[MUSIC - Luscious Jackson: Citysong]

Alison Stewart: This is All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. Thanks for spending your Halloween with us. If you want to see what All Of It's crew is wearing this Halloween, head to our Instagram, @allofitwnyc. A look ahead to tomorrow's show, we'll have another installment of our occasional debate series, Small Stakes, Big Opinions. The topic under discussion, what is your favorite New York bagel place? We had to postpone this conversation once already because it got too controversial-- Just kidding, our guest had to reschedule. But get ready to call in tomorrow and call in with your favorite bagel store, which is, of course, Absolute Bagels on Broadway and 108th Street. I didn't write that sentence, one of my producers did. Anyway, the hot takes begin tomorrow at noon. Now let's get this hour started with the anniversary of a cult classic film. 50 years ago, horror was changed forever.

[playing trailer for The Texas Chainsaw Massacre]

[person screaming in the background]

Narrator: This is the movie that is just as real-

[more screaming in the background]

Narrator: --just as close-

[frantic yelling in the background]

Narrator: --just as terrifying as being there.

Actor: Please, somebody help. Please.

Narrator: Even if one of them survives, what will be left? The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. After you stop screaming, you'll start talking about it.

Alison Stewart: That's right. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre turns 50 this year. Tobe Hooper's masterpiece is considered such an important work of art that a copy of it is in MoMA's permanent collection. The story of a group of teens who find themselves under attack by vicious Texas cannibals, including a guy named Leatherface, has provided inspiration for countless filmmakers. It helped solidify new horror tropes like the final girl, that's the one who makes it out somehow alive. Whether you watch the movie for the first time when you are 14 or 40 or 50, it's bound to have left an impression on you. So we are going to take your calls about The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. How old were you when you first watched it? What do you remember about the experience? What scenes stick out for you or scare you the most? Why do you think it's still so scary 50 years later?

Our phone lines are open. 212-433-9692, 212-433-WNYC. You can call in or you can text to us. Joining me now to discuss the history and the legacy of the film is Erik Piepenburg, who writes a monthly horror streaming column for The New York Times. He is the author of the piece At 50, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Still Cuts Deep. Nice to meet you, Erik.

Erik Piepenburg: Nice to meet you as well.

Alison Stewart: All right, so I saw it for the first time last night, which was a riot. How old were you when you saw Texas Chainsaw Massacre for the first time?

Erik Piepenburg: I was a teenager. This was in the late '80s, my father took me to see it. This was years after it came out. It came out in 1974, so this was years later. I had that cool dad, the guy who took me to weird movies. He was a connoisseur of strange movies, he liked shocking people, so none of my other friends had parents like that. I saw it with him, and it opened my eyes in ways that I didn't expect.

Alison Stewart: What kind of impression did it leave?

Erik Piepenburg: You know, I have two memories of that. Number one, I loved that I was there with my dad, so there's a little bit of nostalgia. But I remember watching it and thinking to myself, "This is disgusting. What kind of crazy person would make this film? What kind of degenerates would pay money to go watch this film?" So I remember enjoying being there with my father, but at the same time thinking, "This is warped." I remember on the drive home, and this is in suburban Cleveland, so rural Texas was a different planet as far as I was concerned, and thinking to myself, "I can't wait to see this movie again." There aren't a lot of horror movies that I've seen multiple times, but this is one of them.

Alison Stewart: Well, now that you're a grownup and you can look back on it, what was new or interesting about Texas Chainsaw Massacre? What was it doing and trying that was different?

Erik Piepenburg: A lot of things. I think first of all, it introduced a villain, an antagonist who wore a mask. This was years before Michael Myers and Jason from Friday the 13th. That had really not been done quite that way before, so that was one of them. I think the second thing, and I think one of the reasons it really holds up is that it was this strange combination of fiction and documentary. It looks real. The director Wes Craven described it as what would happen if someone just sort of picked up a camera and started killing people. It does sort of have that very real feel to it. Not quite found footage in the way that Blair Witch Project was, but it felt like you were watching actual people being slaughtered in this house somewhere. I think that's one of the reasons that it holds up, and it really changed the way that we think about what horror can look like.

Alison Stewart: Yes. You know, some older horror movies, they sort of lose their potency with time. Why is this considered relevant? Why is it still a potent film?

