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Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III
Theatrical poster
Directed by	Jeff Burr
Produced by	Robert Engelman
Written by	David J. Schow
Starring	Kate Hodge Viggo Mortensen William Butler Ken Foree Joe Unger Tom Everett Toni Hudson Miriam Byrd-Nethery and R.A. Mihailoff as Leatherface
Music by	Jim Manzie Pat Regan
Distributed by	New Line Cinema
Release date(s)	January 12, 1990
Running time	86 min.
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$2,000,000 (estimated)
Gross revenue	$5,765,562 (USA)
Preceded by	The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2
Followed by	Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation

Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III is the second sequel to the 1974 film The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. New Line Cinema released the film on January 12, 1990.

It stars Kate Hodge, Ken Foree, William Butler, and a then-unknown Viggo Mortensen. Jeff Burr directed. At the time New Line intended to produce this film as the first of several sequels in the series. However, the film did not prove a success, although Jeff Burr was nominated for the International Fantasy Film Award at Fantasporto film festival 1990.

Leatherface gained a certain amount of notoriety prior to release due to a battle between New Line and the MPAA, which initially gave the film an X-rating because of its violence. The studio relented and trimmed the more graphic elements, but in 2003 released the uncut version in home-video formats.

Plot

The film begins with Leatherface (R.A. Mihailoff) bludgeoning a young woman to death with a sledgehammer before beginning the process of cutting off her face so as to make it into a mask. Another girl, Sara (Toni Hudson) watches from a nearby window. Hearing Sara outside, Leatherface, after she flees, briefly checks outside before going back to work. Elsewhere and sometime later, Michelle (Kate Hodge) and her boyfriend Ryan (William Butler), both traveling through Texas to deliver a car to Michelle's father in Florida, pass through a security checkpoint near the excavation of a large number of butchered bodies and reach the Last Chance Gas Station. Here they meet a hitchhiking cowboy named Tex (Viggo Mortensen) and the station's perverted owner Alfredo (Tom Everett). A fight soon breaks out between Tex and Alfredo when the former finds the latter spying on Michelle while she uses the station washroom. As Michelle and Ryan flee from the station in their car, they witness Alfredo apparently killing Tex with a shotgun.

As night falls, Ryan and Michelle, having taken a route Tex recommended, become lost. As Ryan and Michelle begin to bicker, a large truck attacks them. Ryan pulls over when the vehicle's unseen driver throws a dead coyote at their windshield. As Ryan changes the car's flat tire, Michelle, hearing a noise, urges him to hurry. Just then Leatherface ambushes the two of them. Getting into the car as Leatherface begins hacking at it with his chainsaw, Michelle and Ryan bump Leatherface with the vehicle before driving off.

After their escape from Leatherface, Michelle and Ryan, as well as another driver, a survivalist named Benny (Ken Foree), crash when a bloodied Tex leaps in front of them. As Benny tends to the unconscious Michelle, Ryan begins to explain the situation to him, showing him the damage caused to their car by Leatherface. Then Michelle awakens. Deciding to go off and find Tex, Benny discovers a hook-handed man named Tinker (Joe Unger), who offers his assistance, setting down road flares. Benny soon realizes Tinker's true intentions after finding a damaged chainsaw in the back of his truck. Benny grabs an automatic rifle from his overturned jeep, retreats, and encounters Leatherface when Tinker attempts to ram him with his truck.

As Benny fights Leatherface, Sara who had earlier escaped Leatherface saves him (Benny) from death by luring the killer away before joining Benny. Questioning the injured and traumatized Sara, Benny learns that her entire family has been killed. She states that she has failed to escape due to Leatherface and his family — who hunt people for food and sport — watching the roads. Hearing Michelle and Ryan calling for him, Benny leaves Sara; she dies a short time later when Leatherface pins her to a tree with his chainsaw. After killing Sara, Leatherface stalks Ryan and Michelle, mutilating and capturing Ryan when he gets caught in a bear trap.

