The Texas Chainsaw Massacre True Story Interpreted
Leatherface is still a fictional character, but the real story behind The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is shockingly based on actual events, including the menacing house the cannibalistic family inhabited. This all supports the aura of anxiety the movie still radiates. Considered as one of the most powerful horror films of all time, the classic slasher is credited with innovating the genre with a big, hulking, faceless killer.
Leatherface: Background Information
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre centers on a young woman called Sally and her brother as they travel to an old family house in Texas with some friends. But when the group stops at the incorrect house following a waylaid, they discover they are being pursued by the horrific and almost inhuman Leatherface. Inspired by a number of actual events, the Texas Chainsaw Massacre is Tobe Hooper especially names Ed Gein and Elmer Wayne Henley as Leatherface's inspiration; the actual history of these serial killers is maybe even more unsettling than The Texas Chainsaw Massacre itself.
Ed Gein: Leatherface Inspired from Here
Given the opening narration, which claims the massacre is "one of the most bizarre crimes in the annals of American history," Texas Chainsaw Massacre viewers can be forgiven for leaving the venerable horror film thinking it is based on a true story. Director Tobe Hooper deliberately planned this choice as a marketing ploy meant to draw a larger audience with campfire-style horror stories. He also wanted the falsely told information to answer political and cultural debates on the government's dishonesty toward the people during the 1970s.
Like most legends, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre has only fragments of truth despite the movie's implication that the events really happened and that it is a true story. The idea for the Texas Chainsaw Massacre originated in tandem with the rise of sensationalist, national news cycles from the shocking real crimes breaking out in post-war America. Hooper remembers being inspired for the psychotic family shown in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre from seeing convicted serial killer Elmer Wayne Henley's arrest and shocking acts splashed over San Antonio television sets.
Still, the narrative of serial killer Ed Gein—whose crimes shocked a whole country in the 1950s—is the main source of inspiration for The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Known as the "Plainfield Ghoul," Ed displayed clear links to the final version of Leatherface's character by wearing women's clothes and mutilating bodies. Gein also admitted to killing at least two women, exhumed bodies from nearby graveyards, fashioned keepsakes and trophies from their bones and skin.
Leatherface, like Gein, who also inspired Norman Bates in Psycho, has a low IQ and enjoys wearing women's clothing and disfiguring bodies—qualities that match the real-life serial killer. Leatherface is supposed to not only give a faceless killer some mystery but also replicate the terrible crimes of a well-known serial killer by dressing in the skin of another person. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was an unqualified success because of the pervasive belief that it is a true story, which resulted in the development of an iconic, vociferously popular horror franchise spanning more than five decades and caused the film to be an unqualified success due on true-crime examples it uses.
Inspired by true stories, are Texas Chainsaw Massacre Sequels true stories?
Though real life inspired the Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the house it involved, most of the sequels merely followed Leatherface's terror and chainsaw. This was particularly true with relation to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, which strayed entirely from anything akin to the Ed Gein story.
This film avoided a lot of the scares for over-the-top gore and stressed dark comedy instead of Dennis Hopper's former Texas Marshall hunting the cannibalistic family, transforming the terrible first movie into an actual horror comedy. Leatherface was still based on Ed Gein, but it was a sequel, thus it was no more his story.
Leatherface: In 1990 the Sawyer family was brought back by The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III. Here the family stalked another family across Texas's back roads. Once more, this film lacked any real story outside of Leatherface's original inspiration. Given Matthew McConaughey and Renée Zellweger starred in Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation, the fourth film was a fascinating addition. Inspired by a semi-true narrative, director Kim Henkel claimed the Illuminati were behind-the-scenes driving Leatherface onto his murder sprees to generate "transcendence" (via Halloween Love).
With Leatherface based on the Wisconsin-based serial killer, this was also somewhat inspired by Ed Gein's murder spree, same as the first film. Arriving as a revival of the original in 2003, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre With Leatherface based on the Wisconsin-based serial killer, this was also somewhat inspired by Ed Gein's murder frenzy, much as the first film. Texas Chainsaw 3D came as another sequel after The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning, an origin tale for the family devoid of any actual narrative. This brought about a significant transformation including Leatherface as another prequel. This one followed Leatherface's narrative of how he was once normal before trauma drove him to lunacy; this theme persisted in the Netflix Texas Chainsaw Massacre sequel in 2022.
Other Classic Horror Films Inspired by Real Stories
Though it showed how successful it could be to base a horror film on actual events, the Texas Chainsaw Massacre took a lot of license with the true story it was inspired by. It puts the viewers in a suspenseful state whereby they are observing the movie's events while considering the eerie possibility that this all could have occurred. Since then, several horror films have also cleverly adapted real-life events in a range of forms.
Viewed as a masterwork of the genre, The Silence Of The Lambs is among the rare Best Picture-nominated horror films (and it won). Another movie that borrows ideas from the actual serial killer Ed Gein while drastically altering the nature of his crimes is Actually, Silence of the Lambs draws on another real-life event. Inspired by the actual FBI case to capture the Green River Killer, the story involving Clarice Starling interviewing incarcerated killer Hannibal Lecter in hopes of getting him to assist her captures Buffalo Bill.
Additionally there are horror films more closely related to the actual events that inspired them. The basis for the movie Open Water is the actual event whereby two people unintentionally find themselves left behind after a scuba-diving trip. Still, the film merely depicts the result of the events and turns into a shark attack film. One of the most accurate films based on a real story since David Fincher's Zodiac looks at the actual Zodiac Killer and his crimes with amazing attention to detail.
Even films the viewers know, though, could not possibly be accurate starting with some inspiration derived from real life. The Lighthouse by Robert Eggers is partially inspired by the actual Smalls Lighthouse Tragedy, a real story of two lighthouse employees and a fatal incident between them. But Eggers' take gives his rich horror story supernatural components. Likewise, although they rely on the audience to believe in real demons and ghosts in order to purchase into the "true story" element, the supernatural The Conjuring films are based on the experiences of real people, paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren.