Erik Piepenburg: I think probably the main reason is because it looks like it could have been made yesterday. It's very much of its time. At the time, it was sort of this part of these emerging directors who were pushing boundaries when it came to sex and violence, and in this case, violence for sure, but looks like it could have been made yesterday and released in theaters. It just still holds up as a product of its time, but also fresh. Every time I see it, I feel like I've seen new things in it.

Alison Stewart: Let's take a call. Vincent is calling from Millburn, New Jersey. Hi, Vincent. Welcome to All Of It.

Vincent: Hey, how's it going? Thanks for taking my call. The first time I saw Texas Chainsaw, I was in fourth grade in the '80s, being babysit by a family friend in a high-rise in broad daylight, and it was terrifying then. Probably the scariest film I ever seen before or after Halloween, and I'm still obsessed with it. I see it at least once a year. I think one of the wildest things about it is the soundtrack, and I'll never be able to erase the room of bones when the figure escapes from the deep freezer. So, amazing film, one of the best.

Alison Stewart: Thanks for calling in. Sheila is calling in from Teaneck. Hi, Sheila. Thanks for calling All Of It.

Sheila: Hi, thanks for having me on. As I told your screener, I saw it when I was about 17 or 18. A friend invited me over to her house, this was in suburban New York, and she invited me over because her brother was having a sleepover party for his birthday. There was going to be a bunch of 9 or 10 year olds, and they were planning to get Monty Python and the Holy Grail, which is a movie I love. I got there, and my friend Kathy said, "They were out of The Holy Grail, so we got The Texas Chainsaw Massacre instead." And I said, "That's not an even trade." I was horrified. It was not a movie I wanted to see, but I was friends with her, I didn't want to leave. I sat through it and just was like-- I left there thinking, "There's real evil in the world." [chuckles]

Alison Stewart: Wow, that is a lot. As somebody wrote in our control room, there's a lot of babysitting miscalculations, apparently. [chuckles]

Erik Piepenburg: For sure, it was the '80s.

Alison Stewart: I'm talking to Erik Piepenburg. He writes a monthly horror column for The New York Times. The piece he wrote is At 50, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Still Cuts Deep. Listeners, we want to take your calls about The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. How old were you when you first watched it? What do you remember about the experience? What scared you the most? 212-433-9692, 212-433-WNYC. You can call in and join us on air, or you can text to us at that number as well. Let's talk about the budget. Tobe Hooper made some short films, he made another before Texas Chainsaw, he went on to make Poltergeist later, but what do we know about what he set out to achieve with this film?

Erik Piepenburg: His intent was to be scrappy. It was shot on 16-millimeter, the crew was from The University of Texas. They shot it in about a month. And again, he was part of that generation of filmmakers who just was kind of like, "Let's put on a show," sort of Mickey and Judy. But in this case, they wanted to really go there in terms of violence. I don't think he set out to make one of the greatest horror films of all time, but I think being in this farmhouse, it was hot and it was sweaty, I have to think that he knew that there was something different about this. And so I think that low budget, very few resources, a cast that no one had heard of before, I think that combination-- I think he must have thought that this would be something different.

Alison Stewart: Do you think that those restraints budget-wise really helped the film?

Erik Piepenburg: Absolutely. I think today when monsters are all digital, and it's CGI, it's just a very different horror landscape today, My favorite types of horror movies are those that don't use any sort of digital effects whatsoever, that look like they are real. I'm a big found footage fan, but also films that just look like they are from someone's camera, and I think the fact that this particular film looks the way that it does-- it's grainy, you can almost smell the sweat and the heat.

Alison Stewart: Yes, I was going to ask-- You know, a lot of horror films are set in New England, in misty New England and Maine, but this one's in Texas, and everybody is really sweaty the whole time in this movie. You can kind of feel the heat through the screen. How do you think that impacted the way you feel about the movie? The way a viewer feels about the movie?

Erik Piepenburg: I mean, as I said before, this was a world that I knew nothing of when I certainly saw it-- when I saw it for the first time, so I didn't know what it meant to be hot in Texas. That was sort of eye-opening to me, but I think now-- Remember, the film takes place basically over the course of 24 hours, and there are no costume changes. So you can imagine what those costumes must have smelled like and looked like after a couple of weeks of filming. I think that comes through very, very clearly, and as I said, you can almost smell the terror and the Texas summer.

