was the first movie that made me fear the director more than the villains.

Leatherface brings a big hammer to Kirk’s head. A sickening wet thud and then his collapsed body explodes into angry convulsions. After a final blow, Leatherface drags his victim into another room and closes the metal door. That door bothered me greatly, both because of the tightness of its closing and its industrial-chic look befitting a slaughterhouse, not a home. She also explained that this heinous incident was a routine procedure at this place.

Cut to the outside. Pam is understandably worried that her boyfriend won’t return. She rises from the rocking chair and we move to a low shot that draws our attention to the massive house that consumed Kirk, now looming ominously before her. Hooper and screenwriter Kim Henkel stated that they wanted to do a modern retelling of the film Hansel and GretelThis shot has an appropriately fantastical quality, as it shows us a young girl lost in the forest and wandering into a witch’s house.

Calling out to Kirk, she walks into the house and stumbles into what is surely one of the most bizarre living rooms in all of cinema. There is an abundance of bones scattered on the floor and hanging from the ceiling like haunting dream catchers. The centerpiece of the room was constructed from skeletal remains, either a makeshift couch or a voodoo altar. A lone chicken clucking and shivering inside a rusty bird cage. As with the sliding metal door, this detail got on my nerves. It seemed like a poor imitation of a “natural” pet, much as some space agencies saw a chicken as interchangeable with a parrot or parrot.

The behind-the-scenes star here is the film’s art director, Robert A. Burns, an eccentric character whose set design style included a foray into taxidermy to create one of the film’s opening shots of a dead armadillo smoldering in the Texas heat. In his capable hands, the house and its murderous family are like a perverted reflection of the American dream. Having been replaced by automation in the slaughterhouse, the members of this utopian house turn it into their own slaughterhouse, consuming the very society that spat them out.

As panic mounts, Pam attempts to escape the man-made hell she has stumbled into. A screaming leather face grabs her by the front door and drags her back into the chaos of the house. This time, the ominous metal door would not cast a faint curtain on the ordeal awaiting its victim. Leatherface carries Bam into a dingy room, centered around a huge Meathawk. A low tracking shot of Pam’s slender back flashes across our heads as she is pinned on the hook. Having seized the poll in a futile gesture of resistance, she finds the strength to scream when Leatherface takes the saw to her boyfriend’s corpse, which is now lying on the table. This scene, among the most brutal and depressing ever filmed, forms the heart of the film. Hardly a single drop of blood appears.

Here we gain some insight into genius Texas chain saw massacreAs well as her complex moral vision. Hopper does not assault us with practical implications. Doing so would undermine the seriousness of the violence being unleashed – and also make the film considerably less frightening. By contrast, a modern film like The terrifying 3 It’s full of ridiculous murders, but the heavy emphasis on its practical mechanics dehumanizes the bodies being destroyed and makes it more like something we encounter in a funhouse than a true crime story. By contrast, Hopper’s film refuses to dehumanize both victim and villain. Instead of pierced flesh, we have the horrific details of Pam’s anguished face, the steel pen she clutches, and the rusty bucket beneath her suspended body.

But the scene is not over yet. With both Pam and Kirk dispatched, Leatherface runs into the living room and looks out the window in panic, braying like a wild animal. He taps his temples in a frantic motion as the camera zooms in on his masked face, giving us a clear view of his decaying teeth and frightened eyes. This wasn’t the typical “slasher” I was used to. He didn’t have the inhuman competence of Michael Myers or Jason Voorhees. He was evil, but he was also bumbling, and he was terrifyingly human. And I felt some sympathy for him.

No doubt some will wonder what effect a film like this would have on the pages of a Christian publication. It’s a fair question. My humble attempt at an answer was to highlight a crucial scene in this wonderful film. Another way to state the above argument is to say that Texas chain saw massacre It offers a vision of irreducible evil—acts so abhorrent and cruel that they do not allow for reductive explanations. But the film also doesn’t indulge in the temptation to introduce a bizarre, essentially superhuman villain, as we encounter in the film. Silence of the LambsHannibal Lecter. For all his barbarism, Lecter has more in common with Count Dracula or Darth Vader than someone like Geoffrey Dahlmer. On the other hand, Leatherface and his family are more knowledgeable. They are human monsters, not fictional characters.

Hopper would abandon this rich and disturbing depiction of human depravity for his slapstick sequel. Indeed, most of the film replaces serious exploration of fallen nature with gore and grossness. For better or worse, the original Texas chain saw massacre It stands as one of the greatest cinematic explorations of evil, complete with all its human foibles and clichés. On the face of it, this may seem like an unbearable test of endurance. But it is not. In reality, Texas chain saw massacre Disturbingly captivating.

Part of the reason for this is the stray moments of beauty that intrude into the brutal scenes. Because the film focuses on torture and mass murder, such a statement may seem absurd. How can a film like this be described as beautiful in every sense of the word? In fewer hands, Texas chain saw massacre It would be a vision of pure contempt like any film that explores moral disorder without compassion. A hate-driven movie, no matter how skillfully executed, will always be ugly. For all his painful topics Texas chain saw massacre It’s a deeply sympathetic film that never loses sight of the humanity of any of its characters. Nor does she ignore the stark beauty of her natural surroundings. I’ll never forget the final moments of the movie when Leatherface walks around with his roaring chainsaw while the brilliant Texas sun burns on the horizon.