Robert Jacks

The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre (also known as Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation) is a 1995 American slasher black comedy film written, co-produced, & directed by Kim Henkel. It is the fourth installment in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre film series. The film stars Renée Zellweger, Matthew McConaughey, and Robert Jacks. The plot follows four teenagers who encounter Leatherface and his murderous family in backwoods Texas on the night of their prom. It features cameo appearances from Marilyn Burns, Paul A. Partain, and John Dugan, all stars of the original film.

Principal photography took place on location in rural areas in Bastrop and Pflugerville, Texas, with a largely Austin-based cast and crew.

The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre premiered at South by Southwest on March 12, 1995, and received a limited release in the United States on September 22, by Cinépix Film Properties. The following year, Columbia TriStar Pictures acquired distribution rights for both theatrical engagements as well as home media. The studio proceeded to re-edit the film and re-title it Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation before giving it a limited theatrical re-release on August 29, 1997. Between its two releases, the film was a box-office flop and received mixed reviews from critics, with some lauding its dark humor and nightmarish tone, while others criticized the coherence of its screenplay.

Both contemporary and modern critics and film scholars have noted the film's prominent elements of parody and recursiveness, as well its unique implementation of a secret society subplot involving Leatherface and his family members.[10] In the years since its release, the film has gone on to develop a cult following.[11] Though a full soundtrack was never released, a companion single featured in the film performed by star Robert Jacks and Debbie Harry was released on compact disc in 1997.

On May 22, 1994,[ii] four teenagers—Barry, Heather, Jenny, and Sean—attend their school’s prom. When Heather discovers Barry cheating on her with another girl, she storms out of the dance, followed closely by Barry, who tries to explain himself as they drive away in his car. Their argument is interrupted by Jenny and Sean, who are hiding in the backseat, smoking marijuana. Heather takes a detour off the freeway, and while distracted, collides with another motorist, who passes out in the ensuing confusion. Jenny, Heather, and Barry leave Sean to look after the unconscious motorist, while they search for help.

They stop at an office trailer, where they meet Darla, an insurance agent, who promises to call her boyfriend, a tow truck driver named Vilmer. They leave the office and begin heading back towards the wreck, only for Heather and Barry to become separated from Jenny in the darkness. Vilmer soon shows up at the scene of the wreck, killing the motorist, before chasing Sean in his truck and backing over him repeatedly.

Meanwhile, Heather and Barry become separated from Jenny and discover an old farmhouse in the woods. As Barry looks around, Heather is attacked by Leatherface on the porch swing and subsequently forced into a meat locker. One of Vilmer and Leatherface’s family members, W. E., finds Barry and holds him at gunpoint before forcing him inside. Barry tricks W. E. and locks him out but while using the bathroom, Barry discovers a corpse in the bathtub. He is then killed by Leatherface with a sledgehammer. After killing Barry, Leatherface impales Heather on a meat hook.

Jenny returns to the scene of the wreck, where she is met by Vilmer, who offers her a ride. She accepts, only for Vilmer to threaten her, before showing her the bodies of Sean and the motorist. Jenny jumps out of the truck and runs into the woods. She is soon attacked by Leatherface, resulting in a lengthy chase through the farmhouse, where she finds several preserved corpses in an upstairs bedroom.

After leaping through an upstairs window, Jenny manages to flee the property. She seeks refuge with Darla, who reveals herself to be in league with the killers when W. E. shows up and beats her with a cattle prod. The two put Jenny in Darla’s trunk and she leaves to pick up some pizzas for dinner. After being tormented by Vilmer, Jenny momentarily escapes, attempting to drive off in Darla’s car. She is stopped by Vilmer, who knocks her unconscious. She soon awakens at a dinner table, surrounded by the family, who reveal they are employed by a secret society to terrorize people that may cross their path. A sophisticated man named Rothman arrives unexpectedly, reprimanding Vilmer for his methods, before revealing an array of bizarre scarifications and piercings on his torso and licking Jenny’s face. After Rothman leaves, Vilmer flies into a rage, slashing himself with a razor and killing Heather by crushing her skull under his cybernetic leg, before knocking W. E. unconscious with a hammer.

