31 Nights of Halloween Horror part 20 - Leatherface

Leatherface

90 mins

Dir. Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury

2017/USA

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.  Easily one of the greatest horror films ever made.  It has spawned eight other installments all chasing the impact of the original and all failing.  Now before you say, “Aw Damien, I liked Texas Chainsaw 2.”  I liked it also, but if you are looking at it as a sequel to the original, it fails.  Where the original is gritty, unpleasant, hot, dirty and unnerving, the sequel is brightly colored, fun and humorous.  Totally opposite feel.  Kind of like Evil Dead 2 is to Evil Dead.  “Aw Damien, I liked Evil Dead 2.”  I liked it as well, but compared to Evil Dead again it lacks the gritty, unpleasant dirty unnerving feel and replaces it with humor.

So anyway Leatherface, where does this fall into the mix?  Not to be confused with Leatherface Texas Chainsaw III, which was a sequel?  Re-imagining? Either way nothing to memorable going on there.  Then there was Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation which was a sequel? Re-imaging?  Other than starring Matthew McConaughey and Renee Zellweger, nothing to memorable going on there either.  Then they rebooted the franchise, more crap, a prequel to the reboot, even crappier and the crème da la crème, Texas Chainsaw 3D which was a direct sequel to the original and one of the biggest shitfests I have ever seen.  Yet somehow made enough money to warrant making another Texas Chainsaw movie this time a prequel to the original.  The origin of Leatherface.  Do you care?  Do we really need to know any of this?  Honestly, I would have never have even bothered with this movie especially after the craptastic Texas Chainsaw 3D, but this one was directed by the guys who did Inside which is one of my favorite horror films in the last 10 years.  So, I was expecting something at the very least watchable.

And really that is all Leatherface is, watchable.  Ok look, get it through your head right now.  Even if they made 20 different Texas Chainsaw movies, none of them will ever come close to the impact of the original.  It was a different time, it was a different place.  It is a classic that is untouchable, let’s just move on and view these offshoots for what they are and not try and compare them to a movie that is in a league of its own.  It’s like every shark movie that comes out being compared to Jaws.  “Oh, it was cool, but it wasn’t as good as Jaws.”  Of course it wasn’t, you moron.  Jaws is one of the greatest movies ever made.  They can make 200 more shark movies and none of them will ever be as good as Jaws.  Let’s just hope these shark movies are enjoyable and stop comparing them to a movie that is like Texas Chainsaw Massacre, untouchable.

Anyway Leatherface, Lilith Taylor who seems to be making her staple as the go to horror actress these days plays, mama Sawyer and she has her whole clan of Sawyer rug rats carving up people and eating meat at the old Sawyer farm just like we saw in the original. Till one day those Sawyer boys done kill the sheriff’s daughter and while he can’t prove it, he takes away little Leatherface from his mama and throws him in a ward for wayward children where he stays for the next ten years.  Mama Sawyer never forgets about little Leatherface and once she gets some money and a fancy lawyer she tries to get visitation rights.  When that doesn’t work she inadvertently creates an inmate riot and every one goes ballistic and runs off.  Leatherface escapes with one buddy and a Mickey and Mallory type from Natural Born Killers who are going to shoot, murder and steal their way to Mexico.  Our five-some, also includes a nurse they kidnapped to use as ransom if need be. 

The majority of the movie is them on the run and honestly if you trimmed off the first 10 minutes and the last 10 minutes, you wouldn’t even know this was a Texas Chainsaw movie.  There is very little to lead up to what you expect the development of the Leatherface character to be.  As a little kid, he seems to be a quiet kid who doesn’t revel in killing and by the end he turns into somewhat of a mute and now has no problem wielding the saw, in between he is a chatty nice boy.  So how does he go from reserved kid to psycho killer?  Well, while on the run the cops kill his friend and he gets grazed by a bullet that fucks up his face.  I guess that is enough to send him over the edge?  Also seems to be the angle they are using as to why he wears a mask.  Though wearing a mask that looks worse than your actual disfigured face doesn’t seem to make much sense.  And that kind of sums the story of Leatherface’s origin.  It doesn’t seem to make much sense.

As part of the Texas Chainsaw fodder you can chalk this one up as another fail.  So, what do you have to look forward to in it?  Well if you are not going to give me any scares, suspense or story, you better give me some blood.  While there is definitely the red sauce flowing freely and chunks being hurled, there is also some uncomfortable gruesome scenes include a touch of necrophilia which seems to serve no purpose then to be shocking.  Also, there is the old Empire Strikes Back scene where our outlaws hide inside the carcass of a cow. Never a pretty thing.  Honestly, I was hoping for more from directors Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury, but perhaps I was being too optimistic from a franchise that has delivered nothing but crap in the last 30 + years.  It’s worth a watch for what it is as long as you don’t compare it to the original and it will get you wet, so at least you have that to look forward to.   But it really is a one and done kind of movie.  No repeat viewings here.  Just keeping watching the original and you will be fine.