Product Details

• Actors: Marilyn Burns, Edwin Neal, Allen Danziger, Paul A. Partain, William Vail
• Directors: Tobe Hooper
• Writers: Tobe Hooper, Kim Henkel
• Producers: Tobe Hooper, Jay Parsley, Kim Henkel, Richard Saenz
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, Special Edition, Widescreen, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: R (Restricted)
• Studio: Geneon [Pioneer]
• DVD Release Date: October 14, 2003
• Run Time: 83 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (707 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0000C8ART
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #50,372 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

This sensational, extremely influential, 1974 low-budget horror movie directed by Tobe Hooper (Poltergeist, Lifeforce, Salem's Lot), may be notorious for its title, but it's also a damn fine piece of moviemaking. And it's blood-curdling scary, too. Loosely based on the true crimes of Ed Gein (also a partial inspiration for Psycho), the original Jeffrey Dahmer, Texas Chainsaw Massacre follows a group of teenagers who pick up a hitchhiker and wind up in a backwoods horror chamber where they're held captive, tortured, chopped up, and impaled on meat hooks by a demented cannibalistic family, including a character known as Leatherface who maniacally wields one helluva chainsaw. The movie's powerful sense of dread is heightened by its grainy, semi-documentary style--but it also has a wicked sense of humor (and not that camp, self-referential variety that became so tiresome in subsequent horror films of the '70s, '80s, and '90s). OK, in case you couldn't tell, it's "not for everyone." But as a landmark in the development of the horror/slasher genre, it ranks with Psycho, Halloween, and A Nightmare on Elm Street. --Jim Emerson

Review

the Ultimate, the zenith, the most exhaustive possible celebration and dissection of this horror classic. I d even wager that no one will be able to put out a better one in the next 10 years --Fangoria

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

204 of 215 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Movie, Excellent DVD, Excellent Special Features!, May 9, 2001

By 

Kitten With a Whip "kittenwithawhip" (The Hellmouth) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Texas Chainsaw Massacre (DVD)

First, the movie. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is probably one of the scariest movies ever made. It was unique for its time, and there's still nothing quite like it today. The plot doesn't sound like much- 2 women and 3 men make a drive to rural Texas to check out a graveyard that has been 'defiled', and to also relax and enjoy themselves. This last part of their vacation plan doesn't go real smoothly, as they make the mistake of wandering into an area where an insane, backwoods, inbred, cannibalistic sociopathic family live. Things get more and more horrifying from there.

I've heard people complain this movie isn't scary and not gory enough. As far as the gore, it is fairly low-key by today's standards (though I'm sure my mother wouldn't want to watch it, and it couldn't be shown un-cut on regular network TV). There's not a lot of blood till the end of the movie, but the acting is so good, and the screams of the victims so wrenching, your imagination fills in the rest and it actually is painful to watch. I will agree that the movie is kind of slow to get started- I admit the first time I saw it as a teenager I was getting impatient for some action. However, the last half of the movie more than makes up for it.

But if you think this movie isn't scary, I seriously doubt you've watched alone, at home, at night, with all the lights off. The first time I saw it was in the daytime, and it still made my hair stand on end. When I got the Special Edition DVD I unwisely watched it after midnight with the lights off. I couldn't sleep until the sun came up. The opening scene of the rotting corpse in the cemetery wired to a headstone alone made my skin crawl. The scene where Pam first discovers Leatherface's room, with the furniture made of bones and the chickens in bird-cages, gets scarier each time I see it. The last 20 minutes, at the dinner table, has to be one of the most grueling and realistic scenes to sit through ever made. The final few images--well, over 10 years went by between the last time I saw the movie and the time I watched it on DVD a few weeks ago, and I *still* could remember those shots so vividly it was like I saw it yesterday.

The DVD is incredible-the transfer is so crisp that it seems like the movie was filmed last year instead of in the early 70's. Since I'd only seen it on "pan & scan" VHS, I never really appreciated how beautiful some shots of the rural setting are, and also how well-thought out and carefully put together most of the cinematography is. Breathtaking, actually. Until the commentary pointed it out, I never realized how perfect and effective the long, continuous shot of Pam hesitantly getting up off the porch swing and slowly walking to the screen door is. This movie does not look at all amateurish, even though it was made on an extremely low budget.