Vilmer and Leatherface prepare to kill Jenny, who breaks free and, using a remote control to manipulate Vilmer’s leg, escapes. Jenny reaches a dirt road, where she is rescued by an elderly couple in an RV. However, Leatherface and Vilmer run them off the road, resulting in the RV falling on its side. Jenny emerges from the vehicle unscathed and continues running, with Leatherface and Vilmer in hot pursuit. A plane swoops down on Vilmer, killing him when one of the wheels grazes his skull. Leatherface screams in anguish, while Jenny looks on. A limousine pulls up and Jenny jumps in the backseat, where she is met by Rothman, who apologizes, explaining her experience was supposed to be spiritual and Vilmer had to be stopped. He offers to take her to a police station or a hospital, dropping her off at a hospital, where she speaks to an officer. Sally Hardesty, being pushed by on a gurney, meets Jenny’s gaze. Back on the dirt road as the sun sets Leatherface continues to flail his chainsaw in despair.

The film has been noted for its implementation of a secret society subplot driving Leatherface's family to terrorize civilians in order to provoke them to a level of transcendence. In a retrospective interview, Kim Henkel confirmed that the basis of the subplot was influenced by theories surrounding the Illuminati.[12] Commenting on the film's ominous Rothman character, Henkel stated that "[h]e comes off more like the leader of some harum-scarum cult that makes a practice of bringing victims to experience horror on the pretext that it produces some sort of transcendent experience. Of course, it does produce a transcendent experience. Death is like that. But no good comes of it. You're tortured and tormented, and get the crap scared out of you, and then you die."[13]

Other references to the Illuminati are made in the film's dialogue, specifically in the scene in which Darla tells Jenny about the thousands-years-old secret society in control of the U.S. government, and makes reference to the Kennedy assassination.[14] Critic Russell Smith noted in discussion of this plot point, "Could the unexplained "them" be an allusion to the insatiable horror audience that always makes these gorefests a good investment, or is it a cabal of governmental powermongers...?"

Many of these subplot questions are answered in Kim Henkel's 2012 follow-up film Butcher Boys, which, although not an official The Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie in name, may indeed be the next chapter in the story.[15] Henkel's Butcher Boys was initially written as a sequel to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.[16]

At the time of the film's initial release in 1995, it was noted among critics as a "sharp self-parody" of the original The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.[17] The film is recursive in that it opens with an intertitle referring to two "minor, yet apparently related incidents", a joking acknowledgment of the previous two sequels, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986) and Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III (1990).[18][19] Justin Yandell of Bloody Disgusting interprets the film as a cynical reimagining of the original film, with Henkel parodying his own work.[20] He cites Leatherface's ineffectiveness at dispatching his victims as well as the archetypical teenage characters as evidence of the film being a commentary on the declining state of horror films in the late 1980s and early 1990s:

Writing for Collider, Brandon Burnett makes a similar observation, stating: "Sandwiched between Wes Craven's New Nightmare and Scream, this film exemplifies meta-horror in such an understated and clever way that it sabotaged itself during its initial release. 27 years later, it holds up as a cult classic, offering insightful commentary on the horror genre and the film industry as a whole."[11]

Another element noted by both critics and film scholars is the Leatherface's overt cross-dressing, which was briefly explored in the original film but implemented to a greater extent. Robert Wilonsky of the Houston Press commented on the film's treatment of the character, writing that the film "turns Leatherface (here played by Robbie Jacks, an Austin songwriter who used to host a smacked-up radio show with Butthole Surfer Gibby Haynes) into a cross-dressing nancy boy who screams more than he saws."[21]

According to Henkel, he wrote the character as one who assumes the persona of the person whose face he wears: "The confused sexuality of the Leatherface character is complex and horrifying at the same time," he said in a 1996 interview.[22] Film scholar Scott Von Doviak also took note of this, likening Leatherface's presentation in the film to that of a "tortured drag queen."[23] Burnett notes that the film "emasculates Leatherface by fully embracing him as a drag queen who listens to Marlene Dietrich while painting his lips red in a scene Fassbinder would appreciate."[11]

In developing the film, producer Robert Kuhn stated:

