The Texas Chain Saw Massacre movie review - Aussieboyreviews
IS THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE REALLY THAT MUCH OF A VIOLENT NIGHTMARE?
The film gets pretty violent, especially for the 70s. But it’s hard to understand how the slashing and murdering is terrifying. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is still pretty decent and doesn’t rely on sexual content.
Storyline
A young woman and her friends travel to the grave of her grandfather after hearing that it may have been vandalised. But when they stop along the way to her grandfather’s house, they are terrorised by a chainsaw-wielding killer.
Movie Images
Movie details
Director: Tobe Hooper
Cast: Marilyn Burns, Paul A. Partain, Edwin Neal, Jim Siedow, Gunnar Hansen
Writer: Tobe Hooper, Kim Henkel
Release Date (Australia): 9 February 1984
Runtime: 83 minutes/1h 23m
Genre: Horror
Country: USA
Language: English
CONTENT GUIDE (WARNING: MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS)
The film contains high impact horror themes and torture throughout, as well as depictions of corpses of people and images of animal slaughter.
The film features brief depictions of characters being cut or attacked with sledgehammers and chainsaws. These scenes occasionally depict large amounts of blood detail.
The film includes occasional coarse language in the form of use of the words “bitch”, “s**t” and “damn”.
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mpaa rating
R (for an unknown reasoning)
Aussie boy's thoughts
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is completely overrated. The film unquestionably lives up to its brutal-sounding name, but it’s basically just a bunch of friends running around being slashed and slaughtered like any average psycho horror film. The bloody murders are disturbing, but how do so many people find it terrifying? And just how is it even considered one of the best horror classics?
If there’s any words to describe this violent slasher, it’s decent but slow. Even despite the 80-minute runtime, the cheap scares won’t hold everyone through. It’s very well-made and the effects are amazing for the 70s, but you’d expect all the hype to be because the film is terrifying, which it honestly isn’t. It’s violent, but not scary. So it’s complete rubbish when people call the film a classic masterpiece. Even big horror fans may find the iconic slashing too sickening or nauseating, but they’ll stay for the terror. And they’ll discover by the end that The Texas Chainsaw Massacre relies on predictable violence for scares like most horror features do.
Anyway, the storyline is pretty decent so you can’t complain too much. The effects and killings are epic for a classic slasher. Plus, the film’s quality is excellent for its time. So The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is definitely worth checking out for horror/slasher fans, but doesn’t live up to the hype.
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