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That new chainsaw from Texas ain’t so good.

Well, I finally saw the Texas Chainsaw "reimagining," and boy, did I ever get my hopes up for this one. I'll be honest -- I probably bought into the hype a little too well, and compacted with the number of great reviews I'd read, the flick had little chance of living up to what I was expecting. Still...good God. Many would say that comparing it to the original causes a rift in objectivity, but seriously, it's like they chopped off all of the really twisted stuff, replacing it with more of the same old crap and hoping the added gore would keep you from noticing. The changes seem designed more to make the movie conventional enough to be a money-generator than any sort of creative new ideas or "well, what if we did this instead?" hope shots. For what it is, I guess it's okay, but "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" breaks no new ground and doesn't even hold up against those other lousy sequels on a "depraved joyride" level. It's just made better, performed better. The story itself? Definitely not better.

The only thing I'd give 'em credit for is for playing the horror hand straight. The atmosphere is correct, but that's about it. The characters do enormously stupid and unrealistic things to remain in the line of fire, and basically, what you get is something that's just a few notches above any of the "Friday the 13th" movies...albeit with a better cast. This movie was just way too artificial to succeed in what it set out to accomplish.

That said, is it worth seeing? Yeah, I guess so. I have to wonder if I'd be this critical had I not gone in with such high expectations -- I'm sure it's a factor, but really, our group of six left the theater seeming more apathetic to the past two hours than anything else, and we've got wildly varying tastes. All in all, you're not doing yourself any huge injustice by missing this one, but compared to most of the other horror flicks to come out in this past year, it works well enough. It just doesn't go beyond working "well enough," and that's the big issue for me. Oh well.

Posted by Matt on 10/30/2003. E-mail me!



Discussion Thread: 63 comments

Whoooo First post!

Umm..The remake will never be as good as the original TCM. That one STILL scares me today.

Chestnuts roasted by Kash @ 10/30/2003 12:24 PM

9.50 for a ticket, god damn that’s pricey!

Chestnuts roasted by mindsuckr @ 10/30/2003 12:36 PM

I agree, jesus. I thought that 8.50 was expensive. Whats worse is that I saw the new soda machines that the movie theature has….4 bucks for a 20oz soda. What the hell?

Chestnuts roasted by Adam @ 10/30/2003 1:04 AM

I don’t know if this holds any water, but Ebert and Ropert said the original is much better and said to see that one.

Chestnuts roasted by pikachulover @ 10/30/2003 1:13 AM

I saw the first one and all that I can remember is that the girl at the end who is running away was very cute :)

Chestnuts roasted by Applesauce @ 10/30/2003 1:16 AM

When I heard that the dinner table scene wasn’t in the remake I knew that it had no chance. The mental torture of that girl strapped to the chair screaming as those people laugh at her–that’s what was so damn freaky about the original. That’s all I have to say about that.

The real thing I had to say was tonight was not a good night to flip channels past MTV. Do you want to know why? Because they were playing a documentary of furries. Yes, actual, live furries. And on MTV they were showing actual furry sex. As soon as that came on I picked my jaw off the floor, turned off the channel, tried desperately to scrub my brain with a cue-tip and am now waiting for the end of the freaking world. That’s it my friends. Live, uncensored, furry sex on MTV. Game over man, game over.

Chestnuts roasted by inkmage @ 10/30/2003 1:45 AM

Sorry to be so wildly off-topic. It’s just when the weirdness happens I must proclaim it to the world. I’ll try to stay more on-topic in the future.

Chestnuts roasted by inkmage @ 10/30/2003 4:41 AM

Man iam glad my sister works as a manager in our local theater i mean i would have to pay to watch that rehash..EHEM..i mean remake I mean yeah matt your right it was ok for what it was but it lost all the mystik of the first.Now i just bought 28 days later NOW THATS A GOOD HORROR MOVIE.OK one last thing BARNYARD COMANDOS ROCK

Chestnuts roasted by atomrenner @ 10/30/2003 8:32 AM

This the theater by Home Depot? They’ve got horrible prices for anything over there, but the auditoriums are decent.

As far as the remake goes, I too hoped it would’ve been better, seeing as how it’s been quite a few years since TCM: The Next Generation was released, and those of you that have seen this abomination know that you want compensation, dammit.

Chestnuts roasted by Dr. Phibes @ 10/30/2003 8:35 AM

I’ll be the first to admit that I havent seen either version, I’ve barely seen any horror movies. I did watch creepshow at a slumber party many moons ago. And John Carpenter was on campus last night giving a talk. That has to count for something right?

Chestnuts roasted by allicat @ 10/30/2003 9:18 AM

Sometimes I have a psychic ability to forsee the suckiness of movies by their promos. The first time I saw the new TCM promo in the theater I knew it was going to be the suck. You cant remake a movie like that without it being completely different, or without it sucking in comparison. Dont do it people, at least not until the original is a good 40 or 50 years old…

PLEASE DONT DO IT FOR THE CHILDREN!

Chestnuts roasted by spazzamatic @ 10/30/2003 9:37 AM

Adam asked why drinks (and tickets) are so damn expensive.

First, the tickets are expensive because all the ticket profits go straight to the corporate HQ of that particular movie chain. Movies are expensive to distribute, especially for a big chain.

Soo, the only way for the actual theater to make money is by charging ridiculous amounts for refreshments. That’s the way the world works.