In a 1996-released documentary on the making of the film, Henkel stated that he wrote the characters as exaggerated "cartoonish" caricatures of quintessential American youth.[25] Henkel cited the murder cases of serial killers Ed Gein and Elmer Wayne Henley as influences on his involvement in both The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the original The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.[26] Henkel also deliberately wrote themes of female empowerment into the script, specifically in the Jenny character: "It's her story. It's about her transformation, her refusal to shut up, to be silenced, to be victimized. And by extension her refusal to be oppressed. Even by culture... Bringing Jenny into a world in which the culture was grotesquely exaggerated was a way of bringing her to see her own world more clearly – that is to say, my intent was to present a nightmarish version of Jenny's world in the form of the Chainsaw family in order to enlarge her view of her own world."[12]

Renée Zellweger, a then-unknown Austin-based actress and recent college graduate, was cast in the lead role of Jenny.[27] Commenting on the part, Zellweger said, "It's kind of a dark film. You have to take yourself to places you wouldn't like emotionally."[27]

Henkel cast Matthew McConaughey, another then-unknown Austin actor, as Vilmer.[27] At the time of auditioning for the film, McConaughey had recently completed filming Richard Linklater's film Dazed and Confused (1993).[27] McConaughey initially auditioned for a minor role in the film before deciding to re-audition for the role of Vilmer.[28] Henkel's production casting secretary read lines with McConaughey during his audition, and was so frightened by him that Henkel felt compelled to cast him.[28] "I ran to the kitchen... grabbed a big tablespoon, came back in and just pinned her in a corner and acted like it was a weapon,” McConaughey recounted. "I did it until she cried. And Kim was like, ‘That was good,’ and she was like, ‘Yeah, that was really good. You really scared me.'"[28] Henkel recalled having a "visceral sense of danger in the room" during McConaughey's audition.[27]

Robert Jacks, a local radio host and singer, was cast in the role of Leatherface.[29] Tyler Cone was cast in the role of Barry at the recommendation of special effects designer J.M. Logan, of whom Cone was a close friend.[30] The majority of the supporting cast and crew were locals from the Austin area, aside from James Gale, a stage actor hired out of Houston.[24]

The film features cameo appearances from three actors who starred in original film: Marilyn Burns, who portrayed Sally Hardesty, appears as a patient on a gurney in the film's final sequence, though she receives an anonymous credit; Paul A. Partain, who portrayed Franklin Hardesty, appears as a hospital orderly; and John Dugan, who portrayed Grandpa, plays a police officer interviewing Jenny.[31][32]

Principal photography took place on location at an abandoned farmhouse in Pflugerville, Texas, and nearby Bastrop.[24] The farmhouse had previously been used as a filming location for Flesh and Bone (1993).[30] Production designer Deborah Pastor acquired set dressings for the empty home by visiting local antique stores and a taxidermy shop, the latter of which donated leftover bones from animal carcasses that could be used to adorn the residence.[30] Pastor was also able to acquire an original prop chair crafted with bones that had been used in the original 1974 film; like in the original, the chair was used during the dinner sequence for the Grandpa character.[30] The majority of filming took place at night, and was described by makeup artist J. M. Logan as "very, very rough for everyone."[33]

Renée Zellweger reflected on the film in a 2016 interview, saying, "It was very low-budget, so we all shared a tiny Winnebago that the producer of the film—it belonged to him, it was his personal camper. So, you know, makeup was in the front seats and there was a table in the middle for hair, and there was a tiny little curtain by the bathroom. That was where you put your prom dress and your flower on... It was ridiculous. How we pulled that off, I have no idea. I'm sure none of it was legal. Anything we did was a little bit dangerous. But what an experience. It was kamikaze filmmaking."[34]

The film had its world premiere at the South by Southwest Film and Media Conference on March 12, 1995,[21] and received "glowing reviews" at the time.[21][35] A press review for Variety covering the premiere indicated that the cut screened at South by Southwest ran 102 minutes in length. The film screened again at the Boston Film Festival on September 18, 1995.[36]

Cinépix Film Properties gave the film a limited theatrical release on September 22, 1995 in 27 U.S. theaters, including in Atlanta, Georgia;[37] Madison, Wisconsin;[38] and Portland, Oregon.[39] This cut of the film ran approximately 95 minutes. It earned $28,235 during its opening weekend, and went on to gross a total of $44,272 during its theatrical run.[40]

