History Fridge / TheTexasChainSawMassacre1974

* Franklin is the carrier of the dark fear that kills the kids. His obsession with the slaughterhouse, the mutilation of cattle, the ridiculing of the Hitchhiker's family and giving directions to his friends, is what kills all of them. Only Sally survives because, as possessed as Franklin is, he unconsciously sacrifices himself for her, by DEMANDING that she take him with her even when she pleads that she can't "push him up that hill". Does Sally know that Franklin will die on a subconscious level? It's her survival instincts and disregard for her dying brother that actually saves her from being killed too. The filmmakers were an extremely cynical and hippie-hating lot.
** This is further reinforced simply by Franklin's character design. He symbolically represents the entire Sawyer family. He has a knife and a fondness for the slaughterhouse (like Nubbins, the Hitchhiker). Furthermore, he's stocky with curly brown hair (like Leatherface in at least two of his masks), his clothes are even similar in design to Leatherface, as well as being all one color (like Drayton, The Cook). Lastly, he's wheelchair bound (like Grandpa Sawyer).
* Drayton Sawyer warns the hippies not to go onto other people's property, as the others won't take kindly. Whatever his motives (see AlternateCharacterInterpretation), if they'd taken his warning seriously and stayed on their property, then they probably would have survived just fine. The Sawyers may be cannibals, but they don't kill everyone, and it's only due to Leatherface that the entire thing becomes a massacre. His warning is blown off but is actually serious and to the point as he says that it'd be dangerous to leave their property.

!! Fridge Horror

* The iconic shot of Pam's red-hot pants is gorgeous and ominous as this beautiful girl is slowly lured into a death trap like a fly in a spider's web. But on second viewing, you realize that this was a hypnotic camera effect that highlights her exposed back, which will soon have a rusty meathook rip through it.

* It's only apparent on rewatch, but when the kids pull up to the gas station and Drayton tells them that the tank is empty, he's standing on the side of the car that the Nubbins put the symbol on. There is no apparent signage at the gas station (which is also still open despite being non-operational) and Drayton doesn't point them in the direction of another place that could fill their tank. It's possible that Nubbins marked the van (much like the UrbanLegend of sex traffickers putting zip ties on the car mirrors of women commuting alone) and Drayton lied about the gas, knowing they'd eventually break down and become easy targets.

* The Hitchhiker placed a curse on the teenagers. The film is about the metaphysics of karma and the Law of Attraction (staples of the psychedelic hippie movement). Pam explains the dark forces upon them with her astrology book, and later Sally reveals that she thinks "everything means something, I guess". The Hitchhiker takes a photo of the teens and burns it when they embarrass him, thus dooming them. He cuts his own hand with Franklin's knife and then cuts Franklin's arm with his own razor, creating a blood ritual. When kicked out of the kids' van, the Hitchhiker smears a symbol in blood on their van, which Sally and Franklin notice later but no one else takes seriously. The ejected Hitchhiker does a psychotic ritual, blowing a raspberry, and later Franklin (as he too descends into darkness) shows the same strange behavior. The film is full of occult imagery and references to sunspots, probably added by writer Kim Henkel, whose ''Film/TexasChainsawMassacreTheNextGeneration'' sequel is full of occult and conspiracy references. Director Tobe Hooper's own sequel ''Film/TheTexasChainsawMassacre2'' expounds on the major theme of "they live on fear... they live on fear".

* It's truly creepy when you realize that the Sawyer family is carrying on their family tradition of slaughterhouse work, only they are targeting humans exactly as they used to process cattle.
** Even more creepy when you consider the macabre dinner scene. From the perspective of The Sawyer Clan, they are having a formal family dinner.
** And taking Grandpa Sawyer's age into account, the tradition probably dates back over a century.

* Franklin repeatedly blowing raspberries up at the ceiling seems weird and random, but he's expressing frustration. Kirk and Pam are upstairs, laughing, and sounding like they are having sex (they aren't). Franklin can't go up the stairs because of his disability. At that time it probably all caught up with him: the fact he's the only single person in the group (he probably never had a girlfriend and likely can't have sex anyway), that he's disabled, and that nobody really wants him to be along in the first place. He's not part of all of this, he's the outsider in every way.

* Arriving at the Grandfather's house, Franklin examines the blood symbol on the van with a dried up "sausage" in his mouth. As the plot unravels, its obvious on second viewing that Franklin has a dead man's penis in his mouth. Creator/GunnarHansen and Daniel Pearl point this out on the DVDCommentary and the shy director Creator/TobeHooper laughs it off unconvincingly.
* The iconic shot of Pam's red hot pants is gorgeous and ominous as this beautiful girl is slowly lured into a death trap like a fly in a spider's web. But on second viewing, you realize that this was a hypnotic camera effect that highlights her exposed back, which will soon have a rusty meathook rip through it.

* The Hitchhiker placed a curse on the teenagers. The film is about the metaphysics of karma and the Law of Attraction (staples of the psychedelic hippie movement) as Pam explains the dark forces upon them with her astrology book and later Sally reveals that she thinks "everything means something, I guess". The Hitchhiker takes a photo of the teens and burns it when they embarrass him, thus dooming them. He cuts his own hand with Franklin's knife and then cuts Franklin's arm with his own razor, creating a blood ritual. When kicked out of the kids' van, the Hitchhiker smears a symbol in blood on their van, which Sally and Franklin notice later but no one else takes seriously. The ejected Hitchhiker does a psychotic ritual, blowing a raspberry, and later Franklin (as he too descends into darkness) shows the same strange behavior. The film is full of occult imagery and references to sunspots, probably added by writer Kim Henkel whose ''Film/TexasChainsawMassacreTheNextGeneration'' sequel is full of occult and conspiracy references. Director Tobe Hooper's own sequel ''Film/TheTexasChainsawMassacre2'' expounds on the major theme of "they live on fear... they live on fear".
* Franklin repeatedly blowing raspberries up at the ceiling seems weird and random, but he's expressing frustration. Kirk and Pam are upstairs, laughing and sounding like they are having sex (they aren't). Franklin can't go up the stairs because of his disability. At that time it probably all caught up with him: the fact he's the only single person in the group (he probably never had a girlfriend and likely can't have sex anyway), that he's disabled, and that nobody really wants him to be along in the first place. He's not part of all of this, he's the outsider in every way.
* Franklin is the carrier of the dark fear that kills the kids. His obsession with the slaughterhouse, the mutilation of cattle, the ridiculing of the Hitchhiker's family and giving directions to his friends, is what kills all of them. Only Sally survives because, as possessed as Franklin is, he unconsciously sacrifices himself for her, by DEMANDING that she take him with her even when she pleads that she can't "push him up that hill". Does Sally know that Franklin will die on a subconscious level? Its her survival instincts and disregard for her dying brother that actually saves her from being killed too. The filmmakers were an extremely cynical and hippie-hating lot.
** This is further reinforced simply by Franklin's character design. He symbolically represents the entire Sawyer family. He has a knife and a fondness for the slaughterhouse (like Nubbins, the Hitchhiker). He's stocky with curly brown hair (like Leatherface in at least two of his masks), his clothes are even similar in design to Leatherface, as well as being all one color (like Drayton, The Cook). Lastly, he's wheelchair bound (like Grandpa Sawyer).
* Drayton Sawyer warns the hippies not to go onto other people's property as the others won't take kindly. Whatever his motives (see AlternateCharacterInterpretation), if they'd taken his warning seriously and stayed on their property then they probably would have survived just fine. The Sawyers may be cannibals but they don't kill everyone and it's only due to Leatherface that the entire thing becomes a massacre. His warning is blown off but is actually serious and to the point as he says that it'd be dangerous to leave their property.
* As the Hitchhiker is the only family member that full on embraces psychopathic, ghoulish behavior and we see that he plays with corpses for fun, Leatherface's masks are probably gifts from his brother and not actually made by the big infantile man himself.

* A kind of terrible Fridge DramaticIrony but the protagonists get themselves killed by going into the Sawyer family residence uninvited. There's actually places that it would have been legal to kill them as intruders. It becomes TooDumbToLive as they're explicitly warned against it by Drayton not an hour before.

* Arriving at the Grandfather's house, Franklin examines the blood symbol on the van with a dried up "sausage" in his mouth. As the plot unravels, its obvious on 2nd viewing that Franklin has a dead man's penis in his mouth. Creator/GunnarHansen and Daniel Pearl point this out on the DVD commentary and the shy director Creator/TobeHooper laughs it off unconvincingly.

* A kind of terrible Fridge DramaticIrony but the protagonists get themselves killed by going into the Sawyer family residence uninvited. There's actually places that it would have been legal to kill them as intruders. It becomes TooDumbToLive as they're explicitly warned against it by Drayton not an hour before.

* Drayton Sawyer warns the hippies not to go onto other people's property as the others won't take kindly. Whatever his motives (see AlternateCharacterInterpretation), if they'd taken his warning seriously and stayed on their property then they probably would have survived just fine. The Sawyers may be cannibals but they don't kill everyone and it's only due to Leatherface that the entire thing becomes a massacre.

** And taking Grandpa Sawyer's age into account, the tradition probably dates back over a century.

** Even more creepy when you consider the macabre dinner scene. From the perspective of The Sawyer Clan, they are having a formal family dinner.

* Arriving at the Grandfather's house, Franklin examines the blood symbol on the van with a dried up "sausage" in his mouth. As the plot unravels, its obvious on 2nd viewing that Franklin has a dead man's penis in his mouth. Gunnar Hansen and Daniel Pearl point this out on the DVD commentary and the shy director Creator/TobeHooper laughs it off unconvincingly.

* The worst FridgeHorror of all was revealed on the DVD, where Gunnar Hansen [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqPP4UTwmz8 discusses filming conditions in the climactic dinner scene]]. Not only did he ''actually'' cut Marilyn Burns' finger with the knife, but at one point he believed he was meant to literally kill the actress.

* Franklin repeatedly blowing raspberries up at the ceiling seems weird and random, but he's expressing frustration. Kirk and Pam are upstairs, laughing and sounding like they are having sex (they aren't). Franklin can't go up the stairs because of his disability. At that time it probably all caught up with him: the fact he's the only single person in the group (he probably never had a girlfriend and likely can't have sex anyway), that he's disabled, and that nobody really wants him to be along anyway. He's not part of all of this, he's the outsider in every way.

* Franklin repeatedly blowing raspberries up at the ceiling seems weird and random, but he's expressing frustration. Kirk and Pam are upstairs, laughing and sounding like they are having sex (they aren't). Franklin can't go up the stairs because of his disability. At that time it probably all caught up with him: the fact he's the only single person in the group, that he's disabled, and that nobody really wants him to be along anyway. He's not part of all of this, he's the outsider in every way.

* Franklin repeatedly blowing raspberries up at the ceiling seems weird and random, but he's expressing frustration. Kirk and Pam are upstairs, laughing and sounding like they are having sex (they aren't). Franklin can't go up the stairs because of his disability. At that time it probably all caught up with him: the fact he's the only single person in the group, that he's disabled, and that nobody really wants him to be along anyway. He's not part of all of this, he's [[TheLoad]].

* The worst FridgeHorror of all was revealed on the DVD, where Gunnar Hansen [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqPP4UTwmz8 discusses filming conditions in the climactic dinner scene]]. Not only did he ''actually'' cut Marilyn Burns' finger with the knife, but at one point he believed he was meant to literally kill the actress.

* Arriving at the Grandfather's house, Franklin examines the blood symbol on the van with a dried up "sausage" in his mouth. As the plot unravels, its obvious on 2nd viewing that Franklin has a dead man's penis in his mouth. Gunnar Hansen and Daniel Pearl point this out on the DVD commentary and the shy director Tobe Hooper laughs it off unconvincingly.

* The worst FridgeHorror of all was revealed on the DVD, where Gunnar Hansen [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqPP4UTwmz8 discusses filming conditions in the climactic dinner scene]]. Not only did he ''actually'' cut Marilyn Burns' finger with the knife, but at one point he believed he was meant to literally kill the actress.

* The Hitchhiker placed a curse on the teenagers. The film is about the metaphysics of karma and the Law of Attraction (staples of the psychedelic hippie movement) as Pam explains the dark forces upon them with her astrology book and later Sally reveals that she thinks "everything means something, I guess". The Hitchhiker takes a photo of the teens and burns it when they embarrass him, thus dooming them. He cuts his own hand with Franklin's knife and then cuts Franklin's arm with his own razor, creating a blood ritual. When kicked out of the kids' van, the Hitchhiker smears a symbol in blood on their van, which Sally and Franklin notice later but no one else takes seriously. The ejected Hitchhiker does a psychotic ritual, blowing a raspberry, and later Franklin (as he too descends into darkness) shows the same strange behavior. The film is full of occult imagery and references to sunspots, probably added by writer Kim Henkel whose ''Film/TheTexasChainsawMassacreNextGeneration'' sequel is full of occult and conspiracy references. Director Tobe Hooper's own sequel ''Film/TheTexasChainsawMassacre2'' expounds on the major theme of "they live on fear... they live on fear".

* The Hitchhiker placed a curse on the teenagers. The film is about the metaphysics of karma and the Law of Attraction (staples of the psychedelic hippie movement) as Pam explains the dark forces upon them with her astrology book and later Sally reveals that she thinks "everything means something, I guess". The Hitchhiker takes a photo of the teens and burns it when they embarrass him, thus dooming them. He cuts his own hand with Franklin's knife and then cuts Franklin's arm with his own razor, creating a blood ritual. When kicked out of the kids' van, the Hitchhiker smears a symbol in blood on their van, which Sally and Franklin notice later but no one else takes seriously. The ejected Hitchhiker does a psychotic ritual, blowing a raspberry, and later Franklin (as he too descends into darkness) shows the same strange behavior. The film is full of occult imagery and references to sunspots, probably added by writer Kim Henkel whose TheTexasChainsawMassacreNext Generation sequel is full of occult and conspiracy references. Director Tobe Hooper's own sequel TheTexasChainsawMassacre2 expounds on the major theme of "they live on fear... they live on fear".

* The Hitchhiker placed a curse on the teenagers. The film is about the metaphysics of karma and the Law of Attraction (staples of the psychedelic hippie movement) as Pam explains the dark forces upon them with her astrology book and later Sally reveals that she thinks "everything means something, I guess". The Hitchhiker takes a photo of the teens and burns it when they embarrass him, thus dooming them. He cuts his own hand with Franklin's knife and then cuts Franklin's arm with his own razor, creating a blood ritual. When kicked out of the kids' van, the Hitchhiker smears a symbol in blood on their van, which Sally and Franklin notice later but no one else takes seriously. The ejected Hitchhiker does a psychotic ritual, blowing a raspberry, and later Franklin (as he too descends into darkness) shows the same strange behavior. The film is full of occult imagery and references to sunspots, probably added by writer Kim Henkel whose "Next Generation" sequel is full of occult and conspiracy references.

* The Hitchhiker placed a curse on the teenagers. The film is about metaphysics and the Law of Attraction (staples of the psychedelic hippie movement) as Pam explains the dark forces upon them with her astrology book and later Sally reveals that she thinks "everything means something, I guess". The Hitchhiker takes a photo of the teens and burns it when they embarrass him, thus dooming them. He cuts his own hand with Franklin's knife and then cuts Franklin's arm with his own razor, creating a blood ritual. When kicked out of the kids' van, the Hitchhiker smears a symbol in blood on their van, which Sally and Franklin notice later but no one else takes seriously. The ejected Hitchhiker does a psychotic ritual, blowing a raspberry, and later Franklin (as he too descends into darkness) shows the same strange behavior.