Ok, so the original film was pretty intense, wasn’t it? Obviously the best way to follow that up is with slapstick! Don’t get me wrong, this is still a gore flick. Enough so that, on first viewing, you may not realize it’s meant to be funny, which will leave you feeling more horrified than its predecessor.
There’s a lot that can be said about this film. First, Dennis Hopper is in it. Maybe this isn’t surprising to you, but it was to me. Granted, I only really knew of him from his name and those Ameriprise Financial commercials, but his was not a name I equated with slasher movies.
Second, Bill Moseley. I’m sure Corey and Salty will have plenty to say about Bill and his character Chop-Top, so I will leave it to their masterful words.
Third, the Older Brother (he's not the Dad) character. If there is a stereotypical doggoneit dagnabit character portrayed better than Jim Siedow’s, well, I owe you $5.
Fourth through twenty-seventh, well, just watch it. You’ll enjoy it. Though, to fully appreciate Texas 2, you need to watch it with Salty. There may be no other person who can glean so much joy from this film as he does.
Corey says:
If Texas the first is a grandaddy of horror and terror, then 2 is the goofy uncle that’ll sneak you a beer when no one is looking while telling you stories of how he used to light bottle rockets out of his butt.
The films are fundamentally different in approach, yet the quality of execution is just as high. The maddening tension and fear of Texas are replaced by larger than life characters, each with their own amazing personality (and hilarious quirks). That’s not to say that 2 isn’t a horror film, mind you. It’s just one of those few films that rides that narrow gap between horror comedy and horror absurdity.
One of the things that Salty pointed out to me on this viewing that I hadn’t previously noticed is the set design. If you look at the weird cave lair thing that the Sawyer folken are holed up in this time around, you notice how much time and care went into designing a place that a crazy family would hang out while winning multiple chili cook offs. There’s the bones of old victims, coupled with that crazy network of cobwebby tunnels and pipes. The whole place looks... well... lived in.
Speaking of chili cook offs, I love how Drayton comes off as a greedy capitalist in this film. When he’s not yelling at his idiot family for doing some idiot thing, he’s scheming and trying to weasel his way into generating more money from his family business. And who’s to say he’s not good at it? After all, he’s won multiple chili contests, and that sort of thing will catapult you into financial stardom in a place like Texas.
On a final note, Texas 2 isn’t my favorite in the series. But it sure as hell is the one I quote the most.
Salty says:The films are fundamentally different in approach, yet the quality of execution is just as high. The maddening tension and fear of Texas are replaced by larger than life characters, each with their own amazing personality (and hilarious quirks). That’s not to say that 2 isn’t a horror film, mind you. It’s just one of those few films that rides that narrow gap between horror comedy and horror absurdity.
One of the things that Salty pointed out to me on this viewing that I hadn’t previously noticed is the set design. If you look at the weird cave lair thing that the Sawyer folken are holed up in this time around, you notice how much time and care went into designing a place that a crazy family would hang out while winning multiple chili cook offs. There’s the bones of old victims, coupled with that crazy network of cobwebby tunnels and pipes. The whole place looks... well... lived in.
Speaking of chili cook offs, I love how Drayton comes off as a greedy capitalist in this film. When he’s not yelling at his idiot family for doing some idiot thing, he’s scheming and trying to weasel his way into generating more money from his family business. And who’s to say he’s not good at it? After all, he’s won multiple chili contests, and that sort of thing will catapult you into financial stardom in a place like Texas.
On a final note, Texas 2 isn’t my favorite in the series. But it sure as hell is the one I quote the most.
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 is the best movie ever made.
We start out on a cross-state road trip with two rowdy yuppies raising hell on the way to a college football game in – you guessed it – Texas. The young punks manage to piss off the wrong awooga-horn-blowing, confederate-flag-yielding truck (in Texas?! you exclaim. Yes. There are Confederate flags in Texas) with a game chicken, and a few hours later, in the midst of a prank phone call to our favorite Bedazzled DJ, Stretch, the kids are pursued by the truck which now has a chainsaw-wielding corpse riding in the bed. That’s right! The partially mummified corpse of a Vietnam veteran begins to attack the college kids car with a chainsaw from the bed of the truck, which is going upwards of 60 mph (in reverse). Next thing you know the driver’s head has been cut in half and it’s all been caught on tape by Stretch, who is persuaded into honking the recording out on her radio show to try get into serious journalism.