In October 1995,[41] Columbia TriStar Pictures acquired home video distribution rights to the film at a cost of $1.3 million.[42] As part of their acquisition, the studio also agreed to distribute the film theatrically, with no less than $500,000 invested in prints and advertising.[43] The studio proceeded to change the film's title to Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation[44][45] and re-edit it,[46] excising a total of seven minutes from the previously-released 94-minute version.[47]

Columbia TriStar released Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation in twenty U.S. cities on August 29, 1997.[43][18] It earned $53,111 on 23 screens between August 29 and September 1, 1997.[48] It would go on to gross a total of $185,898 between its 1995 and 1997 releases, making it the poorest-performing The Texas Chainsaw Massacre film.

Around the time of its theatrical re-release, a lawsuit was filed against Columbia TriStar by plaintiff Charles Grigson, a trustee for the film's production companies Ultra Muchos and River City Films.[41] Grigson alleged that Columbia TriStar had failed to fulfill their promise of giving the film a wide release, thus breaching their distribution agreement.[41] The action was voluntarily dismissed by Grigson in the fall of 1997 after Columbia TriStar sought to enforce the distribution agreement's arbitration clause.[41] In late 1997, Grigson, now joined by Ultra Muchos and River City Films, filed an action in state court against the film's star Matthew McConaughey, as well as his management company, Creative Artists Agency (CAA).[41] In the lawsuit, the plaintiffs alleged that McConaughey and CAA had interfered with Columbia TriStar's distribution agreement by pressuring the studio to limit its release.[41][49] In a 1996 interview, McConaughey denied that he ever wished to conceal his work in the film, commenting, "I'm not embarrassed by it at all. It was fun and honest work at a time when I was trying to figure out how feature films are made and how different directors deal constructively with actors. It was back when we were working 15 hours a day for $300 a week, and I wouldn't trade for the experience."[50]

Producer Robert Kuhn stated that Columbia TriStar had also delayed the film's theatrical re-release to await the release of Zellweger's new film, Jerry Maguire (1996), a decision that Kuhn and Henkel had agreed upon with the studio.[43][51] In a 1997 interview with The Austin Chronicle, Kuhn commented:

Reviewing the film after its screening at the Boston Film Festival in 1995, Betsy Sherman of The Boston Globe referred to the film as a "shameless rehash" of the original, adding: "Henkel's idea of an imaginative stroke is to put [Leatherface] in red lipstick and black widow drag. No thanks, Julie Newmar."[52] Critic Joe Bob Briggs championed the film upon its South by Southwest screening, referring to it as "a flick so terrifying and brilliant that it makes the other two Chainsaw sequels seem like 'After-School Specials.'"[53]

Reviewing the film during its 1995 limited release, Dave Jewett of The Columbian awarded it two-and-a-half out of four stars, noting: "Things don't always make sense, and important things go unexplained, but that's part of the nightmarish ambience in this crazed movie with crazy humor."[39] He went on to declare that director Henkel "has probably come as close as anyone could to putting a nightmare on film."[39]

Upon the film's 1997 re-release, many of the critical reviews focused on the lead performances of Zellweger and McConaughey, who had garnered significant fame in the interim.[iii] Janet Maslin of The New York Times wrote: "It was way back in 1995 that this schlocky horror farce, then known as Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, first appeared with the unknown actors Matthew McConaughey and Renee Zellweger in starring roles. But even in a film whose principal props include litter, old pizza slices and a black plastic trash bag, it's clear that these two were going places."[54] Rob Patterson of the Austin American-Statesman awarded the film three out of four stars and praised the performances, noting: "Everyone here certainly pushes at the ceiling of near-absurdity, yet The Next Generation never quite goes over the top."[56] Terry Lawson of the Detroit Free Press similarly championed the lead performances of Zellweger and McConaughey, but expressed disappointment in the "Men in black" subplot and that writer-director Henkel "turns poor Leatherface into a whimpering drag queen."[55] The New York Daily News also noted that "Zellweger impresses in her strenuous, scream-driven turn as Jenny."[57]