Alison Stewart: This one is a text. It says, "One of my first dates with my now husband was the remake of Texas Chainsaw Massacre in the early 2000s. I was deeply disturbed, hiding my face in his shoulder for most of the movie, which he thought meant I was having a great time, LOL." Let's talk to Bruce in Hastings-on-Hudson. Hi, Bruce. Thanks for calling All Of It.

Bruce: Hey, how're you doing?

Alison Stewart: Doing well.

Bruce: I'm from Montreal originally, and I saw this in the early '80s, and I just remember it was a terror ride. Terror ride from beginning to end. The scenes of the freezer door shutting, and I think the grandfather, spoiler alert, eating some part of a human body at the dinner table, just stuck with me until today. We came out of the theater, and all the kids were just running around making chainsaw noises, you know, so it was all fun and games for us. But my brother took his girlfriend, and I'm pretty sure she split up with him because she couldn't believe that he took her to such a crazy movie, so I remember it to this day. It was a crazy movie.

Alison Stewart: Thanks for calling in. Let's talk about the chainsaw. They give it away in the title of the book, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Why do you think it doesn't give it away-- that much of it away?

Erik Piepenburg: Well, understand this, this was an instance where you had a villain who had a signature weapon. It was a tool, and it was a very loud tool, and I think with that, it sort of gave Leatherface this real identity. The sound of a chainsaw starting up is, I think, a really smart move on Tobe Hooper's part, because it sort of says, "Okay, when that starts, you know something terrible is about to happen." So I think he really wanted to embrace that this was a signature villain with a tool all his own.

Alison Stewart: We are talking about the 50th anniversary of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre with Erik Piepenburg, author of The New York Times piece At 50, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Still Cuts Deep. We're taking your calls on the film. How old were you when you first watched it? What do you remember about the experience? What scenes scared you the most? Why do you think it's still so terrifying? Our number is 212-433-9692, 212-433-WNYC. We'll have more after the break.

[music]

Alison Stewart: You're listening to All Of It on WNYC, I'm Alison Stewart. My guest is Erik Piepenburg. He wrote a piece called At 50, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Still Cuts Deep, it's in The New York Times. Okay, I'm going to play a clip for you. This is a long lead up before the chainsaw comes out, including a long van ride where the group picks up a creepy hitchhiker-- very creepy, who turns out to be important later. This is a little bit from that scene in which the hitchhiker starts telling the group about his family's history working in the slaughterhouse.

[playing clip from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre]

Teen 1: How did you get stuck way out here?

Hitchhiker: I was at the slaughterhouse.

Teen 2: I got an uncle that works at the slaughterhouse.

Hitchhiker: Hey, my brother worked there, my grandfather too. [chuckles] My family's always been in meat.

Teen 2: A whole family of Draculas.

Teen 3: Hey, man, did you go in that slaughter room or whatever they call it? The place where they shoot the cattle in the head with that big air gun thing.

Hitchhiker: Oh, that-- that gun's no good.

Teen 3: I was in there once with my uncle.

Hitchhiker: The old way with a sledge. [chuckles] See, that was better. They die better that way.

Teen 3: How come? I thought the gun was better.

Hitchhiker: Oh, no. With the new way, people were put out of jobs.

Alison Stewart: Erik, what do you like about the way that this film builds towards action?

Erik Piepenburg: Yes, I think this scene is great. I think every film student who wants to make a horror movie should study this scene. I think what Tobe Hooper did here is he builds it slowly. You've got the sort of banjo music in the background, you've got this close-up of this creepy character, and Tobe's just a master of timing, of pacing, of reveal. And then when the violence in this scene comes eventually, and it's a small act of violence, but it's a punch in the face, and so I think what he's doing there is sort of setting up this moment. If you think this is disturbing, you don't know what's about to come. I think that's a really smart way for him to set up what we eventually see, and yes, this character does come into play in a very important way later on.

Alison Stewart: Let's take another call. Bob from Staten Island. Hi, Bob. Thanks for calling All Of It.

Bob: Okay. To give you a little setup of what I was doing at the time, I was showing movies, and I never knew what theater I was going to. I was sent to a theater in Brooklyn, I think it was down in Red Hook or Greenpoint, and I was told I'm showing a movie called The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Now, I can only look out at a piece of glass, a port hole, and I have sound in the room to listen to the-- make sure that it's working. I showed the first time that movie in the morning, and I watched it, and for the second time, I said, "I am not going to watch it, and I'm not going to listen to it." I locked the door to the booth and I said, "That's it." I was scared.

