Hooper spent the 1960s as a college professor and documentary cameraman. His 1965 short film
The Heisters was invited to be entered in the
short subject category for an
Academy Award, but was not finished in time for the competition that year. His first feature film,
Eggshells (1969), was made for $40,000. Soon after, Hooper leapt to fame with
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974). He combined elements from a story he wrote about isolation and darkness with the inspiration of graphic news coverage of violence, with his belief that people were the true monsters being a key element for the film. Along with
Kim Henkel, they co-wrote a screenplay that had elements based on the murders of
Ed Gein and
Elmer Wayne Henley while forming a company named Vortex, Inc. They produced the film alongside Jay Parsley and Richard Saenz. The low budget (roughly less than $140,000) meant that the film was shot seven days a week, having shooting times up to 16 hours a day, dealing with brutally hot temperatures, high humidity and limited special effects. Hooper had to deal with the
Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) with the rating; he had hoped the limited amount of gore seen in the film would give it a PG, but the original print was given an X rating. After some cuts, it was given an R rating. The film was cited as one of the scariest films of all time, with film critic
Roger Ebert, despite awarding it only two out of four stars, describing it as a "weird, off-the-wall achievement." It was also a huge commercial success, making $30 million in the United States and Canada, while being one of the highest grossing independent films of the 1970s. Hooper's next film was
Eaten Alive (1976), co-written by Henkel and producers Alvin L. Fast and
Mardi Rustam. As with
Massacre, the film was inspired by serial killings, this time the murderer
Joe Ball, who killed at least two people in the 1930s and whose crimes led to his nicknames of 'The Alligator Man' and 'The Butcher of Elmendorf'. The movie was filmed on sound-stages in
California. Hooper provided the music alongside Wayne Bell - but walked off the production before shooting completed. Hooper had his biggest budget yet with the television mini-series of ''
Salem's Lot (1979), filmed on a budget of $4 million for CBS while being released theatrically in some countries. It was a screening of Massacre'' that led producer Richard Kobritz to hire Hooper as director. He shot the film from July to August 1979, although the film differed from the source material (particularly with the violence and graphic scenes) in order to meet broadcast standards. He described it as 'very spooky - it suggests things and always has the overtone of the grave. It affects you differently than my other horror films. It's more soft-shelled...it has atmosphere which creates something you cannot escape - the reminder that our time is limited and all the accoutrements that go with it, such as the visuals.' Hooper then went on to make
The Funhouse (1981) about teenagers who are stalked by a killer in a carnival fun-house. In 1982, Hooper made
Poltergeist, based on a story by
Steven Spielberg. Hooper was selected by Spielberg to direct based on his prior work, Spielberg having co-written the screenplay and co-produced the film. It was Hooper who collaborated with Spielberg to make it more of a ghost story than the original science-fiction-based treatment had been, as it had originally been conceived as a sequel to
Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Cannon Films approached Hooper with the offer of a three-picture deal. He made
Lifeforce (1985),
Invaders from Mars (1986) and
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986). Hooper also began working steadily in television. Hooper's later works included
Spontaneous Combustion (1990); the television movie ''
I'm Dangerous Tonight (1990); and Night Terrors (1993). He directed an installment of the made-for-television feature Body Bags (1993). His works also include The Mangler (1995), The Apartment Complex (1999), Crocodile (2000), Toolbox Murders (2004), and Mortuary'' (2005). Hooper was asked to contribute to the series
Masters of Horror; he responded by directing "
Dance of the Dead" (2005) with
Robert Englund in the first season, and "The Damned Thing" in the second season. Hooper was inducted into the
Texas Film Hall of Fame in 2003. In 2010, writer and actor
Mark Gatiss interviewed Hooper for the third episode of his BBC documentary series
A History of Horror. Hooper's first novel,
Midnight Movie, was published on
Three Rivers Press in 2011. His supernatural thriller film
Djinn premiered at the 2013
Abu Dhabi Film Festival. == Personal life ==