"I just thought of something so cool," exclaims one of the characters in the fourth installment of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre series, a film in which iconic killer Leatherface bears an unsightly resemblance to former Wilson Phillips singer Carnie Wilson. "What if we got into a wreck, and we crashed into the car in front of us and we all died?" This scene occurs within the first fifteen minutes of the movie, and while I initially applauded this sentiment (and wondered if somehow my own MST3K tendencies had somehow magically manifested themselves on screen), I began to reconsider, and not just because the "New Generation" of the title includes a pre-Jerry Maguire Renee Zellweger and a pre, um, hygienic Matthew McConaughey. This change of heart probably had something to do with the fact that I couldn't stop laughing my ass off.
Not to say that Matthew (whose sterling performance here earned him the title of 11th Hour Hot Guy in Sci-Fi and Horror way back in issue one) wasn't a crucial contributing factor. He spends the entirety of the film with something I initially assumed to be a vacuum cleaner wrapped around his leg; it later turned out to be a mechanical limb operated by -- ahem -- remote control, a fact that came in handy for Chainsaw victim Renee in the later half of the film. Like a cross between King of the Hill's Boomhauer and Inspector Gadget, the resolutely hammy Matthew babbles incoherently, makes peg-legged dives from rooftops, and waggles his tongue like a man suffering from Gene Simmons' Syndrome. That is, when he's not running over people with his tow truck or clumsily pursuing the equally adroit Renee.
Of course, he's nothing compared to this version's Leatherface, who spends half the movie in drag and the other half looking like some undead version of Rambo with an apron. And despite the fact that we are informed that it was Leatherface who killed Kennedy (and was, it seems, responsible for every mysterious crime that occurred over the last millennium -- and yes, I said millennium), the man does not seem particularly, shall we say, functional. I really shouldn't get picky while watching a movie in which the moon appears to be made of cardboard and the main female protagonist is at one point attacked by a Hefty Cinch-Sack, but I couldn't help but wonder why Leatherface lives in an entirely boarded-up house to which he must cut out a door with his trusty chainsaw in order to enter. Then again, the man barely gets a chance to use the titular weapon; he's too busy reapplying his lipstick. Moving on...
What makes all this truly baffling is the fact that Texas Chainsaw Massacre 4 was written and directed by Kim Henkel, who co-wrote the original classic. On many occasions TCM4 virtually remakes scenes from its superior predecessor, with the same shots, sets, and dialogue, only all significantly warped and worsened. These redone scenes are interspersed randomly with what I assume Henkel thought to be improved touches -- the hitchhiker now quotes Ulysses S. Grant and Machiavelli; the Family now takes out for pizza instead of eating their victims. The combination of utter lunacy and incoherence amounts to watching a Samuel Beckett play by way of a raging crackhead. Or as the completely arbitrarily added British secret agent who appears at the end of the movie puts it, "All of this has been an abomination. You must accept my sincere apologies... perhaps it's disappointment that keeps us going." Nah, actually it's hilarity.
DROOL FACTOR: All right, so it's not Matthew's greatest moment, but he sure is funny! Plus, he comes with his own remote control -- how many men can make that claim?
GROSS-OUT FACTOR: Leatherface. In. Drag. 'Nuff said.
STRONG CHICK FACTOR: Renee Zellweger is incredibly amusing as she bumbles around, losing her glasses, driving her escape car into a tree. Then again, she also comes off as the brightest character in the entire movie. Second in line is the more incoherent female villainess, who resembles vaguely Kirstie Alley after enrollment in the KISS army.
Texas Chainsaw Massacre 4: The New Generation is available on video.
-- Sarah Kendzior
