You can’t help but have certain expectations from a movie whose title contains the words chainsaw and massacre. It naturally conjures up images of super-violence and blood-curdling gore, with plot development taking second place to the graphics of horror. This is especially so when a lead character – in this case the brutal Leatherface – enters the annals of cinema history in their own right and becomes the emblem of the film, even to those who’ve never actually watched it. I was steeped in these preconceptions the first time I watched The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and was thus delighted to instead discover a movie of real worth and intelligence.
Loosely based on the story of notorious American serial killer Ed Gein the connections between the reality of his story and what we’re given in Texas are too slack and inaccurate to overpower Hooper’s intentions for the film. He doesn’t attempt to bring Gein’s story to the screen at all but instead takes contemporary America as his inspiration. It’s easy to forget now the traumas that were racking American society in the early 1970s; the Vietnam War was limping to its tragic conclusion, having brutalised a generation of young American males and planted the seeds of insecurity in the rest of the population; at home groups like the Black Panthers and the Weathermen were spreading their anarchist creed to most major cities in a series of bomb attacks and gun-fights; the legacy of the civil rights struggle was still being fought over, with people not sure what their country stood for, if anything; and while all of this was happening the future of the nation itself seemed insecure, with the Watergate affair fuelling disillusionment and distrust of a supposedly sacred institutions.
Hooper harnesses this despair and the feeling of being out of control of events with real aplomb. As our young and innocent party embark on their tragic journey it is difficult not to recognise in them the turmoil and hopelessness of their entire generation (Hooper even dressed them in the style of the counter-culture beatniks who’d have been regular features of the anti-Vietnam demonstrations) and the sense of anguish that this generates elicits sympathy and anger in equal measure. The Vietnam War had brought horrific violence into American homes for over 9 years when Texas was released, and contemporary audiences must have bridled at knowing that what they were seeing on screen paled in comparison to what was happening in their name in Indochina. Indeed, the fact the Sawyer family (granted, not normal even on the surface) perpetrate their horrors hidden from public view resonates with the fact that even now the true picture of what went on in Vietnam is murky and one that people would rather not talk about.
So, the much expected gore never fully materialises, and we’re expected to make do with the implied horror of the situation. This is gives the film a real and gritty edge. The actors are all perfectly proficient and serve the plot well, though this is undeniably a scenario- rather than a character-driven movie. When you put everything together you’re left with a movie of deceptively simplistic clarity and a truly timeless feel which leaves an indelible mark.