13 Scariest Movie Endings That Kept You Up All Night

On paper, Tobe Hooper's seminal 1974 shocker has an ostensibly happy ending. The beleaguered final girl Sally (Marilyn Burns) is the sole survivor of a road trip that went horribly wrong when she and her friends crossed paths with a savage backwoods family of cannibals.

The final act is a hellish ordeal for the protagonist and the audience alike, as a hysterical Sally is held prisoner by the psychotic clan, who make no bones of their plans for her imminent demise. Battling her way out, hotly pursued by the hulking Leatherface (Gunnar Hansen) with flailing chainsaw in hand, Sally finally escapes, piling into the back of a passing pickup truck.

One would assume such a conclusion to come as a relief - and yet, there's no sense of peace whatsoever as Sally speeds away to apparent safety. She stares back at Leatherface as he shrinks into the background, her blood-stained face and guttural screams still every bit as hysterical as back in the house. Her body has survived, but it doesn't look like the same can be said of her mind.

As for Leatherface himself - he clearly stands ready and more than willing to kill again another day, or quite probably later that very same day, as he spins around in a rage twirling his chainsaw through the air against the light of the rising sun.