Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III (1990) (Unrated) [Blu-Ray]

Director: Jeff Burr

Cast: Kate Hodge, William Butler, Ken Foree

Release Date: February 13, 2018

A Review By: Kevin Lovell

Disc Rating: 7.5/10

Synopsis:

Two college students driving coast to coast are lured off the main highway and onto a deserted Texas road. Here they are stalked by the menacing Leatherface and his demented family…a bizarre cannibalistic clan with blood on their hands and a feast on their minds. The students’ only chance for escape is a survivalist with enough firepower to blast Leatherface and the rest of the grisly predators to hell. A depraved shocker of intense terror from the gruesome beginning to the bloody finish.

The third installment in the series and the first absent of Tobe Hooper’s involvement, ‘Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III’ was initially intended by New Line Cinema to kickstart a new franchise focused take on the material that never quite found the desired momentum. Following two travelling college students who after some bad luck and a couple nasty twists of fate find themselves trapped in the unfamiliar Texas landscape and being ruthlessly hunted by the chainsaw wielding Leatherface and his new family of cannibalistic misfits. At long last, ‘Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III’ is now available to own Unrated on Blu-ray from Warner Archive Collection.

A fairly underrated and quite enjoyable horror film and far from the worst of the franchise’s entries, ‘Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III’ definitely has its problems, but as a whole it still manages to provide a solid addition to the series with plenty of twisted fun and bloody carnage to satisfy. Directed by Jeff Burr (From a Whisper to a Scream, Pumpkinhead II: Blood Wings) and featuring a quite decent cast that includes Kate Hodge (Rapid Fire), William Butler (Ghoulies II), Ken Foree (The Devil’s Rejects), R.A. Mihailoff (Hatchet II), Viggo Mortensen (The Lord of the Rings trilogy) and more, the film was originally unleashed upon audiences in January of 1990 to far from stellar acclaim, most likely do to the plethora of cuts required to appease the MPAA and acquire an R rating for the movie. It may certainly seem fairly tame by today’s standards, yet even so ‘Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III’ does deliver some notably gory moments and still holds up as a bloody good time overall. Many longtime fans of the sequel will surely be beyond thrilled to finally have the opportunity to own the Unrated version in HD on Blu-ray, especially with the impressive high definition video and audio presentations included on Warner Archive’s MOD Blu-ray release.

Overall, fans of this undeniably fun third entry in the Texas Chainsaw Massacre series and diehard fans of the franchise overall intent on collecting every film on Blu-ray will both almost surely want to make a point of purchasing a copy of Warner Archive Collection’s MOD Blu-ray release of ‘Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III’ to add to your collection. The release delivers impressive high definition video and audio presentations of the movie’s unrated cut, far surpassing the picture and audio quality of any previous home video releases it has seen and should be a definite must own for the fans. Those who enjoy other ‘Texas Chainsaw Massacre’ films but haven’t previously had the pleasure of this one may also want to consider finally giving it a shot now that it’s finally available to own on Blu-ray, looking and sounding better than ever before.

VIDEO:

Warner Archive Collection’s Blu-ray release of ‘Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III’ features a full 1080p High Definition presentation of the film’s Unrated Cut utilizing a 1.78:1 Aspect Ratio. The video presentation looks surprisingly fantastic as a whole and offers a sharp, detailed and smooth presentation that still retains some grain and a few other artifacts representative of its source. It holds up impressively even during the numerous brutally dark moments and fast moving sequences, never causing anything occurring on screen to become negatively affected or rendered indiscernible. Overall, this is a wonderful high definition video presentation from Warner Archive Collection that’s complimented by a more than adequate bitrate and should easily thrill the majority of fans.

AUDIO:

The Blu-ray release features a lossless 5.1 channel DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack. This lossless multichannel soundtrack offers a crisp, clean and occasionally quite aggressive audio presentation throughout. It frequently takes advantage of all five available channels in order to send nature elements, bits of dialogue and some creepy sound effects along with more throughout the various speakers when fitting, and never allowing any dialogue or additional audio elements that may be occurring simultaneously to become distorted or rendered inaudible in the process. Overall, this is a solid 5.1 channel DTS-HD MA soundtrack that delivers from start to finish and contributes some additional fun to the experience.

SPECIAL FEATURES:

Warner Archive Collection’s Blu-ray release of ‘Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III’ includes some enjoyable extras for the fans (none of which are brand new extras created specifically for this release to my knowledge). Included on the release is a ‘Filmmaker Audio Commentary featuring Director Jeff Burr and many more’, in addition to a behind the scenes Featurette ‘The Saw Is Family: Making Leatherface’ (running approximately 28 minutes in length) that explores the troubled production; plus a closer look at many of the cut, trimmed and abandoned gore sequences in ‘We Knows What to Do with Them Parts… Deleted Scenes Documentary’ (running approximately 10 minutes). An ‘Alternate Ending’ (approximately 5 minutes) and the ‘Trailer’ for the movie (1 minute) are also included.

*Please note that the above images are taken from the Blu-Ray and resized. They additionally will suffer quality loss as a result of .jpg compression. Larger versions of each image can be viewed by clicking on the image. All images and content included on this Blu-Ray release are the property of their respective owners.

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Disc Rating: 7.5/10

‘Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III’; Own the Original Uncut Classic, Now Available on Blu-ray from Warner Archive Collection

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You can purchase your copy of ‘Leatherface: TCM 3’ by clicking on the Amazon Cart Icon immediately below or purchase it directly from the WBShop by clicking HERE!