East Coast Premiere

Few films are of such vital importance to horror cinema as Tobe Hooper’s The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974). To describe it as iconic seems an insufficient descriptor of the profound influence held by this paradigm-shifting phenomena. Its cultural impact and enduring appeal have been well-documented in countless films, books, articles, essays, and other written and audiovisual dissertations. But at this stage—fifty years after being unleashed upon the world—what’s left to say about it?

Enter Alexandre O. Philippe whose obsessive, groundbreaking work has redefined the form of the film documentary. His convention-shredding films like Doc of the Dead (2014), 78/52 (2017), Memory: The Origins of Alien (2019), and Lynch/Oz (2022) have broadened the parameters of film journalism and visual historical record, propelling the artist into realms of auteurism. Through intimate conversations with powerhouse artists, authors, and critics like Patton Oswalt, Takashi Miike, Alexandra Heller-Nicholas, Stephen King, and Karyn Kusama, Philippe has found an inventive way to map Chainsaw’s impact on a personal level. Philippe’s engagement with these important figures uncovers new meanings through their candid insights and reflections on their first-time viewing experiences with Hooper’s nerve-shattering film.

Chain Reactions feels less like a documentary and more a gathering of familiar friends ruminating on a grim, disturbing, and dizzying work of pure horror. Upon the film’s fiftieth anniversary, Philippe has commemorated The Texas Chain Saw Massacre with a framework that is a fresh and inventive expression of love for a grotesque, transformative, and seminal cultural artifact with which horror aficionados feel depthless reverence.

– Chris Hallock

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