Tobe Hooper, who directed one of the truly iconic American horror films of the 1970s,
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, offers his take on another well-remembered scare-fest of the era with this remake. Steve (
Brent Roam) and Nell (
Angela Bettis) are a young couple living in Los Angeles who are short on money -- she's just started work as a teacher, while he's a medical student doing his internship. They rent a flat in the Lusman Arms, a once beautiful but now decaying (and therefore affordable) apartment building managed by the sleazy Byron McLieb (
Greg Travis), who tries to pass off the ramshackle accommodations as "charming" and "historic." Watching over the Lusman Arms beside Byron is Ned (
Adam Gierasch), a greasy simpleton who serves as the building's handyman. Steve and Nell haven't been living at the Lusman especially long when she notices that a growing number of young women living in the building have been meeting a violent death, and with some help from good-hearted part-time actor "Jazz" Rooker (
Rance Howard), she begins looking into the murders and makes some disturbing discoveries about both the building management and her fellow tenants. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide