A new clip from Leatherface features Lili Taylor as Leatherface's mom, Verna Sawyer. Directed by French filmmakers Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury (Inside), Leatherface is actually the second cinematic attempt to tell the story of Leatherface's origin. The first try at doing this came with 2006's Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning, a prequel to 2003's Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake. Unlike that film, Leatherface will serve as a prequel to the late Tobe Hooper's original 1974 Texas Chainsaw Massacre film.
The overall continuity of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre horror franchise has become quite convoluted over the years, although Leatherface's status as a genre icon has more or less remained intact through it all. Hooper's own Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 was a direct sequel to the original, albeit much more comedic. Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3 got weird, introducing an entire new family for Leatherface, with no explanation. TCM: The Next Generation got even weirder, introducing aliens into the mix, and creating yet another new family.
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2003's remake reset the franchise continuity completely, but after 2006's The Beginning came 2013's Texas Chainsaw 3D, which was itself ostensibly a direct sequel to Hooper's original. This was complicated by casting Alexandra Daddario as a character that should logically have been much older. Maury and Bustillo's Leatherface seems to once again be ignoring every film but the original. Yahoo today got its hands on a new clip from the prequel, featuring Lili Taylor (The Conjuring) as Verna Sawyer and Stephen Dorff (Blade) as a vengeful Texas Ranger out to get her. Check it out above.
It's unclear based solely on the above clip why exactly Dorff's character is so intent on punishing the Sawyers, but what he says to Verna - "you take one of mine, I take all of yours" - clearly suggests that he holds her family responsible for the loss of someone close to him. Considering the history of the Sawyer family in the various Texas Chainsaw Massacrew movies though, it's not hard to believe that Dorff's lawman is absolutely correct in wanting to get Verna's kids the hell away from that family, no matter his motivation.
After the widely panned Texas Chainsaw 3D, Leatherface will hopefully be able to reestablish the Texas Chainsaw Massacre franchise as one worth watching. The fact that the film has been sitting on a shelf for three years isn't exactly encouraging, but to be fair, studios don't always know best when it comes to quality.
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Source: Yahoo
