Leatherface

Leatherface (2017)

** (out of 4)

This origin film tells how a redneck from Texas would turn into the maniac known as Leatherface. We start off seeing him being put into a mental hospital where ten years later he escapes. He was thrown into the hospital and eventually chased by the cop Hal Hartman (Stephen Dorff) and soon bodies begin to pile up.

LEATHERFACE was directed by Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury, the duo that were behind the incredibly gory and controversial INSIDE. Reviews of this film have been rather mixed and I must say that I'm somewhere in the middle because a lot of people have enjoyed how different it is while others are screaming bloody murder due to its story and structure. If you're looking for gore it's certainly about as bloody as you're going to get from a mainstream picture but there are many issues here as well.

I think the biggest problem I had with the film is that it just didn't feel like a Texas CHAINSAW movie. I say that because it starts off like ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST and then we get some sort of strange NATURAL BORN KILLERS type of road picture. I know this is a origin story but lets be honest for a moment. These type of films rarely work and to me this one just doesn't cut it. I think the biggest issue is the story itself because it's just not all that fascinating seeing the future Leatherface in a mental hospital and it's even less interesting seeing him in a road picture.

Making the character a supporting one was a major mistake for a number of reasons including the fact that out of the five people on the run he's the least interesting. He's also not as interesting as the cop or his own mother (Lili Taylor) so you've got the title character falling to around seventh place in his own movie! As I said, if you're wanting violence and gore then there's plenty of that here but, again, I'm sure many fans of the original film are going to be disappointed because this stuff wasn't in the original Tobe Hooper movie. So, again, why even do a origin movie?

I personally thought the violence and gore was great but I can see why some are turned off by it. I also thought the performances were good for the most part and this is especially true of Dorff and Taylor. It was great seeing them in a movie like this and I thought they both delivered. Technically speaking the film is well-made, features some very good cinematography and the score was nice as well.

LEATHERFACE isn't a complete disaster like THE RETURN OF THE Texas CHAINSAW MASSACRE but I'd say it's the next worst of the series.

I've seen complaints that this film contributes very little to the origins of Leatherface, which is true. However if you go into this without that expectation you have a very solid slasher flick, which is surprisingly well shot might I add. A fun movie intended for lovers of the genre.

The only good thing about this movie is that it is exceptionally fast paced. The many bad things include

• Zero subtlety

• Generic and by the numbers story

• terrible acting

• no actual scares

• not much of a point overall.

And a chainsaw is seldom seen. Snore.

As a child, Jed Sawyer is taken from his murderous hillbilly family and put in the Gorman House Youth Reformatory, where he spends the next ten years with a new identity. When the prisoners revolt, a small group make a bid for freedom with pretty nurse Lizzy (Vanessa Grasse) and fellow inmate Jackson as their hostages.

Tobe Hooper's original The Texas Chain Saw Massacre ranks as one of the scariest films ever made, its iconic killer Leatherface its most frightening creation. With this latest film in the series, they've gone and done what Rob Zombie did with his godawful Halloween remake: give the killer a back story. In humanising the character, they have lessened his effectiveness as an object of fear. Once an emotionless, uncontrollable monster, impossible to reason with, he is now someone we can identify with and feel a level of pity for. It didn't work for Michael Myers and it doesn't work here.

The origins story-line also makes much of the film seem frustratingly unlike a Texas Chainsaw movie, at times even reminding me of a Tarantino flick (the escape from Gorman House made me think of Natural Born Killers while the BBQ stop massacre was redolent of both NBK and Pulp Fiction). Only in the film's closing moments do things actually feel like they belong to the franchise, with Lizzy trying to escape the Sawyer's charnel house, a chainsaw wielding Jed (soon to become Leatherface) hot on her heels. Directors Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury don't hold back on the brutality and blood, but even so, I can imagine many fans of the series being disappointed with the level of splatter (too much for some, not enough for others).

5.5 out of 10, rounded down to 5 for that really dumb scene in which three people (including one really fat guy) hide from the law by climbing inside the festering carcass of a steer. A really big steer. Also, minus half a point for the unbelievable necro sex scene. And another half point subtracted for Jed's sudden (and also completely unbelievable) transformation from rational human being to hulking homicidal maniac.

Prequel to the legendary Texas Chainsaw Massacre, this is as much a violent road movie as it is a horror. I heard many negative things about the film beforehand but as always I watched it with an open mind. On the negative side I found this film to be somewhat unconvincing and unnecessary. Obviously it was made to make money but it really does not add anything worthy to the TCM series. On the plus side it was technically pretty good, having seen a few of the director' previous films it lived up to expectations. Acting and pace is good plus there is a lot of blood & violence to satisfy most gorehounds. I would certainly watch it again.