Miscellanous Outworlder Reviews

My Money Says You're Not Going Anywhere

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning
directed by Jonathan Liebesman
posted by Kattastrophe

 

So… I actually kind of honestly liked this movie. I didn’t expect to. I mean, historically speaking, horror prequels are trash. Especially when they’re made thirty years after the original (though, I think it’s technically a prequel to the remake). So, yay for not feeling like I just lost ninety-one minutes of my life. It’s not cinematic genius, but it was totally enjoyable to watch.

I expected that it might follow Tommy/Leatherface (Andrew Bryniarski) a little more closely, as it opens up with his birth. An overweight woman is working in a slaughterhouse in sweatshop conditions. She pleads to go to the bathroom and, when she’s denied, dies and births the ugliest baby EVAR! Seriously, it looks like a gelatinous goblin. The boss guy dumps him with the trash and then a very senile seeming woman pulls him out and takes him home. Cut to the opening credits.

The opening credits are creepy in the way that so many horror movie credits are creepy. Slow music, severe close ups on innocuous objects with sinister meanings, burning photographs. Nothing spectacular there.

But, the story actually seems to follow Tommy’s adopted father. Or uncle (R. Lee Ermey). I’m not really sure which family role he’s taken up. After they close down the slaughterhouse, the town dies. Though, I’m not sure how the third world country style slaughterhouse was keeping anything afloat. Aside from being so unsanitary as to let a woman piss herself rather than give her a bathroom break, it only seemed to have about three employees. Tommy kills the overlord of the slaughterhouse, forcing the sheriff to go get Tommy’s uncle-thing. Surprisingly, he’s a fucking nutjob and the sheriff ends up dead. The uncle steals his uniform and name, wielding all the power of the small-town law enforcement.

The crazy Hewitts are now the last people in the town and they decide to eat people because that’s what Uncle Hewitt had to do in the army. There’s your history lesson, folks. The rest of the movie plays out exactly the way you would expect it to: Pretty teenagers are passing through the town, they end up caught in the bloody grip of the Hewitts. Tommy picks up a chainsaw and Uncle Hewitt is a sadistic bastard.

The characters are pretty awesome though. You’ve got Erik (Matt Bomer) who’s just come back from the Vietnam War for his little brother, Dean (Taylor Handley), who’s just been drafted. They’re taking one last roadtrip before they ship off with their girlfriends, Chrissie (Jordana Brewster) and Bailey (Diora Baird), respectively. Dean is worried about going and Bailey tells him to run to Mexico while Erik talks about how excited he is to be taking his brother back with him. As male characters, they show a surprising amount of weakness and uncertainty.

Chrissie is an awesome female character, holding her own in front of scary bikers and most of the Hewitts. She also has what I think is the crowning moment of the movie. But it’s a spoiler, so you’ll have to wait to read about that.

Bailey… well, she’s more your typical girl-in-movie. She mostly cries. But three out of four aint bad.

The storyline is sparse. Aside from the slaughterhouse closing down, there isn’t much. Mostly just killing. I didn’t really get a sense of the time period. It could have been in the 70’s or now. In the for real original movie, one of the things I always loved was how it looked hot. Like, just watching the movie made me want to change into a t-shirt and shorts. Along with time anchors, this feeling of oppressive heat was missing. All in all, pretty entertaining. Not awesome, but decent.

nWoD Inspiration:
Who doesn’t need a family of cannibals in their game? Srsly.

Also, the slaughterhouse scenes are really great for that dirty, sick-sad-world atmosphere.

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