Texas Chainsaw Massacre ages well

I do enjoy the holidays but it does take an emotional toll on a person, I’ve learned to offset it by enjoying some of the grimmest horror movies created. I mean, if I have to suffer, well then, others should suffer too. I mean, vicariously. A couple of days ago I finally watched Texas Chainsaw Massacre and boy there is some suffering to be had in that movie.

It was literally the first time I’ve ever watched this “slashic” and although I wouldn’t say it’s terrifying or even particularly gruesome (a friend suggested horror aficionados are desensitized, I don’t think that’s necessarily true) it’s just an old film. In fact, I thought it was tame and I told my wife that (who did not watch) that she had seen much worse on AMC’s Breaking Bad, the story of terminal cancer patient normie, Walter White, who enters the violent underworld of crime to make high-grade meth. A notable low point of the series, one of Walter’s henchmen kills a boy and stuffs him in an oil drum to dissolve in acid. OVER THE LINE.

Anyway, I digress. Does Texas Chainsaw Massacre hold up though? Hell yeah. It’s an absolute classic and brilliant piece of cinema that sets the bar into the heavens. TCM doesn’t strike me as horrific – it’s more bizarre and terrifyingly realistic than anything. A sonic mechanical roaring that cuts into the flesh of cinema for years to come. The last scene is so transcendent and freshly horrific that it leaves the viewer breathless.

Leatherface swinging his chainsaw during the sunset.
A Texas Sunset. Final scene.