Alison Stewart: [chuckles] Love that. Let's talk to Sylvie who has called in. Hi, Sylvie. Thanks for calling All Of It.

Sylvie: Hi, Alison. Hi, Erik. This movie is one of my boyfriend's favorite movies, and I've never seen it because I'm too scared. He told me that it's actually a very funny movie, trying to convince me to watch it. It's one of his favorite things about it. I'm wondering if there's a way to kind of look up where the jump scares are, and then go into it with some knowledge of when to hide or when to close my eyes, or if that would just kind of ruin the whole thing.

Alison Stewart: What do you think, Erik?

Erik Piepenburg: I think it would ruin the whole thing. But I will say that I recently was part of this team that put together a big feature on jump scares for The New York Times, and so there is a website out there. I'm blanking on the name, but something like, "where is the scare" or "jump scares here," or something that will tell you exactly where the jump scares are. So if you do want to do that, that is certainly an option, but I would just say go for it. Just make sure you've got your hands ready to cover your eyes. And really, the point about comedy, I think, is a good one. Especially in the family dinner scene, it's just pure farce. It's ridiculous, and so I think, yes, it's definitely scary, but the point about comedy is really important to make.

Alison Stewart: The first kill happens pretty suddenly. Kirk has encountered an empty house, he's at the door asking if anyone's home. Before he eventually goes inside, he meets Leatherface for the first time. Let's listen.

[playing clip from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre]

[Kirk knocking on the door]

Kirk: Hello?

[rumbling sound in the background]

Kirk: Hey, pal.

[rumbling sound in the background]

Kirk: Hello?

[loud commotion and grunting noises in the background]

[Kirk yelling]

[ominous soundtrack]

Alison Stewart: That was pretty quick. No fanfare, just happened. What did you think of the first kill?

Erik Piepenburg: Yes, I think that's one of the best kills, one of the best jump scares in all of horror. There's silence, there's maybe the sound of like a lawnmower in the back, and then out from nowhere comes Leatherface and kills this person as if they were an animal in a slaughterhouse. It's bam, bam, bam. It takes what, a couple seconds for that to happen? And they're standing against this blood-red wall with skulls on it, and then Leatherface just shuts the door, and it's over. And then that ominous soundtrack comes in. I mean, it's just-- It's two of the best minutes in horror.

Alison Stewart: I found the skeleton scarier than anything, and all the lights cutting through them, that was the thing that freaked me out more than-- Because it really isn't that bloody a film for a movie called Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

Erik Piepenburg: Right, and that's a good point too. It's very artfully directed. There are moments of tranquility, and beauty, and shadows, and light shining through skulls, which you think, "Well, this is disgusting," but it's actually a very artfully made film in some places.

Alison Stewart: This is a question we have via text. If you can answer, it's fine. If you can't, no worries. "Please A.S., mention to your guest about those commercials where those young teens try to find a hiding place and they end up finding the shed where he's waiting with a chainsaw. I think it's a GEICO commercial, and it's about making good choices."

[laughter]

Erik Piepenburg: I think I know the commercials that they're referring to, and yes, that's really smart and that's really funny, sort of taking this terrifying movie and having fun with it. I think Tobe Hooper would have really been proud.

Alison Stewart: They said, "I was 13 in 1993 when I saw Texas Chainsaw Massacre for the first time. And while I wasn't at all afraid, I was more intrigued about the character Leatherface. I had just learned about sociopath Ed Gein, so I was fascinated between the similarities between the two." So Leatherface was unique at the time.

Erik Piepenburg: Yes, absolutely. We sort of take it for granted now in those sort of singular one-name, Freddie, Jason, Chucky, Pinhead characters, but at the time, we really didn't have an understanding of this sort of singular villain, certainly not with a signature weapon. So yes, he was very ahead of its time in terms of, this is a one-named person that you've got to be really terrified.

Alison Stewart: Let's talk to Frank from Woodbridge, New Jersey. Hi, Frank. Thanks for calling All Of It.

