Warning: This article contains spoilers forTexas Chainsaw Massacre.
With the odd exception, likeHushandThe Perfection, Netflix has become the new home of the kind of by-the-numbers low-budget horror films that used to go direct to DVD. Unfortunately, unlike those old direct-to-DVD horror producers, Netflix has the capital to drag seminal names likeTexas Chainsaw Massacrethrough the mud along the way.
The streamer’s newTexas Chainsawmovie is a prime example of the horror franchise trend satirized by the newScreammovie.Screamcoined the term “requel”to describe movies that act as a legacy-driven cross between sequel and reboot, like 2018’sHalloween, 2021’sCandyman, and indeed, 2022’sTexas Chainsaw Massacre. This movie was sold as the story of “Old Man Leatherface,” but it’s ultimately just a bundle of well-worn slasher clichés. The movie starts off as a re-tread of the 1974 original with a group of naive youngsters on a road trip through Texas before settling into the cookie-cutter genre formula forged by countlessTexas Chainsawrip-offs over the years.
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Chris Thomas Devlin’s script doesn’t have enough fun with the premise of Leatherface taking on a literal busload of social media influencers. This plot setup is a uniquely contemporary take on the slasher formula, but the only thing that separates its execution fromthe average bargain-bin slasheris a couple of tired gags that undercut the terror of the killings. A ghost town is an interesting setting, but the movie doesn’t do much with it – it’s largely confined to a single house.
Replacing Bloodless Terror With Blood-Drenched Boredom
Tobe Hooper’s groundbreaking originalTexas Chainsawmovie was relatively bloodless. The director achieved a relentless sense of terror from beginning to end without resorting to excessive gore. This requel completely ignores that, with huge splashes of red that are more squeamish than scary. With a lot of gruesome, gratuitous closeups of bones being bent the wrong way, 2022’sTexas Chainsawplays more like “torture porn” than Hooper’s suspenseful, masterfully restrained original masterpiece.
Hooper’s original movie used irony forsharp but subtle social commentary. He used the story of a cannibal hunting down, slaughtering, and eating a bunch of human beings to point out the barbarity of the meat industry. The reboot has its own social commentary, but it’s about as subtle as a chainsaw to the jugular. Instead of using horror motifs as visual metaphors for the terror of current events (like Hooper, John Carpenter, Wes Craven, et al were renowned for), the newTexas Chainsawspells out its themes in its dialogue, with painfully on-the-nose terms like “gentri-f***ers.”
One of the protagonists being a school shooting survivor brings up an interesting point – that, in today’s climate, American high schools are as dangerous as a ghost town with a chainsaw-wielding maniac on the loose – but the movie does nothing to really explore that trauma. The character’s emotional catharsis comes from emptying a shotgun into Leatherface’s chest. The message is essentially that even the most anti-gun person will become pro-gun whenfaced with a superhuman serial killer.
Sally Hardesty Becomes Laurie Strode Lite
Like theHalloweenreboot that clearly inspired it, the newTexas Chainsawreboot catches up with the original final girl, Sally Hardesty (now played by Olwen Fouéré, replacing the late Marilyn Burns), years after she escaped the wrath of a masked madman. But the influence ofHalloweendoesn’t stop there. Sally’s post-Texas Chainsawlife has been cribbed entirely fromthat reboot’s depiction of Laurie Strode’s twilight years. Much like Laurie, this movie catches up with Sally as a hardened badass who’s spent 40 years preparing for a rematch with the killer.
The return of one of horror cinema’s most beloved final girls culminates in a very brief fight with Leatherface that ends with the grisly murder she avoided half a century ago, after which she’s thrown onto a pile of trash in a perfect symbol of Hollywood’s treatment of familiar fan-favorites in the reboot age. The new protagonists are mostly dull, one-note archetypes with internal conflicts like whether or not to move back in with Dad needlessly crammed into a story about the external conflict of a quick succession of murders. Elsie Fisher, the star ofBo Burnham’sEighth Grade, is massively underutilized as the younger sister who’s constantly being told to stay back and wait on the bus.
Force Awakens-Style Nostalgia Doesn’t Work In A Slasher
This movie struggles to strikeaForce Awakens-style sense of franchise nostalgiawith familiarTexas Chainsawmotifs. The Millennium Falcon and Leia Organa are a lot easier to nostalg-ify than a murder house or a blood-soaked chainsaw. In a post-credits scene, Leatherface goes home, but it’s hard to get excited about it, because noTexas Chainsawfan has fond memories of that house. This movie’s version of Han Solo boarding the Falcon and saying, “Chewie, we’re home,” is an extended sequence of Leatherface cutting off another human being’s face and placing it over his own.
The final twist comes out of nowhere in a really bad way. Just when everything’s wrapping up,Leatherface comes out of nowhereand kills the only one of the new heroes who was somewhat interesting. This isn’t an unexpected, game-changing plot turn; it’s just a baffling choice for this movie that completely undermines the bittersweet optimism of the original ending. In Hooper’s original masterpiece, Sally goes through hell and earns her escape. The ending of this movie plays like an alternate ending to the original in which Sally is dragged out of the back of the truck and decapitated. This bizarre ending destroys what little goodwill the movie has earned by that point.
Maybe it’s unfair to compare the newTexas Chainsawto the 1974 original. The original is widely regarded to be one of the greatest horror films ever made and broke more new ground in the genre than it’s possible to break today. But when filmmakersuse that legendary titleand bring the icon of Leatherface to the screen, they invite those comparisons. The sad truth is that the newTexas Chainsawmovie just isn’t very scary. Loud music and the cheap shock factor of images like a skinned face or a severed head make up for the film’s complete lack of tension. For 90 taut, unceasingly terrifying minutes of Texas-based killings, audiences are better off just rewatchingthe timeless original classic.
