When I reviewed the remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre a couple years ago for a message board, I stated that it was not a horror movie. Horror films can do so much more than just scare us. They can excite us, make us laugh, and thrill us. The 2003 version did none of those things. I referred to it as a "pointless, plotless freak show that is intended only to gross out and torture its young cast and audience". Needless to say, my spirits were not exactly lifting to the heavens when I heard another film, much less a prequel, was in the works. So, here I am reviewing The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning, and obviously director Jonathan Liebesman (Darkness Falls) saw no reason to improve on imperfection. In fact, I'm almost tempted to just write a new plot synopsis, then copy and paste my old review from three years ago, since both films are pretty much the same thing. But, because I have more respect for anyone reading this, I will do my best not to repeat myself, hard as it will be.

Set in 1969, the film follows legendary movie monster, Thomas "Leatherface" Hewitt (Andrew Bryniarski) from his humble beginnings working at a slaughterhouse, to the psychotic madman he became in the original film and its remake. When the small Texas town that Thomas and his family live in dries up and the slaughterhouse closes shop, the Hewitt family finds themselves forced to resort to drastic measures in order to keep on living in their broken down Southern mansion home. The family resorts to cannibalism, with the sadistic head of the Hewitt clan (R. Lee Ermey) posing as the local Sheriff, and bringing unsuspecting people driving through town to their home to be slaughtered by Thomas, and then eaten by the family. The latest potential victims for the deranged family are a group of four young people who are driving cross country for one last joy ride before two of the guys in the group head off to fight in Vietnam. Our heroes include brothers Eric (Matthew Bomer) and Dean (Taylor Handley), along with their respective girlfriends, Chrissie (Jordana Brewster) and Bailey (Diora Baird). When they are involved in a car accident, and three of them wind up trapped in the Hewitt family home, it's up to Chrissie to find a way inside to rescue her friends, and find a way to escape the nightmare she's trapped in.

Much like the original remake, not to mention this year's remake of The Hills Have Eyes, The Beginning cares not one single bit about creating any genuine thrills, scares, or tension. All it wants to do is cover its entire cast with blood, sweat, grime, mud and dirt, and have them parade in front of the camera before they get tortured and killed by the deformed maniac. Since the movie can think of nothing scary to do, it relies time and time again on the same old tired "jump scares" where somebody pops up seemingly out of nowhere, and the soundtrack blasts a loud sound in a futile attempt to make the audience jump. Not only can you predict these moments coming from a mile away, but some of them just don't make a lick of sense. You would think that a lumbering giant of a man armed with an industrial strength chainsaw would make a bit more noise, thus making it a bit harder for the villain to surprise his victims, let alone suddenly pop up in the back seats of cars without any warning. Leatherface has obviously mastered the art of teleportation as well if this movie is any indication, as there were a couple moments where I just could not figure out how the heck he got around so quickly. I know, I know, it's a slasher movie. I'm not supposed to be asking these sort of questions. If movies like this tried to make sense, they'd be over in 15 minutes or so. But, when you're faced with a movie as pointless as this (It's a prequel to a remake that's almost exactly like the remake!), you're forced to find other ways to entertain yourself, since the movie doesn't want to. So, I started trying to figure out how Leatherface gets around so fast, and how he can possibly sneak up on people, especially since when he sometimes pops up, he already has his chainsaw going. How the victim and us the audience didn't hear that chainsaw until he was literally right in front of us, I'd really like to know.

As is to be expected, the characters are one-note, trite, and about as deep as a puddle. What is less expected is just how boring most of them are. I don't know how you make a family of deranged Texas cannibals boring, but somehow screenwriter Sheldon Turner (2005's The Longest Yard remake) manages to do just that. That's a real shame, because the sadistic Sheriff character was one of the few bright spots of the original remake, thanks mostly to the wonderful performance by R. Lee Ermey. Here, Ermey seems to be giving it his all, but his character isn't quite as memorable as he was the last time around. He lacks the dark sense of humor that made him stand out. Oh, it's still there in some form (a scene where he tortures one of the young travelers by beating him while forcing him to do push ups is one of the few scenes that stand out in this film), but he just doesn't have the same spark as before. The rest of the evil family may as well be props on the set, as all they do is sit around and very seldom interact with any of the other characters. Heck, even Leatherface makes only random appearances when it's time for someone to die, then goes back to whatever it was he was doing before. For a movie that's supposed to explain the origins about this famous monster and his family, it sure doesn't dig deep. We see how Leatherface got his trademark weapon, how he got his flesh mask, and that's about it. So much more could have been explained, and the idiotic screenplay wastes every opportunity given, opting instead to give us more blood-splattered youths crawling around in the muck.

As for the heroes, very little needs to be said, as they exist simply to be future victims. We get some hint of turmoil between brothers Eric and Dean early on. Dean doesn't want to go to Vietnam, and is thinking about going to Mexico with his girlfriend in order to dodge the draft. Eric is about to set out on his second tour, and is an overly patriotic supporter of the war. Their personalities are bound to clash, but just as the drama is about to unfold, they smash into a cow crossing the road (splattering blood all over the windshield and everyone inside the vehicle, of course), and are kidnapped by the family. Why the movie even bothers setting up this plot point when it's not even going to do anything with it, your guess is as good as mine. It fools us into thinking there's actually going to be some kind of point, only to snatch it away, and turn the characters into your standard splatter victims. The lead character of Chrissy is so underdeveloped that you're literally left wondering why the movie decided to follow her. She has no personality or character traits, other than the fact that she happened to be the girlfriend to one of the brothers, and happened to avoid detection after the accident, because she got thrown out of the vehicle after it crashed. Wouldn't it have made more sense to have the brothers be the main characters trying to rescue their girlfriends since, you know, the movie spends the opening 20 minutes building a conflict between them that is almost entirely forgotten about as soon as the blood starts splattering on the screen? I guess it doesn't matter, as none of the young actors are required to display any real acting ability. They just have to scream and walk around covered in blood and mud. Despite all this, the four actors still show more acting skill combined than Jessica Simpson's entire performance in Employee of the Month, so I guess they can take comfort in that.

I really want to know when did slasher movies start having the fun taken out of them? They used to be somewhat tongue in cheek, or at least they knew how to come up with some creative kills that would make you laugh and shake your head at the very sight of them. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning takes itself way too seriously, and seems to think that it's a story we're actually supposed to care about. And yet, there is nothing on display to care about. It is a vast, empty void of nothingness that sucks away 90 minutes worth of time from its audience, and leaves them absolutely nothing to take home with them. There is no fun to be had here, no thrills, and no genuine scares. The great slasher films know how to leave an impression and stick with you. Even if you wind up laughing over how cheesy the whole movie was, it's still an impression! All I felt at the end of this movie was the feeling that the filmmakers had too much time on their hands to make a movie like this

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