Producer Michael Bay steered this remake of the infamous 1970's horror flick, without bringing in anything new. When I first saw the trailer for this version of the story, I thought it looked a lot like a hurried sequel to the contemporary silly release "Wrong Turn." Five youths on their way to a Lynyrd Skynyrd concert pick up a young hitchhiker who commits suicide in the back of their van. Looking for help, and a little common sense, they stumble upon a weird family and their chainsaw wielding offspring. Much violence and such ensues.

While the first TCM was not perfect, I eventually learned to love the shaky camera, lousy sound, and cheap look. One reason that film worked for me was the fact that much of the horror took place in blinding daylight, the cast was hot and uncomfortable, and it showed. In this version, even with the original's director of photography, most of the shots are too calculated. The horrors in the dark are not all that horrifying. This might be the rantings of a jaded horror film fan, but I never got the same feeling of unease as I did in the first film. Much of the original's story has been changed as film makers tried to keep the audience guessing by not doing a shot by shot remake, like Gus Van Sant's "Psycho." The absolute lunacy of the first film's family was strange enough, here the members are more dimwitted than scary. This lessens the impact of Leatherface's scenes. You know he is the worst it can get, you don't have an equally sick family to fall back on. One disappointing scene involves the heroine Erin (Jessica Biel) running to a trailer and meeting two women who will obviously not help her. Instead of being a tense moment, where mind games involving drinking a seemingly harmless cup of tea could be played out, the women are there for nothing more than exposition, blaming Leatherface's penchant to kill on being teased when he was younger for a degenerative skin disease. The five victims all meld together, Nispel's direction is okay, but the cinematography is too nice for this type of horror film. The black and white scratchy scenes recall TV's "Millennium" or "The Blair Witch Project." If I would compare "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" to anything, it would be the terrible sequels that came out after the original "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" to that point. Just one was watchable, "Leatherface," but with the exception of Part 2, they were all simply remakes of the original film. Most direct to video sequels do that now, and while this film tries to be something different, it is simply a remake that cannot match the original. As Leatherface and the clan enter a new millennium, their wrinkles were showing.

This is significantly better than it has any reason or right to be. Gorgeous cinematography, attention to details (I loved the Eric Balfour face mask), somewhat believable characters, and a nice sense of dread. Looks like the makers have taken the time to assimilate lessons from countless worthless remakes, and striven to come up with something of value rather than another cash grab. There's a loving homage to great (horror) movies, but with a contemporary sensibility.

Full disclosure: the original TCM didn't really work for me. I've watched and appreciated many horror movies, but for some reason that one didn't click (same with Cannibal Holocaust, of which the most horrific scene is the one with the turtle, but that's another story). This here version however got me more involved.

Which is saying something, because I found even The Pact boring, whereas countless fans go on about how great it is (don't get me started on Begotten). Tetsuo the Iron Man was fun, though, in an artsy way. But I digress.

Anyway -- this is a good/great version, the main _and secondary_ characters are well fleshed out (if not believable), and of course Jessica Biel in a wet shirt is all we can ask for, can't we ?

Marcus, you did good on that one.

EDIT: I would almost give this movie a 7/10 or something just slightly above what I gave it. Marcus Nispel gorgeously directed this movie. Really great work all around with the design and look of the feature.

Definitely some likable elements and it's worth a watch, but it loses some of the haunting atmosphere the original had. That's not to say there's isn't tension in this movie, as there is quite a bit, and it follows the same idea of a psychotic area of Texas, rather than just one killer. However, the tone and execution are completely different. If there's one thing I have to give credit to this movie over the original is the characters are a little more believable to me. While Marilyn Burns and crew were great fun to watch previously, their characters had the depth and intrigue of walking cardboard cut-outs. That was one of the only complaints I had with the original, but it didn't matter, because it's atmosphere and setting is what made up for it. This time around, the atmosphere is slightly lost, but the gore, scares, and character development is upped a lot. Here's how I envision both of these movies. The original is the nightmare retelling of what the events were like. The remake is like the archival footage. The original wasn't very realistic in it's presentation or execution, making the film looking like a re-enactment, which worked. But now, in an attempt to update, the remake looks like real events transpiring in real-time. You get what I mean?

Just like with the Nightmare remake, some clever character write-ins were a nice bonus and expansion on the original's story, but unlike the Nightmare reboot, I don't know if enough was done here to fully warrant a remake. I still like it and appreciate all it's glorious chainsaw showmanship, but I don't think it's as great as the original. Still very good.