Running Time: 100 min

Cast: Dennis Hopper, Bill Moseley, Caroline Williams, Jim Siedow

With 1974's Texas Chainsaw Massacre (TCM), Tobe Hooper exploded on to the horror scene with one of the memorable entries in the genre: a grim, relentless nightmare journey of visitors to a hillbilly town being hounded, tortured and mutilated by a family of rednecks who came from just a little south of Heaven. Inspired in part by the Ed Gein murders, the no-budget no-frills production with its rough-and-ready shooting style gave the film a documentary-type realism that no amount of studio polish could buy. TCM brought in its wake a flood of imitations and, alongside John Boorman's Deliverance, practically invented the sub-genre of backwoods brutality horror film. It was 12 years before Hooper returned to the grisly subject matter, and what he had to bring to the table was, for better or worse, not more of the same.

With the only survivor of the original film supposed to be in an asylum, the sequel has a mostly new cast and a different setting. It also sports a radically different tone, apparent from the opening moments in which a couple of happy asshole-types on a weekend trip go about shooting road signs and hassling the local radio jockey 'Stretch' (Caroline Williams) from their car phone. They are soon encountered by a pickup truck with Leatherface (Bill Johnson) strutting about on top, leading to some solid chainsaw mayhem. This scene conveys the intentionally OTT carnival flavor that the film almost constantly revels in.

Stretch, who has recorded the entire incident on audio tape, meets up with Ranger 'Lefty' (Dennis Hopper, in another psychotic role), a cousin of the original TCM victims out to seek bloody vengeance on their murderers. Lefty persuades her to play the tape on air to lure the killers, but forgets to land to her rescue. So we have a situation where Stretch and her studio partner are given the red carpet terror treatment by Leatherface and his brother Chop Top (Bill Moseley). Spared from a bloody death because of Leatherface's adolescent (?) crush on her, Stretch follows up with the incredibly stupid move of following the manic siblings to their playground where the entire second half of the film plays out. Needless to say several more moments of full-blown carnage and insanity play out, including a climactic chainsaw duel.