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It’s scary movie time for many. Texas Standard commentator W.F. Strong dug into the facts behind one horror fan favorite.
The full transcript of this episode of Stories from Texas is available on the KUT & KUTX Studio website. The transcript is also available as subtitles or captions on some podcast apps.
Our very own charming little low budget film, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, is considered by many critics to be the best and most horrifying horror movie ever made.
At the time of its release in’74, the famous film critic Rex Reed said that it was the most terrifying movie he had ever seen.
When the celebrated master of horror, Wes Craven, first saw the movie, he wondered what kind of a Mansonite crazoid could have produced such a thing.
And my favorite critique comes from Anton Biddle, who said that the very fact that it was banned in England was a tribute to its artistry.
In honor of Halloween, I thought I would help you appreciate this hallowed film by cutting up this commentary into 10.5 things you may not have known about the Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
Number 1, Ed Gain is the name of the real criminally insane killer who inspired the character Leatherface.
He did not wear a leather mask.
What he wore was worse, a mask made of human skin.
2.Ed Gaine only killed 2 people, not dozens.
Hardly a massacre.
He didn’t use a chainsaw either.
He used a gun.
Gaine did his killing in Wisconsin, not Texas, but Wisconsin Chainsaw Massacre just doesn’t have that same poetic ring to it.
Number 4.
So where did the chain saw idea come from?
Toby Hooper, the director, said that he was in a Montgomery Ward store a few days before Christmas.
The store was annoyingly crowded with aggressive shoppers.
He stood in front of the chain saws, and he had a disturbing epiphany.
He realized that if he started up one of those chain saws, the sound alone would part the sea of shoppers, giving him a quick path to the exit.
51 last thing about Gaine.
He inspired not only Leatherface, but he was also the demented muse for Norman Bates and Psycho and Buffalo Bill in Silence of the Lambs.
Number 6.
Perhaps the most horrifying aspect of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre for the actors, at least, was that it was filmed in the middle of the scorching Texas summer.
Hooper said that everyone suffered mightily because there was no stopping to wait for cooler weather, and even though some days were well over 100 degrees, they had to press on to get it done in a month, come hell or high water, and hell is what they got 7.
In his much praised book Chainsaw Confidential, Gunner Hansen, who played Leatherface, said that the name of the depraved family in the first film was Slaughter, not Sawyer.
If you look above the Coca-Cola sign at the gas station, you will see WE Slaughter Barbecue.
Number 8, Hansen also said that the power of the chainsaw myth that they created on film persists with such tenacity in Texas.
That people would not believe him when he said that no such chainsaw crimes ever happened in the state.
People would say something like, No, they happened.
My cousin worked on death row in Huntsville, and he saw Leatherface get the chair.
9.
The film cost less than $300,000 to make and eventually grossed $30 million in the US Number 10.
Horror and humor are allies.
The movie even spawned a hilarious Geico ad, the one where four people are running from a killer and debating where to hide.
One suggests that they take the running car, and another says she’s crazy and suggests that they hide behind the chain saws.
Even Leatherface is astounded by their filmic ignorance.
And finally, number 10.5.
The film’s gas station is now a kind of bed and breakfast.
It is called the Texas Chainsaw Massacre’s Last Chance Gas Station.
It’s in Bastrop where you can get barbecue and spend the night in a cozy cabin, chainsaw alarm clocks certainly available.
I understand the barbecue ain’t half bad.
At least the owners are not like those in the film, focused only on serving their fellow men.
I’m WF Strong.
These are stories from Texas.
Some of them are true.
This transcript was transcribed by AI, and lightly edited by a human. Accuracy may vary. This text may be revised in the future.
