Product: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (Original Uncut) [Region 2] (1974)
Rating: 5.0
One of the Scariest Flicks Ever!
When police found Mrs. Worden, she was naked and slung from a meat hook in the basement. She had been gutted and dressed like a deer in hunting season. On further investigation police discovered preserved body parts, human skulls and skeletons. They even found furniture fashioned from the remnants of once-interred corpses. They couldn�t have known at the time, but Wisconsin police, searching the home of Ed Gein in 1957, were unraveling the definitive American nightmare. Mild-mannered Gein had been a busy man by all accounts � raiding graves and skinning the bodies to make a female body suit, as well as for food and furniture. The fact that he killed only one person is irrelevant. His real crimes were more unimaginable to the public consciousness. He precedes Dahmer by at least 35 years, and yet he is the single foundation on which so many of America�s nightmares have been built � in cinematic terms it�s �Psycho� (1960) �Deranged� (1974), and �Silence of the Lambs� (1988) One youngster haunted by stories of Gein�s exploits, was Tobe Hooper, who would marry the memories of these stories and accounts of the Vietnam war to produce possibly the single most important American film in years � �The Texas Chainsaw Massacre�. Given the current climate of war and devastation, I think that TCM is more important a film than ever (discounting for the moment the inexplicable decision to remake the film in 2003). It tells the story of a group of teenagers, packed in a green �Scooby Doo Mystery Machine� van, on a day trip most of them will not remember. A series of events leads them into the clutches of a Texas cannibalistic family, which does not take kindly to their presence in the house. It�s �Family Ties� done the way Jeffrey Dahmer would have liked � it�s barbarism and wholesale slaughter, with a pinch of situation comedy. At first glance the film is throw-away drive in fodder, but you can�t escape the barbaric undertones that are all too familiar to anyone with a passing acquaintance with CNN or Sky News. As far as violence goes, Gein has a lot to answer for � he brought the idea to the fore that (in singer/songwriter Morrissey�s words) �Barbarism Begins at Home�. Extended to include the issue of war � gone was the idea that governments are there to serve us, it�s more of a case of governments being there to serve us up. This is a truly scary and disturbing flick, so I'd recomend seeing it alone in the dark.