You know, there are a few other threads on this board about this film and 99% of the responses are negative.
I totally disagree.
WOW!!
This was a kickass movie and I enjoyed every minute of it.
I guess I fall into that 1% of people that love this film.
I guess that this is why I decided to write my own thread on it...because I am in the minority for once and that in my opinion deserves its own thread.
I found this film to be a worthy remake in every sense.
I loved the original and this one, while a bit different in certain aspects, definitely lived up to my expectations.
I simply cannot understand why so many people hated this film...I for one was totally riveted!
I was leaning forward the entire film and when I do that, it means that it has my undivided attention all the way...and it did.
Another thing I wanted to mention was the fact that Roger Ebert is my favorite film critic and I usually 99% of the time agree with his reviews completely.
Not this time!
He gave the film 0 stars out of 4.
Here's what he said:
"The new version of "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" is a contemptible film: Vile, ugly and brutal. There is not a shred of a reason to see it. Those who defend it will have to dance through mental hoops of their own devising, defining its meanness and despair as "style" or "vision" or "a commentary on our world." It is not a commentary on anything, except the marriage of slick technology with the materials of a geek show."
Yes IT IS vile and brutal and ugly and that is precisely the reason I found it to be so good.
As for "dancing through mental hoops of my own devising" well I won't dance through any hoops of anyone's devising and I didn't see it as style or vision or even commentary...I liked it simply for its brutality and somewhat faithfulness to the original.
I guess that I took it in with a much simpler view than he and others did and what is wrong with that?
Nothing at all my friends.
He also goes on to say:
"The ending, which is cynical and truncated, confirmed my suspicion that the movie was made by and for those with no attention span."
Ok...I find that remark personally insulting as I have a perfect attention span and am intelligent as well. (you regulars here cannot deny that I'm no dummy!)
That statement of his was a slap in the face to me and others who liked it and was totally his opinion, which I consider complete BULLs**t!
He goes even further by saying:
"I like good horror movies. They can exorcise our demons. "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" doesn't want to exorcise anything. It wants to tramp crap through our imaginations and wipe its feet on our dreams."
And why not?
It was this "tramping crap through our imaginations and wiping its feet on my dreams" which made me like it!
Like I said...I usually agree with him but not here and not now.
Anyway, a couple of things...
One inconsistency I found was when Leatherface sawed that guy's leg off, the guy would've bled out within minutes but no, LFACE had him alive n the basement long after that guy would've expired.
And I'm assuming that was salt that LFACE packed into his severed leg...it looked like ice to me at first and I had to rewind and watch again to be sure it was salt.
I found that to be a nice sadistic touch.
Another thing which made me laugh my ass off was the fact that the family's last name was Hewitt/Hewett.
It's a personal thing for me because I know a hardcore redneck that I personally dislike who lives here in town and his and his family's last name is Hewett.
I've had a few problems with him and his kin in the past.
It was something that maybe only I could identify with personally and I sure as hell did.
When they said aloud the last name of the family I burst out laughing and almost fell out of my chair!
I thought, "What a small f**kin' world!"
I still get chuckles thinking about it.
Hehe!
The film also had a nice little touch to it that wasn't in the original and that was the brief run through the abbatoir.
Good stuff!
As I stated before, I have seen the original and I must state that this film DOES do the original justice in my honest opinion.
I loved it!
If you haven't seen it yet, go rent it.
Hell, I just may go out and pick this one up on DVD!
I give this movie 3 1/2 out of 4 stars!
Are there any of you out there who fall into that 1% who love this film like I do?
Post Edited (04-05-04 04:29)
You, sir, are a wuss of the highest degree ;)
I think I have by now made my voice plenty clear about how much I hated this stupid and unecessary movie.
Brother R
Well Brother R. you should know by now after our road trip last year that you & I don't exactly see eye to eye when it comes to certain films!
I gotta disagree with you on this one.
Fantastic movie!
Thumbs up!
Hehe!
Post Edited (04-05-04 04:20)
Whilst I didn't think it was too bad a film, I have to say that it's also not that memorable a film. The only real thing I thouroughly enjoyed was the fact that all the 'family' are in on it, that to me is kinda freaky, but other than that it was fairly run of the mill, especially the [quite amusing really] run through water just to get jessica's t-shirt wet scene [it was never really explained why he turned the water on!]
Anyway, overall I don't think it's the shocker everyone made it out to be, but it ain't no work of art either.
It wasn't really a necessary film but at least it didn't insult the original too much...they didn't turn it into a SCREAM-like film, they kept the same serious tone and didn't ruin it with a bunch of lame top-40 music...they seemed to try to look at the original as much as they could and stick with it when it was feasible. It had the same cinematographer as the original, for crying out loud...that's about as good as it gets. The main problem is that the original hasn't lost any of its impact over the last 30 years, and you can't help but think, why not just watch the original? The DAWN remake worked because the original was made more relevant by being updated to our times. TCM didn't really need any kind of change or updating--about the only thing they really bring is more gore--but even there, the original is creepier because it shows less and your imagination does all the work.
I have to disagree with the assessment of Ebert's review, though....some of the greatest horror films have been despised by critics, and that this movie would bother him so much makes me think that maybe horror is getting dangerous and offensive again, which can only be a good thing even if this movie didn't quite pull it off.
Yeah, it is pretty offensive all right. Not in the good, 70's style grindhouse kinda way, though. More in the "woman talking on her cell phone right behind you while her child makes irritating child noises and kicks your seat" kinda way.
Brother R
As I said in the other thread, it sucked! the original is awesome.
Me and my friends all loved it
me and my friends all loved it
I think Ebert is a total jackass. Lately it seems he gives thumbs up reviews to 99% of the movies he sees. I think he's just happy that his career survived after Siskel's death.
As for the TCM remake, I thought it was much, much better than the original... but still a p**s poor film. The teenagers were the typical horror movie moron type characters. The story was full of cliches. And the idea of some retard redneck with a chainsaw really doesn't scare me all that much. I'm not exactly sure why.
I do love the fact that they kept the b***hy fat wheelchair queer out of the remake. I couldn't stomach to see that character again.
Hey, relax everybody. Michelle and all her firends loved it...twice!
Considering that Michael Bay's name is on the producing credits, one would really think the remake will suck big time. However, after seeing the film, I will say that Bay is a better producer than he is a director because none of his "trademark" images are in this film.
As a whole, THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE remake wasn't bad at all. But, it wasn't very good to begin with either! It had it's moments and their were a few nice touches, and the acting was slightly average for a typical horror film made in today's contemporary times. What else worked about the film was it attempted to be original: in other words, it didn't try to imitate the original, manly use ideas from the original and added new touches, and the results aren't bad. Plus, it's great to see R. Lee Emery play a non-millitary officer for once!
However, other scenes were just too damn silly and the gore effects were just downright pathetic (i.e., The girl who blows her head off within the first 15 minutes into the film. Again, a nice touch. But, it is quite ruined by the horrible CGI effects of the camera entering out of the gaping bullet-hole-in-the-head. The head-blowing-off scene in Lucio Fulci's THE BEYOND was better than this. Maybe Bay should have hired Gianetto De Rossi instead?) and the running time is just a bit too short as the film ends quite abruptly, leaving a few plot inconsistancies open and unexplained events. I sure would have loved it if the Italians made this, they would have at least offered some better nasty gore effects and a much more interesting premise.
As it stands, the remake is okay and cannot compete with the original. But then, the original 1973 film wasn't much to write about either.
You know, when I first watched this, the one thing that kept running through my mind was, wow, these folks really need to take a shower.
However, like you say, it was okay, but not anything spectacular.