The DVD is packed with cool and interesting special features. First, the commentary by Tobe Hooper, Gunnar Hansen aka Leatherface, and director of photography Daniel Pearl is fascinating. There's lots of subtle but powerful elements in the movie I missed till now-for instance, the lack of almost any score or soundtrack that gives it a documentary feel, making it that much more disturbing. Hardcore fans of this movie know already this was NOT an easy shoot by any standards, but their accounts of how much energy and work it took to get certain things right, not to mention the really tortuous things many of the actors went through...well, if any actor deserves to be paid millions for a movie, this cast certainly earned it. The dinner scene was the most horrendous- they could only do one take, it went on for 20+ hours, and this was in 110 degree heat with no air conditioning. Gunnar Hansen said that by the end, he was so out of it he started to think he wasn't acting. Kind of gives the tag line "Who will survive and what will be left of them?" a whole new meaning.

There's also some deleted and alternate scenes, including some "lost footage" never available before. With many of them, you can read the script excerpt of the scene first. There's a hilarious blooper reel-the quality isn't that great, but you'll laugh your butt off. There's lots of production notes and stills, along with shots of rare publicity material. A couple scenes are broken down shot by shot, with Hooper explaining why he made the directing and editing choices he did. There's even more, I just don't have room for it all. The menu is also pretty great. I highly recommend the Special Edition to anyone who is a fan of TCM. You'll be able to spend hours enjoying it, and they couldn't have done a better job. My recommendation (for what it's worth) is to get this one fast, because it would be a shame if it went out of print and so many people missed this wonderful collector's edition.

23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Freakiest Movie I've Ever Seen, March 4, 2000

By 

"tee-vee-stevie" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Texas Chainsaw Massacre (DVD)

As a massive horror fan from the UK (where this film is banned) I had to wait many years to see this film, and after all the hype and expectations which I had built up I was half expecting to be dissapointed when i finally watched it...how wrong could I be? This film had me gripped instantly. The film builds up suspense like no other and when the murders do actually happen they are not ruined, like many other horrors, by almost comical deaths, they are nasty! This film is gritty and raw, with documentary like visuals which only add further to the sense of fear which you can almost smell. The acting is brilliant, its laid back yet energetic at the same time. Never have I seen fear portrayed as realistically as Marilyn Burns haunting display in this movie (but then again I never looked at myself in the mirror while watching the film). All of the factors in this film mix to make an evil couldron of depravity, that'll make you too afraid to look but even more scared when you close your eyes. This film is the freakiest i've ever seen and to say i enjoyed it seems kind'a sick as the killings are so realistic and depraved, but there's no denying it, I loved it.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Join us for dinner, January 25, 2006

By 

Matt (NJ) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (DVD)

This is just one of those movies that leaves you feeling disturbed. So few movies are capable of eliciting such feelings - in fact, few even attempt it anymore. Since the 80s, movie-makers flood the screen with gore, completely abandoning what is truly scary and contributing to turning the genre into something of a joke.

I didn't get to see this movie until the mid-90s due to my age. I can only imagine how unsettling it must have been when it was released in 1974. "The Family" came before Jason, freddy and all those to follow - and what made this film so much more gripping than those others was the fact that it was loosely based on events that actually took place. Nothing is scarier than the manifestation of evil and horror from nightmare into reality.

The low budget of the film helped to make it what it was. Most of the camera-work appears to be handheld, giving the film a documentary-like feeling. This is, no doubt, what helped to make movies like "The Blair Witch Project" disturbing. They were forced to be inventive and the viewers are called upon to utilize their imaginations.

This is one of the most influential horror movies of all time. The director made no attempt to scare viewers with decapitations and excessive gore - that is not scary - it is just disgusting. This film, along with the other influential films in the history of the genre, coaxes the imagination and allows people to frighten themselves. The movie is wonderfully done.

Highly recommended for fans of the horror genre who want to see a movie that will finally frighten them.