schneefink

Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974). A group of hapless twenty-somethings wander into a farmhouse in rural Texas hoping to buy gas for their van and are picked off one by one by the home's very large nonverbal resident, who wears the skin of a human face for a mask.

I got to see this in the theater, which IMO is definitely the way to go for this one. It does a great job building tension from the very beginning. For all its raw filmmaking approach, I felt the movie had a surprising amount of ambition in terms of both background themes (city vs country, the way technological progress can disrupt people's lives) and this recurring idea of, like, a sense of cosmic apocalypse brought on by the alignment of the stars and planets. The sun as a malign figure wreaking havoc on humanity. The movie goes way harder than it needs to do to succeed as an exploitation horror film.

I was surprised by how little of the actual story I'd osmosed from hearing about the movie over the years. For example, I had no idea that of the little friend group of victims, the one with by far the most lines and personality is a guy in a wheelchair, which honestly felt pretty progressive. His mobility is a significant element of his character throughout the film without being a plot point, and I appreciated that. The movie also leans more into black comedy than I expected. Leatherface lumbering around chasing people with the chainsaw is some pretty good physical comedy, actually!

I also had not realized just how sympathetic a character Leatherface is. He's clearly upset about these people just walking through his front door and wandering around his house. After the second or third one, he sits in his living room, surrounded by taxidermy and bone furniture, and puts his head in his hands, like why is this happening to me!! He also doesn't seem to have any malice towards his victims. There's a whole backstory of how his family used to kill cows at the slaughterhouse, and he treats the tresspassers like cows. But once he and his family has captured the final girl alive and tied her up at the dinner table, he dresses up for dinner! I feel like these details sound like I'm being sarcastic or making fun, but genuinely I liked him a lot and felt sorry for him, especially in the context of how his family members treat him.

Overall a good time. Would watch again.

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Honey Don't (2025). In the second in Ethan Coen's "lesbian B-movie trilogy," Margaret Qualley stars as Honey, a neo noir private eye investigating a death that may or may not be connected to a creepy local church pastored by head creep Chris Evans.

I had a great time with this movie until I didn't. It's 2/3 of a very fun movie in which Margaret Qualley is a really hot PI, and then 1/3 of a very annoying movie in which she is those things, so at least you get really hot Margaret Qualley the whole time. The plot barely counts as one; this movie is running entirely on vibes. For most of the movie it's unclear whether a crime has even occurred. Fortunately the vibes are excellent. Yes, I DO want to watch Qualley show off her long legs in dressy casual slacks and heels while kicking ass, taking names, and having lesbian one-night stands. She did the job she needed to do in The Substance, but she is absolutely magnetic in this. On the other hand, the ending is nonsense AND made me mad, the worst combo.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but Chris Evans the cult leader was a disappointment. Between this and Bad Times at the El Royale, I'm 0/2 on Avengers-turned-cult-leaders. (Has Ruffalo been one? He seems the likeliest. Does his role in Mickey 17 count?) The pastor's plotline also turns out to be completely irrelevant, and the whole thing where his church is a front for a drug running business funded by "the French" is just signature Coen quirkiness, I guess.

OTOH, I think Charlie Day has finally aged into roles I can enjoy him in. So there's that.

Honestly this movie needed another writing pass or two and probably should have excised the church plot entirely and come up with a new, better mystery for Honey to investigate. But if vibes and Qualley are enough of a draw, this might be worth your time.

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Biosphere (2022). Sterling K Brown and Mark Duplass are childhood friends who live in a tiny dome they can't leave after the rest of Earth and humanity has been destroyed.

This is the purest two-man show I have seen in movie form in a very long time. It has exactly one set (broken up into various pieces, but still) and exactly two actors, who are clearly what all the tiny budget went toward. It is a science fiction comedy/drama thing about, idk, hope and resiliance and male friendship.

A movie like this lives or dies by the chemistry between its leads, and Brown and Duplass are great together. There are many funny bits, enough honest emotion to keep me hooked, and various plot developments that I enjoyed. (Gotta love when you quote a famous movie line and then five minutes later the character ALSO quotes that line.) I also just respect the hell out of this kind of barebones, microbudget moviemaking. You see it a fair bit in horror (such as Duplass's project Creep), but less in other genres.