Mike Clark of USA Today described the film as "The kind of cinematic endeavor where you suspect both cast and crew were obligated to bring their own beer,"[58] while Owen Gleiberman wrote in Entertainment Weekly that it "recapitulates the absurdist tabloid-redneck comedy of the great, original Chainsaw without a hint of its primal terror."[59] Margaret McGurk of The Cincinnati Enquirer also remarked the film's muddled narrative, writing: "The script, such as it is, establishes a new benchmark for incoherence. Something about some teens who wander away on prom night and run up against a family of psycho-cannibal-thrill-killers... Of course, there is no point to any of it, either the humor or the creepy (though relatively bloodless) mayhem—except maybe the permanent embarrassment of poor Matthew [McConaughey] and Renée [Zellweger]."[60] Dann Gire of the Daily Herald suggested "a massacre might be less painful."[61] John Anderson of Newsday wrote that the film was the kind that "Wes Craven's Scream has now rendered virtually defunct... What we want from Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation is a giddy mix of gruesome horror and campy humor. What we get is less massacre than mess."[62]

Joe Leydon of Variety wrote that the film "manages the difficult feat of being genuinely scary and sharply self-satirical all at once... it is adept at keeping its audience in a constant state of jumpiness." He also lauded Zellweger's performance, calling her "the most formidable scream queen since Jamie Lee Curtis went legit." The Hollywood Reporter' s Dave Hunter similarly noted the film as being "blackly comic and extreme,"[18] while Nathan Rabin of The A.V. Club summarized it as "a slightly above-average slasher film that's only partially redeemed by small but endearingly loopy shreds of black humor." The Austin Chronicle also gave the film a favorable review, stating: "Writer-director Kim Henkel penned the original Chainsaw and this effort shows that he still has a felicitous grasp of the things that cause us to shudder in dread."[63]

Literary critic John Kenneth Muir writes in Horror Films of the 1990s (2011) that the film's dark humor "works" and that its conspiracy angle "breathes new life into a familiar story, and the performances, especially by McConaughey and Zellweger, are strong. Additionally, the movie evidences a sharp wit, and there's even a sense of homage too, to franchise history."[31]

As of September 2023[update], the film holds a 16% approval rating on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, based on 37 reviews with a weighted average of 3.6/10. Its consensus reads, "The Next Generation has the fortune of starring early-career Matthew McConaughey and Renée Zellweger, but it services neither headliner well in a convoluted and cheap-looking slasher that doesn't live up to the Texas Chainsaw Massacre legacy."[64] On Metacritic the film holds a score of 50 out of 100, based on reviews from 11 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[65]

In late 1995, the film saw its first home video release in the form of a LaserDisc released in Japan under its original Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre title.[66]

Columbia Tristar Home Video released the film on VHS in the United States in September 1998,[67] with a DVD release following on July 13, 1999.[68] The Columbia Tristar DVD release was reissued with new cover artwork in 2003.[69] In 2001, Lionsgate, who purchased Cinépix Film Properties shortly after the film's 1997 theatrical run, released the film on DVD in Canada; the Canadian release featured the original 94-minute cut of the film.[70]

In June 2018, Scream Factory announced a forthcoming Collector's Edition Blu-ray, slated for a September 25, 2018 release.[71] On July 10, 2018, the horror media website Bloody Disgusting reported that the release had to be delayed due to the proposed artwork, which had originally featured stars Zellweger and McConaughey, whose images were to be removed due to licensing issues.[72][73][74] The Blu-ray was ultimately released on December 11, 2018.[74] It features both the 1997 theatrical cut, as well as the 94-minute director's cut with optional commentary by writer-director Henkel, and several other special features.[74][75]

The film's soundtrack featured many local Texan bands, but never received a release. However, star Robert Jacks, a friend of Blondie's Debbie Harry, produced a song with Harry titled Der Einziger Weg (sic; English: The Only Way; the correct German title would be "Der einzige Weg"), a single written for and featured in the film. The song was released by Eco-Disaster Music in 1997 as a single on compact disc, featuring Debbie Harry on the cover with a portrait of Jacks as Leatherface, featured in his three costumes, on the wall behind her.

Songs featured in the film: