The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
Though 1974’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre begins with a crawl solemnly insisting that it’s based on actual crimes, the details cribbed from real life again go back to Ed Gein—this time, gleefully exploiting the troubled farmer’s fascination with making clothing, furniture, lawn art, and who knows what else out of leftover bones and dried skin. Fun fact: the production designer for Chainsaw, Robert A. Burns, also worked on The Hills Have Eyes—another movie that uses cannibalized body parts to make its mise-en-scène extra creeptastic.