This is just the beginning of the film ladies and gentlemen, just the start of this masterwork. The rest of the movie is filled with fry-houses, aching bananas, crazy armadillo hats, Sonny Bono wigs, plot-driving trap doors, handicapped skeletons, fake brick walls full of discarded viscera, Christmas lights, food trucks, and Mr. Shark. Ever wonder how many times you would have to strike a stranger’s face with a hammer before it stopped being horrifying and started being funny? What does it look like when Death eats a cracker? Would a Vietnam-themed amusement park attract tourists? What would you do if you woke up to find a dear friend was wearing your recently cut-off face? Some questions will be answered, others merely posed - this is a bizarre and wonderful film that totally redefines what it means to be a Part 2.
The film, as a sequel, brilliantly revisits ideas conceived by the original, while simultaneously providing more depth. As it turns out the crazy hitchhiker from Part 1 (who was run over by the Black Maria) has an even crazier identical twin brother who got a metal plate in his head after getting wounded in Vietnam during the events of the first film (you know the plate is there because he has picked away and eaten the burnt scabby skin around it with a wire hanger that he sanitizes with a lighter). The identical twin, Chop Top and the corpse from the truck, Nubbins, expand the family without giving the feeling that new characters are just thrown in, and it’s great to spend more time with the surviving Sawyer brothers: Drayton is more pissed at the world than ever (but I think that that’s due to his hems); Bubba is starting to wonder about the joys of S-C-E-X, and, don’t worry, grandpa is still the best. Dennis Hopper has been added as Lefty, the renegade uncle of the wheelchair-bound raspberry-blower Franklin from the original film. In my opinion Dennis Hopper can do no wrong and this is his defining performance.
So the Part 2 aspect of the film is used expertly, but you may be concerned about the rest of the key elements – as would any fan of Patton Oswalt. The Massacre is admittedly minimal due to budget cuts (only 2 on-screen deaths), but fear not, there is plenty of Chainsaw. How much chainsaw? In addition to the aforementioned partial decapitation, and the live skinning of a chronic spitter, we get a chainsaw swordfight (I admit that this has already been done in Motel Hell), and plenty of phallic allusions. But it’s not just the bad guys that have access to the saws: Dennis Hopper comes right back at the family of chainsaw killers with not one, not two, but three chainsaws. Three chainsaws!? Yes, three chainsaws! You may be wondering how he manages to lug three chainsaws around. Two words: Chainsaw holsters. Oh yes! It’s a chainsaw extravaganza all up in this motherfucker – they even throw in an electric knife, just to cover the bases.
So we get a little Massacre and a lot of Chainsaw, which leaves the Texas. There is more Texas than a pair of rattlesnake cowboy boots, darlin’! The Texas is the best part of the movie. No character could abide any other part of the Union. From old hymns to “Remember the Alamo”, the dialogue reeks of Texas in the best possible way. What better place for a family of cannibals to win awards for their excellent chili? (The secret is in the meat.)
Thanks to Stretch, the movie has a great soundtrack (though no inavitadegotta, baby), and there is an excellent all-synthesizer score that always makes me think of some weird, jazzed up organ. What else can I praise? How about the set design? Brilliant! The home of the chainsaw killers is a delight to behold in real time or frame-by-frame to take in the subtler touches. Casting? I could think of none better. The costumes? Perfect! Do I like every aspect of the movie? Yep. Even the ending? Yeah, I even like the ending. Brazos.
