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Audio Commentary with Marilyn Burns, Allen Danziger, Paul A. Partain, Robert A. Burns, and David Gregory
presentation gets the job done -- and of course, there are those who might actually prefer a more grimy appearance. But the level of The reasons why that happens aren’t necessarily easy to quantify, because with The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, the whole is much greater than the sum of its individual parts. It was produced on a low budget under difficult circumstances, and what was going on behind the camera became intertwined with what was happening in front of it. The conditions were brutal, with everyone working long days for seven hours a week, and since there wasn’t enough money for multiple versions of each costume, the actors wore the same clothing every day in the sweltering Texas heat. The real suffering that the actors experienced is visible on camera, and the unrelenting nature of Hooper’s direction mean that tensions remained high regardless of whether or not the camera was rolling. It wasn’t quite method acting, but it was definitely method filmmaking, and it had a tangible effect on the finished product. Now, it’s important to note that all of these differences are subtle ones. Second Sight’s version isn’t necessarily a night-and-day improvement, but it’s still an improvement across the board. When viewed in native 4K via projection, Second Sight is the clear winner. Depending on the size and type of display that you have, as well as your viewing distance, your mileage may vary. Yet the differences are still there, if you look for them.
Alongside these feature length pieces are several new video extras. Behind the Mask is a brief but interesting video essay on the role of masks in horror cinema in general, as well as with reference to Leatherface specifically. Cutting Chainsaw is an 11 minute interview with editor J. Larry Carroll. Grandpaw’s Tales talks to John Dugan, who was buried under all the prosthetics to play the grandfather, for 16 minutes. There are some particularly interesting things I hadn’t heard before in Dugan’s interview, including that he got the job largely because Kim Henkel was his brother in law and that, at least for him, Henkel was more hands on in directing performance, while Hooper handled camera and lighting. The real coup among the newer interviews is the fact that Teri McMinn, who for years didn’t talk about the film, sits down for 17 minutes on her role as Pam. She’s clearly come round to appreciating the film (after some initial reticence over the famous swing shot) and is one of the most engaging interviewees. Finally, production manager Ron Bozman sits down for 16 minutes on the business end of the film. In Second Sight Film’s release of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Leatherface is ready to be witnessed in 4K UHD 48 years after its original release. In Roger Ebert’s largely dismissive two-star review of Tobe Hooper’s iconic horror film The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, he opened with the following paragraph:
Of course, I say all this with the knowledge that The Texas Chain Saw Massacre's built-in grindhouse aesthetic means that even a "bad" Now here’s a grisly little item. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is as violent and gruesome and blood-soaked as the title promises—a real Grand Guignol of a movie. It’s also without any apparent purpose, unless the creation of disgust and fright is a purpose. And yet in its own way, the movie is some kind of weird, off-the-wall achievement. I can’t imagine why anyone would want to make a movie like this, and yet it’s well-made, well-acted, and all too effective.” The on-disc extras are identical on both formats; they're squeezed onto the 4K disc along with the movie, and spread out on both Blu-rays -- Disc 1 If you really want to appreciate the quality of the 4K restoration and transfer, take a look at the 25 minutes of deleted scenes and outtakes. They appear to be drawn from a VHS (they’re in 4:3 and pretty murky) most of these sequences are silent, none, I would argue, essential. Finally among the video extras are the standard collection of advertising spots and a gallery with a mix of stills and behind the scenes imagery, most of them familiar from the documentaries and interviews on the disc. A few vintage odds and ends are curiously absent, including "Friedkin/Hooper: A Conversation about The Texas Chain SawThe Legacy of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre – a new feature length documentary produced by Second Sight Films Commentary with actors Marilyn Burns, Paul A. Partain, Allen Danzinger, and art director Robert A. Burns The film that redefined horror, tells the story of a group of five friends who take a road trip and find themselves at the mercy of a depraved Texan clan, among them one of the all-time horror icons, the chainsaw-wielding Leatherface – played by the inimitable Gunnar Hansen. It’s not long before their idyllic drive becomes a macabre nightmare... James Ferman hit on something essential about The Texas Chain Saw Massacre in observing that the ‘problem’ with it couldn’t be cut around: it’s a deceptive film. From the beginning, as camera flashbulbs illuminate rotting corpses and skeletal remains, the horror inherent in the images makes you believe that you’re seeing them for longer and more explicitly than you actually are. This carries over into the rest of the film, which spills only a few actual drops of blood on screen (real blood in one moment, because the prop knife that was going to be used for the effect of cutting Marilyn Burns’ finger wasn’t working, so they just cut her) but some viewers would swear to you that they had seen the most brutal and graphic violence.
For a synopsis of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, please read Martin Liebman's review of MPI's 2008 Ultimate Edition Blu-ray. This is a clear genre Loosely inspired by serial killer Ed Gein, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is one of the most effective horror films of all time. More than merely scary or macabre, it’s truly unnerving. Deceptively short at only 83 minutes, it’s something of an endurance test. The performances are manic across the board, likely exacerbated by the arduous shooting conditions, and Robert A. Burns‘ ( Re-Animator, The Hills Have Eyes) art direction is equally unhinged. Fresh out of theaters, currently available on VOD and now streaming exclusively on SCREAMBOX, Bloody Disgusting’s Onyx the Fortuitous and the Talisman of Souls is coming home for the holidays, arriving as a Collector’s Edition Blu-ray on December 19, loaded with bonus features, extended/deleted scenes, commentaries and an exclusive slipcover. All told, it seems that Second Sight wanted to ensure that this was the definitive edition of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre by sweeping up every possible extra they could include. I can’t fault them there, but watching a lot of the material in one sitting, you do hear the same stories several times. This perhaps a collection to dip into and savour, rather than binge on, but it all has value. Summary
As for the Blu-ray presentation, these disc-captured screenshots -- the first ten of which approximately match those from its MPI counterpart -- it likely uses the same master as MPI's recent 4K edition as its solid base. But it's abundantly clear that said "additional work" yields fairly substantial results in