Frank: Yes, hi. One thing about the movie that really got me was the intensity of how things just kept building up, building up, building up, up. Like the scene when Leatherface was chasing Sally through the woods, she's running and screaming, and he's like right behind her. People in the theater-- I saw it in this little Hole in the Wall theater in New Brunswick. People in the theater were screaming, "Run, run, run." And when the scene finished, when she ran into the gas station, everything just stopped. I was leaning forward in my seat, and I had my hands on the seat in front of me. That's how into it I got. I was already out of college when I saw this movie, so-- Movies normally don't affect me, but this one was, like I say, very, very intense.

Alison Stewart: Thanks for calling. Tony from Manhattan. Hi, Tony, you're on the air.

Tony: Hey. Oh, thank you. I had an adverse reaction to that film, and can actually say I hated it. I was in my early 20s when I saw it, and I guess it was probably because it was on the heels of the news reality, which was, you know, like the eight student nurses that were bludgeoned to death and things like that, in cold blood and all that. I felt like this movie was just too real and kind of mirrored what was beginning to happen in society, and I didn't like that. I would rather have it be entertaining from a sort of cinematic fantasy point of view rather than like the real thing. So that was my thoughts about it.

Alison Stewart: Tony, thanks for your call. Erik, what was the reception for the movie when it premiered in 1974?

Erik Piepenburg: Yes, it was very well received by folks who wanted to go there. Critics were mixed. I think there were some who saw it as just trash. I think there were others who recognized that it was doing something very, very different, and appreciated that. MoMA put it in its collection two years after it came out, so the museum itself even understood that there was something very different there. But it became one of those films that people would say to each other, "Have you seen this?" In the way that The Exorcist would do, and still that happens today. But I think it was a film that everyone sort of braced themselves to see and said, "Yes, I sat through that. I made it through." Whether it was at the grind house, or a drive-in movie theater, or at just an art house. It was one of those movies that people had to say, "Yes, I could handle that," or not, and they left, they fled the theater.

Alison Stewart: You talked to some filmmakers about how Texas Chainsaw Massacre really inspired their work. What did they tell you about what they admired about the movie?

Erik Piepenburg: Yes, I talked to Eli Roth, whose recent film is Thanksgiving, and he directed Hostel. He was just saying that when he saw it as a teenager growing up in Massachusetts, it affected him because it did feel like this blend of fiction and reality in a way that he had never really seen before. He grew up watching traditional horror movies, Universal monster movies, and this was doing something completely different. And that inspired him to sort of push his own boundaries in terms of the kinds of violence that you could depict on screen.

I also talked to director Paul Feig who directed Bridesmaids, of all things. And he also said that that's not a horror film, but it is a film that has inspired other directors in terms of pacing and timing. He said that it had this B-movie vibe that, again, felt like a documentary. I think that no matter what genre you're working, I think you could certainly appreciate what Tobe Hooper was doing then. And it was just great to hear directors who have been so successful sort of say, "Yes, when I was a kid, I was freaked out by this movie, but it still lives here right in my heart to this day."

Alison Stewart: What movies are descendants of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre movies?

Erik Piepenburg: There are movies like The Devil's Rejects, The Hills have Eyes. I think the biggest homage would be Ti West's film X, which came out not long ago, which was about a group of young people who go into a house in the middle of nowhere and they are making adult film. But in terms of the costume and in terms of the feel of the film and this idea of being in the middle of nowhere with this crazy family, I think that was probably the most direct homage, and it's really, really successful. Ti West knew what he was doing when he made that movie, and I think anyone who's seen Texas Chainsaw would really appreciate what he's doing in X.

Alison Stewart: We got this comment on Instagram. "My son is eight, and will be Leatherface tonight. He has only seen the trailer, but already a fan." So that makes me wonder, is it part of the cultural wallpaper? Like, even if you haven't seen it, you know about it.

Erik Piepenburg: I think so. I've written before for The Times about how Chucky has sort of become that. I think you see little kids in Chucky costumes on, and you'll see that tonight, I'm sure. I think even if you haven't seen the film, like Jason, Freddy, Chucky, all those people, Leatherface is very much a part of that. Do not show this to an eight-year-old. When they're a little bit older, and then you can show it to them, but it certainly has become part of the-- sort of where we are in our understanding of horror. I think it's adorable, I would love to see little Leatherface. [chuckles]

Alison Stewart: My guest has been Erik Piepenburg. We were talking about The Texas Chainsaw Massacre turning 50 this year. Thank you so much for joining us. This was a lot of fun.

Erik Piepenburg: This was a lot of fun. Thank you.