THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
Leatherface has been looked as one of the most frightening slashers since his cinematic debut in ‘74. After all these years, some would still wonder if he was always the way we’ve seen him. In 2017, we got an origin story that said otherwise.
PLOT
The film follows a completely different origin of Jedidiah Sawyer and his cannibal family led by his mother Verna. In ‘55, he takes part in committing his first kill, teenager Betty Hartman (Lorina Kamburova). Unfortunately for the family, she was the daughter of Sheriff Hal who takes his first step in revenge by sending Jed to the mental institution, Gorman House Youth Reformery. 10 years later, the boy now goes under the name Jackson, as part of inmates being renamed to avoid their families, and befriends another inmate named Bud. Although Verna scores an injunction allowing family visitation, the facility’s director Doctor Long (Christopher Adamson) denies her privilege. Wanting to reunite with her son, she causes an escape riot which results in nurses and other patients getting killed. The only nurse that survives the ordeal is Elizabeth White, who gets protected by Jackson & Bud on the way out, but all three of them get taken hostage by the crazed couple Ike & Clarice who want to flee to Mexico. As they start running, they ditch their uniforms for civilian clothing and eat at a diner, only for the couple to have a murder spree. Long after leaving the crime scene, Hal is already on their tail and is sure Jed is with them. The group briefly takes shelter at an abandoned mobile home and when Elizabeth tries to make a run for it, Ike stops her. He almost kills her, but Jackson prevents that from happening and Bud kills him first due to previous insults. When Clarice goes looking for her lover, she gets found by Hal and his partner Deputy Sorells (Finn Jones). The former kills her when she mocks him of his daughter’s death. The others see this from afar and keep moving. Elizabeth does see another police car nearby and calls the deputy for help. He sees her only for him to get involved in an altercation with an approaching Bud. He defends himself when shooting him, but Jackson avenges his friend by killing him in return. He and Elizabeth drive away together, but Hal pursues them and starts shooting. One bullet hits Jackson in the face and severely disfigures his cheeks. When Elizabeth gets shot too, they crash. They then wake up in the same barn where Hetty died, as the sheriff plans his ultimate act of revenge. Elizabeth is able to use the radio to call Sorells for help, but he uses this information to tell Verna instead of calling for actual backup for the sake of extra pay. When she gives him what was promised between them, he only gets killed and eaten by her farm pigs. Just when Hal tells Elizabeth who Jackson really is, his family arrives in time to stop him. They incapacitate him and bring both him & the nurse to their home. At the Sawyer residence, Verna is able to stitch Jed’s face and apply a muzzle on him to hold it together. He officially becomes part of the family when killing the sheriff with his birthday gift, a chainsaw. Elizabeth tries running away as well as plea with him, but the young Sawyer chooses to be loyal to his family by beheading her when she calls her mother crazy. The film ends with Jed beginning his hobby making handmade masks to cover up his disfigurement, starting with Hal and Elizabeth’s faces.
THOUGHTS
My expectations were very low on how this would turn out due to how bad the 3D sequel was, so I found myself surprised when saying this one wasn’t so bad compared to what came out before. I am not gonna try to call it the very best origin story, but I think the directing pair of Julien Maury & Alexandre Bustillo give their own spin that the trail of violence can come from unexpected places. Appearances are known to be deceptive; That was the whole point when having Sam Strike be the mature Jackson rather than the slow Bud who was well played by Sam Coleman. It was a smart move to make since we’ve known Leatherface to be intellectually disabled from the start but just because we’ve always known him for it doesn’t mean he was always like that. The makeup effects done for Jed’s disfigurement were surreal as well, showing how quick a downfall could be. Despite having his own mind, he was so loyal to his family’s ways because it was all he knew before being separated from them. The loyalty would only be permanent since they came back for him and made him who he is. By the time he used his chainsaw for the first time, there was no going back. If it hasn’t been so obvious, bad things happen to run in the family. Lily Taylor was quite imposing as Verna since she had all the pride in her to ignore how wrong she was in raising her kids the way she did. You just know she’s twisted the moment she gifted her son a chainsaw and she’s lucky to not be in jail for starting the riot that led to her son escaping. Then again, craziness can come from more than one place. James Bloor & Jessica Madsen brought their own flair as Ike & Clarice because they own up to their insanity and don’t filter themselves compared to others around them. They were a more twisted version of Bonnie & Clyde since they didn’t care of the trail they left behind. Ironically, the most vicious person in this story was someone who is in the right. Stephen Dorff showed Hal as a man on the prowl because he refuses to not do anything about losing who he cares for. He knew how dangerous the Sawyers and have been and was not let them get away with it anymore, knowing the message would get across had he got even with Jed. Sadly, his decision to soak it all in led to his own demise. His arc alone backs the actions of his relative Burt in the 2013 sequel which I will forever defend because there’s no way to sympathize with cannibals whichever point. The only other person I was rooting for was the final girl Elizabeth. Vanessa Grasse accurately showed her to walk into a world she was far from prepared her. Despite the natural kindness she brought to Jed/Jackson and the other patients like him, it was never gonna be enough to fix him. Had she known that, she would’ve taken another line of work that could’ve saved her from a cruel fate. The fact she and Hal are part of Leatherface’s first mask make sense because it does represent how they part of making him who he is and instead of honor, it’s a warning for those who cross him and his family. I respect what this movie is going for, but it didn’t avoid the head scratching moments I picked up on. Like I can say Betty should’ve ignored Jed the second he revealed himself, but I can also point out Hal could’ve covered his tracks from the start if he made a false report on his first encounter with Jed. I mean I doubt the other cops that arrived at the scene would be too strict at their jobs knowing the stakes, especially in the 50s. And I can’t be the only one to think Verna’s last minute plan of an escape riot could’ve been avoided if a janitor went to clean the ladies room she was hiding in. And hell, the deaths of Ike & Clarice could’ve been avoided if one of them or even Jackson kept an eye on Elizabeth during the night. That bothered me more than the fact Clarice didn’t even check on Ike at night and chose to wait until sunrise to look for him. On top of that, how the hell did she know about Betty’s death? She may be smart for a psychopath, but I doubt she’s the kind of psycho to read newspaper no matter the time period. Lastly, how the fuck did Elizabeth fit inside a cow carcass with Jed & Bud as well? Even if they removed all the guts, I don’t think she’d fit since Bud was a big boy. That situation tripped me out more than the fact Hal chose to keep Elizabeth around as he trying to extract revenge. Other than that, this film still works for what it is. To wrap up, 2017’s Leatherface is somewhat of a creative spin on the infamous slasher by trying another route that has its effects. If you’ve seen both hits and misses of of this franchise, I hope you can identify this one as the former.
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