The 1974 film “The Texas Chain Saw Massacre” was a turning point in horror, so scary and influential that it holds the #1 spot on Variety‘s 100 Best Horror Movies of All Time. “Chain Reactions,” a new documentary opening in New York City on Sept. 19 via Dark Sky, is a documentary from Alexandre O. Philippe about the film’s impact on five creatives: Author Stephen King, comedian Patton Oswalt, director Takashi Miike, horror critic Alexandra Heller-Nicholas and filmmaker Karyn Kusama.
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King, no stranger to horror, says that although he was late to the film, it shook him because of the gritty look and feel.
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“I should say that I never saw ‘Texas Chain Saw Massacre’ when it came out,” King says. “I saw it in 1982 in Colorado. I was a young father and I was writing to stay ahead of the bill collectors. I was in the theater almost by myself. That’s when a movie really has a tendency to work on you, to get its cold little fingers under your skin. It had that kind of washed-out ’70s look, for want of the better term. You could tell that this print had been around for a while, and it’s better for it, because it just looks fucking real. It works because there’s no artifice about it, there’s no buildup, there’s no character nuance. I mean, there are scenes in the graveyard … they’re not extras, they’re not Hollywood people at all. They look like they came from the nearest little Texas town. It’s fantastic.”
Watch King discuss the movie in an exclusive Variety clip below.