Shortest review ever: Absolutely essential.
Though Dark Sky Films' upcoming two disc edition of Tobe Hooper’s classic The Texas Chain Saw Massacre isn’t due to hit shelves until September 26th the Canadian distributor – Paradox Entertainment – has been good enough to slip me an advance copy and this is absolutely stellar, an incredible release for what is literally one of the most lasting and influential films ever made.
Everything there could possibly be to say about the film itself has been said many times so rather than repeat what has been said better elsewhere I’ll just offer some comments on presentation and special features, starting with the features.
The second disc is positively loaded, containing roughly three hours worth of bonus material. There are two hour plus documentaries about the making of the film, The Shocking Truth and Flesh Wounds, both of which feature a wealth of interview footage and do an excellent job of both relaying stories about the production and placing the film in larger context. Star Gunnar Hansen takes us on an unauthorized tour of the TCSM house, there are two minutes of production bloopers, interview outtakes from the Shocking Truth doc, stills, a makeup progression gallery, and likely most prized by fans a full twenty five minutes of deleted scenes and outtakes from the film itself. This disc is exactly how films like this should be presented: plenty of fun stuff for the fans, but it also treats the material seriously and isn’t afraid to be critical.
Disc one is no less loaded. Fans will no doubt gravitate to the commentaries – one features much of the cast plus the art director; the other features Hooper, the film’s cinematographer Daniel Pearl and ol’ Leatherface himself, Gunnar Hansen. The disc also includes all of the film’s promotional materials – trailers, radio and tv spots – plus new 5.1 and 2.0 sound mixes plus a remastered version of the original mono soundtrack.
The big reason to pick this up, though, is the film itself. And even if you’ve seen the film before, or already have an earlier edition, you haven’t really seen it until you’ve seen it here. This edition features a new high definition transfer of the film taken directly from the original 16mm camera originals and it looks absolutely stunning. The natural grain of the film comes through, of course, but I have never – absolutely never – seen 16 mm look anywhere close to this good on DVD. Ever. Of course part of the charm of seeing this the very first time was squinting to make out what was happening on grotty second and third generation VHS tapes, but the novelty of that has worn of somewhat as I’ve aged and this release gives us Hooper’s film very likely looking even better than it did when projected.
