| SPOILERS Below |
The Saw is family. I’ve been a huge The Texas Chain Saw Massacre fan ever since I first seen it as an impressionable youth in the 80’s. It grabbed the young me with how raw it was. Leatherface was just a killing machine. There have now been many sequels & reboots in this franchise but FINALLY Leatherface is back in style. Is the movie perfect? Nope. I can see where test audiences may have had issues and that’s why it was sold to Netflix from Legendary.
I’m sure covid had a bit to do with it as well. But it checks the important boxes of what you want in a Texas Chain Saw Massacre.
- Chain saw
- Young people to put said chain saw through
- Lots of blood
- Sense of dread
- at minimum shot professionally
- good soundtrack
- Body count that makes it an actual Texas Chain Saw Massacre
Checks all those boxes so I say it’s a successful Texas Chain Saw Massacre Movie. I’ve seen all of the TCM movies multiple times & well I say this one holds up pretty well. I love each of them for their own reasons. Whether is be for the rawness of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre 1974 or the weird wildness of Texas Chain Saw Massacre Next Generation. It’s okay for everything to not work and for you to like it for it’s parts while dismissing it’s bad parts. This isn’t exactly Academy level cinema and I wouldn’t want it to be. I love my Horror sloppy and brutal & this Chain Saw is brutal & mean like many slashers refuse to be.
There are parts that don’t work. Like the legacy chain saw stuff with Sally Hardesty. You can tell that the director David Blue Garcia & writers Chris Thomas Devlin (screenplay by) , Fede Alvarez (story by) , Rodo Sayagues (story by) watched Halloween 2018 & took heavily from Laurie Strode. I just didn’t think it fit perfectly. That’s not the fault of Olwen Fouere taking over as Sally for the late Marilyn Burns who passed in 2014. Olwen did a fine job. Maybe it would have hit better if I hadn’t seen Jamie Lee Curtis come back as Laurie Strode as she did in 2018s Halloween. But that’s a small personal problem in my eyes.
It has a nice cast. From Jacob Latimore of the great show The Chi , Sarah Yarkin from Motherland: Fort Salem , Elsie Fisher from Eighth Grade , Moe Dunford from Vikings . They all do a great job especially Mark Burnham as Leatherface. This isn’t rocket science. Man with chain saw kills people intruding on his life. Why make it more difficult than that? I LOVE this era of Horror. In my youth I would have to wait years in-between Horror Icon releases. In the last few years we’ve has Halloween , Chucky The Series , Scream , Candyman , now Texas Chain Saw Massacre with Hellraiser , Firestarter , Halloween ends still to come later this year. Then all the non franchise horror films on the way like Nope & The Black Phone. It’s all a win as far as I’m concerned. Oh and I seen on twitter earlier that the saw from the movie was the same saw as the 1st? I thought the location was unknown so you be the judge.
So I say if you love slashers & The Texas Chain Saw Massacre in particular give this a shot. It’s not quite up to the originals level (What is?) but it’s a worthy follow up. It’s well worth the time & I give it 5 Chain saws Out of 5 for what it is a gory good time. Oh and stay after the credits.
