Originally I was very upset at the notion of a “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” back in 2003 when it was announced. The original is so perfect as is, it’s tough to think that someone would try to top it. Thankfully the remake didn’t top it, and after watching it I realized my antipathy toward it was pointless because “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” is one of the many genre classics that’s been unofficially remade almost a dozen times already. So what’s the big deal? And as much as I enjoyed the sequels, they also couldn’t quite top the original film. And Tobe Hooper was behind the second film, oddly enough.
Tag Archives: tobe hooper
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part 2 (1986)
From what I’ve read, Tobe Hooper pretty much had to make a sequel to his masterpiece “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” in order to make films he wanted. And the sequel to his slasher classic is exactly the type of film Hooper has to make, It’s forced, tired, and a complete retread of the original film. To add to the utter lack of entertainment value, there’s even plots that are completely unresolved or unfinished that I would have enjoyed seeing explored expanded just to give this film the feeling that it was an extension of the first film rather than just a retread.
In spite of the family hiding in the outskirts of Texas and hunting travelers for meals, now we learn that the head of their family is a local celebrity thanks to his entering of his prize winning chili and wonderful meat that he keeps a secret. Dennis Hopper is Lefty, a mysterious cowboy hunting the cannibal family and trying to uncover their secrets and put an end to their chaos. And in the opening the two unlucky schmucks that get killed by Leatherface are dismissed as accidents, in spite of one of the two getting his head sawed off. Nothing is ever really expanded or realized beyond these nuggets of ideas.
Nothing Men (Digital)
In the interest of full disclosure, I am a long time friend with author Doug Brunell, but this review is as objective and fair as possible.
Reading “Nothing Men” is a lot like the beginning of a rollercoaster, where you’re riding up further and further and building up to momentum. You’re sitting waiting thinking “Here it comes, here it comes,” and when the rush finally does come, author Doug Brunell delivers on a final half that soaked with blood, guts, and an ending that will likely make you re-think travelling to small towns ever again. “Nothing Men” made me think about the like of Herschell Gordon Lewis, Tobe Hooper, and prompted flashbacks of films like “The Wicker Man” and “Texas Chainsaw Massacre.”
No matter how far you run, you’re never really quite out of the grasp of the environment and its deadly residents that dwell in its bowels, and that sends a surge of dread and a bleak atmosphere in “Nothing Men” that’s wrenching. Especially in its final pages. Author Brunell simply doesn’t let his characters off the hook, and punishes just about everyone in the book. It’s almost like a splatter version of “Funny Games” at times. Partly they pay for playing god, and partly for their hubris in the situation. Hubris is the ultimate undoing for just about everyone in the book, and Brunell unfolds layers of Valley Bottom slowly with every chapter.
Eaten Alive (1976)
I’ve always said that If you want nihilism and unabashed filmic carnage, you need to look no further than “Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” but Tobe Hooper’s “Eaten Alive” as a follow up almost reaches the heights of pure carnage that his first outing did, but “Eaten Alive” is a film that will properly divide audiences. “Eaten Alive” has a definite potential to it that’s never quite realized what with an irritating uneven pace, and a nonsensical story not to mention that unnerving feeling that this may as well be touted as a sequel to the former. The main downfall is that itching feeling you get that Hooper originally intended this as a follow up and that’s what keeps “Eaten Alive” from ever getting off the ground.
Poltergeist (25th Anniversary Edition) (1982) (DVD)
Who directed this movie? Was it control freak egomaniac Steven Spielberg (Still my hero, Stevie!), or poor sap semi-talent Tobe Hooper? The debate continues, and I could care less. For me, “Poltergeist” is still one of my favorite horror flicks of all time, and it’s a wonderful combination of both directors’ styles. For the Spielberg nuts, there’s wonder and magic and epic nightmarish fantasy, and for the Hooper fans, there’s the horror, the terror, the frantic energy in the climax, and that great scene of the face being torn from its bone in the mirror. This is a wonderful demented bastard child from two great directors, and “Poltergeist” is simply still a great piece of filmmaking.