The Texas Chainsaw Massacre part 2 arrived on Home Video this week in 1987, after an August 22, 1986 theatrical release.
Tobe Hooper’s deal with Cannon Films was a Hollywood handshake that smelled like barbecue but left Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus holding the bill. Fresh off Poltergeist, and likely still smarting from accusations that Spielberg ghost-directed, Hooper found himself in a three-picture deal with the Go-Go boys. He was supposed to be their golden ticket – a commercially viable a-list auteur that would deliver the next big horror franchise starting with Texas Chainsaw 2.
Things worked out a bit differently.
Hooper, ever the subversive at heart, took their cash and backburnered Chainsaw 2 until he could get his other passion projects in the can – Lifeforce and the Invaders from Mars remake.
After burning through these two box office disappointments, he finally went back to the well but turned TCM into a gonzo black comedy that pushed the grotesque slapstick straight into a full-blown satire.
Gone was the vérité-style grit of the 70s, this one was big and loud – and very 80s. The colours were garish, the violence was cartoonish, and every performance was dialed up past human comprehension. Dennis Hopper may have been there to cash a check, but he’s still giving it everything he’s got. And while Bill Moseley’s Chop-Top is a cackling Vietnam-fried nightmare that abuses every scene, this movie belongs to Caroline Williams. She’s no mere final girl – much like the best horror heroines of the late 80’s, she’s there to kick some serious ass. In short cutoffs no less. And Jim Siedow, the only returning main cast member, turns Drayton Sawyer into the ultimate Reagan-era wannabe yuppie businessman.
Cannon expecting a lean, mean slasher that could take a cut from Freddy and Jason. But what they got was a cult film that was almost guaranteed to be misunderstood by mainstream horror audiences at the time. Texas Chainsaw 2 didn’t play by the rules because Hooper wasn’t setting out to make a horror movie, no siree. He was making fun of the entire industry, its expectations, and even himself.
The whole thing feels like a frustrated mic drop, and a glorious one at that.
Hooper’s carrer never quite recovered. Cannon wasnt about to let him make a Chainsaw 3 after that, but by then it didn’t matter. He got in, and got out. -Pop
The film hit video shelves in February of ‘87 and its been growing that cult class ever since.