Ryan tells Michelle to run. Finding a house, she enters it seeking aid, and finds a little girl (Jennifer Banko) who has a room filled with the remains of various animals. The girl stabs Michelle with a knife she has concealed in her skeletal doll. Then Tex enters the room and restrains Michelle, bringing her to the kitchen and nails her to a chair, introducing her to Grandpa, a withered corpse to whom the family feeds blood. After Mama (Miriam Byrd-Nethery) (an elderly woman with voice-assistance) appears, Tinker drags in the barely-living Ryan, whom he and Tex proceed to suspend upside-down with a pair of meat-hooks. Michelle, horrified by the sight of her boyfriend's nearly dead body, begins screaming uncontrollably. As a result Tex gags Michelle with a long strip of gaffer tape, wrapping it around her head so she cannot attract attention. (Notably, unlike most tape-gags which involve taping the mouth shut, here Tex pries her mouth open — although the gagging remains effective.) When Leatherface returns home, Tex (whom along with the rest of the family affectionally call him "Junior") gives him a large golden chainsaw with the phrase "The Saw Is Family" engraved on it — a present made by Tinker, who expresses dissatisfaction with Leatherface's failure to kill Benny. Outside the family home, Benny finds and attempts to interrogate Alfredo as he disposes of human bodies in a bog, eventually knocking the man into the bog with his rifle and leaving him to drown after Alfredo proves uncooperative.

Leatherface "Junior" Sawyer, who had gone off to practice his vocabulary with a computer, rejoins his family as they prepare for dinner in the kitchen, where the little girl kills Ryan with a sledgehammer-swinging device. With Ryan dead, Leatherface prepares to kill Michelle with his chainsaw. The noise attracts Benny, who opens fire on the house with rifle, killing Mama, blowing Tinker's ear off (in the unedited version also blasting two of his fingers off) and partially destroying Grandpa's body. With Leatherface incapacitated after Benny's gunfire knocks him to the floor, Michelle tears herself from the chair she is nailed to, stabs Tex while escaping, and joins Benny outside.

When Leatherface begins heading towards them with Tinker's truck, Benny tells Michelle to run to the woods as he tries to shoot Leatherface. But the truck hits him after he realizes he has run out of ammo. With Benny stunned, Leatherface exits the truck and grabs his chainsaw before going after Michelle. As Leatherface stalks Michelle, Tex and a recovered Benny begin fighting, a battle which ends with Benny soaking Tex in fuel and burning him with a lighter the girl from earlier had given him. Rushing to Michelle's aid, Benny stops Leatherface from murdering her, knocking the killer into the bog. Fighting Leatherface in the water, Benny appears to die when Leatherface forces his head into the blade of the floating and still-running chainsaw. Turning his sights on Michelle, Leatherface begins dragging her underwater. But Michelle, grabbing a rock, bashes Leatherface over the head with it again and again, knocking him out and underwater.

As dawn breaks, Michelle reaches the main road and rests on an abandoned tire. Alfredo's pickup truck, driven by Benny, stops in front of her. As Benny helps Michelle into the truck, a sledgehammer-wielding Alfredo attacks him from behind. Avoiding Alfredo's attacks, Michelle shoots him in the chest with a shotgun, dumping his body in the middle of the road before driving away with Benny, not noticing Leatherface revving his chainsaw some distance away.

Cast

Soundtrack

1. "Leatherface" (Lääz Rockit) - 4:10
2. "Bored" (Death Angel) - 3:27
3. "When Worlds Collide" (Wrath) - 5:42
4. "Spark In My Heart" (Hurricane) - 4:56
5. "Power" (SGM) - 4:05
6. "One Nation" (Sacred Reich) - 3:20
7. "Monster Mash" (Utter Lunacy) - 5:31
8. "The Gift Of Death" (Wasted Youth) - 8:50
9. "Methods Of Madness" (Obsession) - 3:24
10. "Psychotic Killing Machine" (MX Machine) - 3:22

DVD Release

In 2003, the film was released by New Line Home Entertainment (in the R and Unrated versions) on DVD. The DVD includes as special features:

• audio commentary with Jeff Burr, Gregory Nicotero, R.A. Mihailoff, David J. Schow, William Butler, and Mark Odesky
• "The Saw is Family: The Making of Leatherface Featurette"
• "We Knows What To Do With Them Parts", a small compilation of unrestored, raw, deleted scenes: director Jeff Burr explains the reason for their removal
• the original ending

See also

• List of American films of 1990

External links

• Official web-site
• Leatherface: Texas Chainsaw Massacre III at the Internet Movie Database
• Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III at Rotten Tomatoes