However, I have found a way to save money! Bring your girlfriend (or mom) to the movies with you. And make sure they have a really really big purse! They can bring in a lot of food that way. Heck, my GF and I once snuck in 2 Burger King extra value meals!

Chestnuts roasted by shane! @ 10/30/2003 9:53 AM

see Cabin Fever, its alot better and it has the angry kid from boy meets world

Chestnuts roasted by fuzzy underwear @ 10/30/2003 10:05 AM

Tickets up here cost 12.50 :(

Chestnuts roasted by Xen @ 10/30/2003 10:06 AM

where the heck do you live, xen??

side thought: Is "Kill Bill" playing anywhere around all of you? I live in a small town in WV and the theater (6 screens) only had it for about 2 weeks? Did it do that badly?

Chestnuts roasted by shane! @ 10/30/2003 10:12 AM

$12.50?!? Good God, that’s just obscene. For that price, they’d better have naked supermodels showing you to your seat…

I’m telling you, guys, the best way to save on movies is STILL just to carry around your old student ID in your wallet everywhere you go. Just remember, 2002 isn’t the year you GRADUATED, it’s the year you were a freshman…

Oh yeah, and Kill Bill is still playing here in mid-Jersey, shane; I just saw it last week. I think it’s doing decent numbers at the box office.

-D

Chestnuts roasted by The Lucky One @ 10/30/2003 10:24 AM

I have a feeling Xen lives in Canada. Which means that our movies cost about $8-$9 in US$ (in the real Canadian cities, $10-$14 is not unheard of, but in Saskatchewan, they still hover at $9). So it’s even. Except I have seen about 3 movies in the past 2 years that were worth that much–XMen2, and the two LOtR movies. I suppose Spiderman was kind of worth it, but it was more because I was in NYC at the time. Most of the time, I wait for the movie channels to play them. I won’t even pay extra for PPV.

Chestnuts roasted by Sean @ 10/30/2003 11:03 AM

Haven’t seen the TCM remake yet; even if it’s been proclaimed awful, I’ll still have to see it. Interesting to note, Leatherface was based on a real life guy. The guy from Psycho (Norman?) was also based on the same guy. There’s a report on it here:

http://www.crimelibrary.com/gein/geinmain.htm

Don’t know about you; but it made my skin crawl, maybe because it really happened. Truth is stranger than fiction.

Chestnuts roasted by sharkie @ 10/30/2003 11:39 AM

I have never seen either TCM, I’m just never in the mood, I guess. Now Kill Bill IS A MUST-WATCH BEYOND BELIEF. The anime scene alone is worth it. Up in Canada, around where I live, it’s about $12 for a ticket. But with my CNIB(Canadian National Institute For The Blind) card, I get SUPER CRAZY DISCOUNT SUPER HAPPY! $7, and a buddy gets in for free! FREE! If you know a blind friend, hit ‘em up for goin’ to a movie. That is, if your local Theater supports said program. Fare thee well!

Chestnuts roasted by Armagideon Time @ 10/30/2003 12:31 PM

have to agree with armagideon time, kill bill is a must see. i just saw it last night and i cannot wait for the sequel. the ending really hooks you. all the fighting scenes were incredible. uma was in really good shape to do this role. everyone has to check it out. it totally rocks!

Chestnuts roasted by jessica_76 @ 10/30/2003 1:30 PM

US $10 to see this tripe? This isn’t a movie. It’s the basis for a class action

Chestnuts roasted by Was a Man @ 10/30/2003 1:52 PM

I’m a huge horror fan. I loved it, but only for the gore and as a totally seperate movie then the original.

This movie had me more scared of the cop then leatherface. I thought the scariest and edge of your seat moments all dealt with the cop.

And the no dinner scene was a huge dissapointment.

That said… I had huge expectations going in, and I wasn’t dissapointed. There was nothing disturbing about it like there was in the originaly. In fact… I can think of a few parts in Kill Bill that were more disturbing (i.e. carefull she is a spitter)

Chestnuts roasted by chad @ 10/30/2003 2:03 PM

The new TCM was a joke. Not only was it a terrible re-hash missing important scenes and re-vamping characters (creepy little boy instead of crazy brother, stupid hippy instead of fat brother in wheelchair) it was just really boring. I pride myself on being able to watch crap, but this crap literally made me feel bored. Any movie I feel like I can fall asleep during gets a huge thumbs down.
Luckily I live near the ghetto so I can watch movies at a "digital" theater for $6.50. Boo-YA!

Chestnuts roasted by BaronVonHotPants @ 10/30/2003 3:41 PM

inkmage: that MTV true life special is VERY VERY VERY OLD. get with the times, man.

shane: kill bill has made 54 million dollars already, so I wouldn’t call it a flop. i’m predicting a large number of yellow jumpsuits hitting the streets tomorrow.

Chestnuts roasted by squee4242 @ 10/30/2003 3:55 PM

the spice girls movie was scarier than this. standing in the corner of the classroom in grade 2 was more entertaining than this.
my sister said this was the directors first movie. he was supposedly partly responsible for big brother 4.
see the ring, that’s a good horror
movie.
so much potential, figures they’d mess it up. hav’nt been that disappointed since T-3.

Chestnuts roasted by turkey's can't fly? @ 10/30/2003 4:23 PM

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This entry was posted on Thursday, October 30th, 2003 at 12:11 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.