TCM (1974) Vs TCM (2003)

Texas Chainsaw Massacre(1974) was possibly one of the greatest slasher films of its time as it was the first film which began to reveal the horrific traits and repertoire of elements which are now so commonly viewed in slasher films today. The success of the film induced a remake to be created in 2003 which with the new technology was able to capture the horror and the graphic detail to its full extent making it just as successful. This essay will compare and contrast both versions and attempt to make a judgement as to which one is more successful in achieving its purpose.

The 1974 film is about a group of teenagers who are stalked and hunted down by a deformed killer with a chainsaw in order to sustain his poor family who can only afford to eat what they kill. During the time the first version of TCM was produced, there was an economic decline and a fuel crisis. The film highlights the fact that these things lead to terror. Therefore it reflects the zeitgeist. The main similarity between both films is that it has a final girl. Clover theory suggested that every horror film, especially slasher films have a final girl who survives at the end of the film after everyone else is killed. This could be linked to the fact the women are becoming more independent and strong and no longer rely on men. Also at the time that the film was produced there was the second wave of feminism which had an influence on the way women were represented on screen.

Both films have a hitchhiker at the beginning who causes the disruption of the film. The hitchhiker is the one who leads the group to the place where they all end up getting killed. The cinematography used in both films is similar. For example both films use fast paced shots, for example when the killer is running after the girl. Also there is a use of tracking camera, where the camera follows the characters around. This tends to create suspense and tension within the audience which makes them want to watch the film more in order to find out what happens. However the new version does differ from the old version in some ways. For example the new version of TCM shows a lot of blood and the murder scenes are very explicit. This shocks the audience however some may also gain sadistic pleasure from these scenes. Also some characters in the new version have different roles, for example in the old version of TCM the granddad is unable to do anything and literally dead, however in the new version we see that it is the granddad who also takes part in the killing of the group of teenagers.

The remake has different character types in the film, one way they differ is that now the audience see the teenagers, picking up a female hitch hiker who shoots her self in the van. This differs from the original on how previously it was a male but this time the character is represented as a traumatised victim most definitely of leather face.

One of the major changes between the two sets of characters was the willingness not to give up on life and carry on fighting until they died. In the 1974 version it seemed that not one member of the group put up a decent fight to survive and all died in weak and feeble circumstances, in the new version Michael bay gave some of the group more fighting personalities as they didn’t die straight away and tried to carry on clinging for life as much as they could for instance when Morgan was kept on his own in a cell instead of perishing he managed to stay alive and get free with the help of Erin, also Andy after having his leg cut off and being dropped on a massive hook still managed to stay alive for the course of the film before asking Erin to put him out of his misery. Moreover the final girl actually managed to fight back against leather face and ended up chopping his arm off with a hack which was an aspect which played a massive role in leather face inability to kill her off. The characters improvement in strength and desire to fight off the killer is used by the director to give the audience a sense of the times that we are living in; audiences would not expect characters to be killed so easily as they were in past slasher a movie without thinking it is realistic.