Making of Texas Chainsaw Massacre to Be Dramatized in New Film

Like how Tim Burton’s Ed Wood showed us the life of the cult filmmaker and the making of Plan 9 from Outer Space and Netflix’s Dolemite is My Name brought the legend of Rudy Ray Moore to life, a project about the making of another infamous movie has been announced. Deadline brings word about the formation of Ambitious Entertainment who have announced they’re developing a movie about the making of the 1974 classic The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Ambitious has optioned the rights to Chain Saw Confidential: How We Made the World’s Most Notorious Horror Movie, the memoir written by actor Gunnar Hansen who played the part of Leatherface in the original film.

According to the trade, David Dubos has panned the adaptation of Hansen’s book and the film is being considered a dark comedy. The report that the project “purports to bring to the screen all the fun, horror and craziness from the making of the original seminal 1974 Tobe Hooper-directed horror film that cost $140,000 and grossed north of $30 million, spawning knock offs and numerous noisy and bloodier franchise extensions.” Casting on the project is expected to begin soon.

Written by Hooper and his partner Kim Henkel, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre was created as a deeply political manifesto by the pair and was also inspired by serial killer Ed Gein. In his introduction to Chain Saw Confidential, Hansen wrote:

“Nothing went right during the shooting. Everyone was incompetent and people hated each other. Most were so stoned that later they remembered only that they had a lot of fun….Neighbors complained about disturbing events at the farmhouse. The police came. People died. No one wanted their name on the credits. The film was an inept, blood-soaked disaster. The director had to prove to the FBI that it was not a snuff film.”

Despite the troubles in the making of the movie, it would go on to become a hit film and influence filmmakers for generations. Chain Saw would also go on to spawn three direct sequels, a big Hollywood reboot (with its own prequel), two more reboots a decade after that (with another on the way) and create an icon in the chainsaw wielding Leatherface.

Hansen, who passed in 2015, penned Chain Saw Confidential in 2013 and was best known for playing the killer in the film despite no appearances in any sequels; while Hooper, who passed in 2017, returned for The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 in 1986, itself a dark comedy.