We start out on a cross-state road trip with two rowdy yuppies raising hell on the way to a college football game in – you guessed it – Texas. The young punks manage to piss off the wrong awooga-horn-blowing, confederate-flag-yielding truck (in Texas?! you exclaim. Yes. There are Confederate flags in Texas) with a game chicken, and a few hours later, in the midst of a prank phone call to our favorite Bedazzled DJ, Stretch, the kids are pursued by the truck which now has a chainsaw-wielding corpse riding in the bed. That’s right! The partially mummified corpse of a Vietnam veteran begins to attack the college kids car with a chainsaw from the bed of the truck, which is going upwards of 60 mph (in reverse). Next thing you know the driver’s head has been cut in half and it’s all been caught on tape by Stretch, who is persuaded into honking the recording out on her radio show to try get into serious journalism.
This is just the beginning of the film ladies and gentlemen, just the start of this masterwork. The rest of the movie is filled with fry-houses, aching bananas, crazy armadillo hats, Sonny Bono wigs, plot-driving trap doors, handicapped skeletons, fake brick walls full of discarded viscera, Christmas lights, food trucks, and Mr. Shark. Ever wonder how many times you would have to strike a stranger’s face with a hammer before it stopped being horrifying and started being funny? What does it look like when Death eats a cracker? Would a Vietnam-themed amusement park attract tourists? What would you do if you woke up to find a dear friend was wearing your recently cut-off face? Some questions will be answered, others merely posed - this is a bizarre and wonderful film that totally redefines what it means to be a Part 2.
The film, as a sequel, brilliantly revisits ideas conceived by the original, while simultaneously providing more depth. As it turns out the crazy hitchhiker from Part 1 (who was run over by the Black Maria) has an even crazier identical twin brother who got a metal plate in his head after getting wounded in Vietnam during the events of the first film (you know the plate is there because he has picked away and eaten the burnt scabby skin around it with a wire hanger that he sanitizes with a lighter). The identical twin, Chop Top and the corpse from the truck, Nubbins, expand the family without giving the feeling that new characters are just thrown in, and it’s great to spend more time with the surviving Sawyer brothers: Drayton is more pissed at the world than ever (but I think that that’s due to his hems); Bubba is starting to wonder about the joys of S-C-E-X, and, don’t worry, grandpa is still the best. Dennis Hopper has been added as Lefty, the renegade uncle of the wheelchair-bound raspberry-blower Franklin from the original film. In my opinion Dennis Hopper can do no wrong and this is his defining performance.
So the Part 2 aspect of the film is used expertly, but you may be concerned about the rest of the key elements – as would any fan of Patton Oswalt. The Massacre is admittedly minimal due to budget cuts (only 2 on-screen deaths), but fear not, there is plenty of Chainsaw. How much chainsaw? In addition to the aforementioned partial decapitation, and the live skinning of a chronic spitter, we get a chainsaw swordfight (I admit that this has already been done in Motel Hell), and plenty of phallic allusions. But it’s not just the bad guys that have access to the saws: Dennis Hopper comes right back at the family of chainsaw killers with not one, not two, but three chainsaws. Three chainsaws!? Yes, three chainsaws! You may be wondering how he manages to lug three chainsaws around. Two words: Chainsaw holsters. Oh yes! It’s a chainsaw extravaganza all up in this motherfucker – they even throw in an electric knife, just to cover the bases.
So we get a little Massacre and a lot of Chainsaw, which leaves the Texas. There is more Texas than a pair of rattlesnake cowboy boots, darlin’! The Texas is the best part of the movie. No character could abide any other part of the Union. From old hymns to “Remember the Alamo”, the dialogue reeks of Texas in the best possible way. What better place for a family of cannibals to win awards for their excellent chili? (The secret is in the meat.)
Thanks to Stretch, the movie has a great soundtrack (though no inavitadegotta, baby), and there is an excellent all-synthesizer score that always makes me think of some weird, jazzed up organ. What else can I praise? How about the set design? Brilliant! The home of the chainsaw killers is a delight to behold in real time or frame-by-frame to take in the subtler touches. Casting? I could think of none better. The costumes? Perfect! Do I like every aspect of the movie? Yep. Even the ending? Yeah, I even like the ending. Brazos.
| Maire | Corey | Salty |
|---|---|---|
| ☆☆ | ☆☆☆ | ☆☆☆ |
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