STORYLINE: En route to visit their grandfather’s grave (which has apparently been ritualistically desecrated), five teenagers drive past a slaughterhouse, pick up (and quickly drop) a sinister hitch-hiker, eat some delicious home-cured meat at a roadside gas station, before ending up at the old family home… where they’re plunged into a never-ending nightmare as they meet a family of cannibals who more than make up in power tools what they lack in social skills. (IMDb)

  The 1970’s was am incredible decade for horror. Imagine being in attendance when Linda Blair’s head turned around in The Exorcist (1973), or  when Michael Myers went on his rampage in Halloween (1978).  George Romero frightened mall walkers and film goers alike with 1978 release Dawn of the Dead, and Dario Argento made his way into cinenas with The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970). Can you imagine being in the audience when The Texas Chainsaw Massacre made uts grand debut on the silver screen?

   The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is from an era in cinema when films where meant to seen, and experienced, in theaters.  This was before streaming services, and before cell phones.  With that said, this 1974 horror film, is a very brutal film.

    I purchased a ticket, to a repertory screening, with that knowledge, recently.  After eighty three minutes I felt like I had been put through the ringer multiple times.  The film is not only physically brutal to watch, as the title suggests, but takes a psychological toll, to view, as well

    The film is a home invasion film.  It flips it though.  The invaders are the victims, and must fend for their lives, from an aggressor.  The aggressor is not just relentless, but above and beyond extreme. 

    The psychological aspects continue because the film is a two sided survivors tale.  Beyond the group fighting to get away with their lives is Leatherface and his family.  Their cannibal lifestyle means they are hunting these folks down so they can sustain themselves. 

  The film has a look that is incredibly eerie.  It is a combined gritty look from the Cinematography, and some eerily placed production details.  To watch this play out across the big screen, while sitting in the dark, is a spine tingling experience.  

   That’s one of the things I love about going to the movies, it offers a variety of experiences.  These experiences can be funny, scary, dramatic, or any kind of cinematic drama.  I have said it before, I am saying it now, abd will say it again I am sure, because I believe it: the movie experience is one of best shared. 

   Though the original release of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre predates me, to see it in its theatrical glory was a nightmare come true!  One I loved every minute of!

    Until next time I will see you at the movies!