Leatherface (2017)

As it were, the "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" well clearly hasn't dried up - hence, we get yet another piece of the Sawyer family timeline, this time in the form of another prequel. This one, however, is a precursor to Hooper's '74 original; not the '03 remake. I'll say, this one seemed promising enough seeing as how it was directed by the guys who did the memorably savage home-invasion flick, "Inside" and I couldn't fathom it possibly being any worse than that 3D piece of shit from a few years back. So here's how they went about the origin story:

First taking place in 1955, where the Sawyer clan is celebrating the birthday of a young, soon-to-be 'Leatherface' (named Jed) who is gifted with, what would eventually become, his gas-powered weapon of choice that he's urged to 'break in' on a bound neighbor. From there, we see the Sawyer boys lure the sheriff's daughter to her death, prompting the vengeful lawman to whisk Jed off to a mental facility. Cut to ten years later, mother Sawyer has acquired the means to hire a lawyer to fight for visitation which is denied, goading her into causing a deadly nuthouse riot/break out for Jed and a few other highly destructive and violent patients. After robbing and massacring the patrons of a rural diner, they hole up in a run down trailer as the sheriff homes in on their whereabouts...

For those who complained that 2006's, "Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning" was a let-down as far as a needless prequel is concerned, "Leatherface" goes back further, giving us the teenage years and lead-up to the infamous horror character's 'transformation' into the flesh-masked, chainsaw-lugging maniac... And, I wasn't all that impressed with it, overall. This flick DID do a few things I liked, but ultimately it was nothing special and just felt far too detached from any of the other TCM movies, especially the original, of which, again, this is suppose to 'prequelize'. In no way can I buy into the reasonably sympathetic, much too articulate and sensitive kid in this - in any conceivable way - transitioning into the retarded, overweight cannibal lummox we see 'later' in Hooper's film. I guess this was suppose to be a surprise reveal, yet I found it to be the most glaring misstep of the movie. It just didn't fucking work.

Aside from that, the 50s-60s period setting is a definite plus in helping with a fairly gritty 'tone' and there's a few decent gore scenes, but nothing too outrageous. However, props go out to some gratuitous necrophilia! I just think, in all, they could've gone a multitude of ways with something like this and connected it so much better with the '74 film, but, at the end of the day, it just hit me as another tired and pointless TCM cash-in and a disappointing 'back story' to Leatherface.