Macabre...ish Horror Review: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning 2006

by Kimberly Walker March 31, 2019

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning 2006/89 min. A woman gives birth in a slaughterhouse and the manager discards the deformed baby in a dumpster, this was 1939. Foraging for food, Luda Mae Hewitt finds him and takes him home, naming him Thomas, she raises him as her own.

Thomas grows up to work in the same slaughter house he was born in, in 1969 and works under the same manager that threw him in the trash, 30 years earlier.

The slaughterhouse is shut down by the health department and the manager makes Thomas leave, he returns and beats him to death. Taking a chainsaw with him.

Sheriff Hoyt arrives at the Hewitt’s House to arrest him for murder, Charlie Hewett, Luda Mae’s (Marietta Marich) son kills him for stew meat and assumed his identity. Meanwhile, 2 brothers are traveling across the country with their girlfriends, to enlist in the Vietnam war.

They meet a female biker, Alex (Cyia Batten), who follows then forced them off the road. After the ensuing chaos, the jeep wrecks and ejects Chrissie,

Sheriff ‘Hoyt’, (R. Lee Ermey) arrives and shoots Alex, forcing her and the group in the vehicle. He calls Uncle Monty (Terrence Evans) to tow the Jeep to the house. Back at the house, Thomas butchers Alex and now Bailey (Diora Baird) Dean (Taylor Handley) and Eric (Matt Bomer) are held captive. While Chrissie (Jordana Brewster) hides in the Jeep.

Dean is tortured by ‘Hoyt’ when he confesses to forgoing the draft. When Hoyt leaves, Eric slips his restraints and frees Dean before going into the house to free Bailey. But she tried to escape in Monty’s truck, just to be dragged back by Thomas via a meat hook. Meanwhile Dean gets caught in a bear trap and Eric is knocked unconscious. Chrissie arrives with Alex’s boyfriend, Holden (Lee Tergesen), who she flagged down on the freeway, and goes searching for her friends. Holden takes Hoyt hostage and demands Alex but is killed by Thomas with his chainsaw.

And Chrissie finds Eric in the basement but can’t free him and hides upon Thomas’ return. Then ends up getting chased back to the plant by Thomas, Eric tries and fails to rescue her and in the end, she almost escapes but the Hewitts are always one step ahead.

This movie, just like the original is hopeless and no one gets free of this family alive. Some are eaten, some lose their face which because Thomas’ mask.

This movie moves fast and you realize that this is all happening in one day, the day Thomas kills his boss. I love how most people try to fight back, few of them just lay down and die. Also, sometimes I’d forget that this is supposed to be happening in 1939, so there would be a little cognitive dissonance. Still as gory and graphic as expected and the effects are well done. It also maintains that bleak and hopeless feel. I did miss the grit and grainy aspects that come from old fashioned cinematography that lends to the overall bleakness if the story. The cast was very good and really sold us the story, who doesn’t love the crazy, intensity of R. Lee Ermey!

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