Chadzilla ROARS!!! (The Official Blog of Chadwick H. Saxelid, Writer)

Saw 3D (2010)

There once was a time that I loved the Saw series for what it was: a gleefully gritty and nasty Americanized Giallo series (the Saw movies amped up the family friendly gore and violence, while toning down and/or flat out erasing all of the offensive and not family friendly sex and/or nudity) that wasn't afraid to go full tilt pulp when attempting to deliver a mind blower of a twist ending.  When the first Saw ended with the big reveal of who Jigsaw was, I literally burst out laughing and applauded.  I had not seen a twist so lovably ludicrous since Dario Argento's Tenebre, and that is why, at that very moment, I dubbed the film (and every one of its equally ludicrous sequels) American Giallo.

But there also came a time when I began to ask myself, why am I watching this?  That happened when I sat through Saw III's brain surgery sequence.  When that film ended, I hoped against hope that the series would go out with a winner (at least in the financial sense of the word, as the film really does not qualify as an artistic success) and let it stay a trilogy.  But it grossed some 80 million at the box office, so more Saw was a forgone conclusion.

I sat through Saw IV more out of duty, and to placate my son, who really wanted to see it, than any interest in the series.  While I liked certain aspects of the twist ending (i.e. Saw IV's story took place during the events of Saw III) there was nothing about it that made me want to see Saw V or Saw VI.  I was done with the series.  So were a lot of other people, as the low box office returns for Saw VI showed.

But then they had to go and not only make a "Final Chapter," but make it in 3D.

 
Self-proclaimed Jigsaw survivor turned self-help guru Bobby Dagen (Sean Patrick Flanery) makes the unwise decision to bring his best-selling book tour to Jigsaw's home turf.  What makes his decision unwise is that Dagen is not what he claims to be.  He has never been in one of Jigsaw's traps, but that is going to change very soon...

While Dagen navigates one of Jigsaw's mazes of traps, police detective Gibson (Chad Donella) attempts to chase down Jigsaw's psychotic henchman, Hoffman (Costas Mandylor).  Jigsaw's widow, who attempted to dispatch Hoffman at the end of Saw VI, is more than willing to help Gibson find Hoffman.  In fact, she's desperate for Hoffman to be captured, so he won't be able to kill her.

The new, and supposed final, Saw film is as boilerplate as the last two that I sat through.  Screenwriters Patrick Delton and Marcus Dunstan (Feast I - III, Saw IV-VI, The Collector) simply put a cast of ill-defined and underdeveloped "characters" into situations where they can die slow, gruesome and painful deaths.  None of the situations seem to be connected to one another, it's just a jumble of death and torture.  The most unconnected of them all is the film's opening set-piece, which has nothing whatsoever to do with the two intertwined stories that come after it, and seems to exist simply to give a sterling example of how misogynistic horror films can be.  The rest of the movie is no better.

Bobby Dagen's plight is a sketchy one, at best.  A mere gimmick to populate yet another lethal obstacle course, at worst.  With the sole exception of Dagen's wife, there isn't a single person in any of the traps where it really matters whether or not they survive.  That none do really isn't a spoiler, as the series has pretty much dispatched with the whole moral lesson of the traps for those that are stuck in them.  Whatever lesson that Dagen, who, despite his callous dishonesty, seems like a nice enough guy who truly loves his wife, is supposed to learn from this experience is beyond me.  Perhaps the lesson is to not make money off of the exploits of self-righteous serial killers.  Where was Jigsaw when they made this movie?

The only other thing of note, if it could be called that, is the unsurprising fan service of bringing back Cary Elwes' character of Dr. Gordon, the primary victim in the first film.  He isn't in the movie all that much, but, should there be a need for yet another sequel - A New Beginning, if you will - then he will be back in a far larger role.  You can count on it.

One star out of four.

Saw 3D "full" trailer.

I liked the first three Saw movies in an Americanized giallo kind of way, but I gave up on the series with part four.  I just lost my taste for that kind of entertainment.

Until now, it seems.

The full trailer for Saw 3D has made its debut and it is every bit as over-the-top in its cheesiness as the trailer for My Bloody Valentine 3D had been (which was, not suprisingly, released by the same studio) and just got me grinning with its Barnum-style "This movie could KILL YOU" hype.

 

 

I doubt that it will be all that good, but I do hope that it will be fun.  As to whether or not this will indeed be the last film in the series, well that depends on how much this one makes and the collective greed of those involved.

Saw IV (2007)

"Live or die, it's your choice."

Jigsaw (Tobin Bell) and Amanda (Shawnee Smith) are dead, but their torturous games have only just begun...

To reveal anymore of the plot of Saw IV (which pretty much begins where Saw III ended) would spoil the fun of having the now completely expected twist ending unleashed on the "unsuspecting" viewer.  I knew the twist going in, because I was curious and had no intention of seeing the film, I thought it best to let the series end with Saw III and move on to less gruesome thrills, but my son was determined to see Saw IV.  So I found myself attending a matinee screening with him and suffering through yet more horribly sadistic torture segments.  Happy happy, joy joy.  At least they weren't nearly as horrible as those in Saw III, but they still had me covering my mouth and, on one or two occasions, my eyes.

While the series traps remain as vicious as ever, the plot twists in the ever expanding and increasingly convoluted Saw storyline are starting to run the risk of stumbling over their own knots.  To make the twist work this time around, Saw IV has to juggle and weave together three or more separate story lines:  Jigsaw's abduction and testing of SWAT Team leader Rigg (Lyriq Bent), the search for the abducted Rigg by Detective Hoffman (Costas Mandylor) and FBI Agents Strahm (Scott Patterson) and Perez (Athena Karkanis), and the back story of Jigsaw himself.  Say what you will about the film, but this isn't a movie in which you can just switch your brain off and enjoy.  Not if you want to appreciate how all the twists and turns in the story spell out NEW DIRECTION.

Just how successful this new direction will be remains to be seen (there is still a lot of explaining that needs to be done) and, thanks to the current WGA strike, I think it might be some time before that will come to pass.  Next Halloween could very well be the first one in four years without a new Saw movie to bloody up theater screens around the world.

Saw III

"Suffering?  You haven't seen anything yet."

Although Jigsaw (Tobin Bell) is on the verge of death, he still has enough energy to play one last, and quite brutal, end game with Amanda (Shawnee Smith).  Together they abduct an emotionally troubled surgeon (Bahar Soomekh) so that she will keep Jigsaw alive long enough to see if their latest unwilling game player, Jeff (Angus Macfadyen), will manage to survive his series of life threatening tests.

Let the game begin...

Saw III manages to beat the odds and bring the story of Jigsaw to an end that both satisfies and stays within the series multiple twist endings formula.  Screenwriter Leigh Whannel (who wrote, as well as starred in, the first Saw and who also co-wrote Saw II) gathers together all the characters and plot threads and ties them up into a tight knot of scares and suspense.  Considering how fast these movies have been put together (three in just as many years) and that Saw II was an original project revised into a sequel after the surprsing success of the first film, it seems to be something akin to a minor miracle that these movies don't have more of a slapped together feel to them.  But they don't, Saw III even fills in all the supposed plot holes of the first two films, explaining how the games were planned and the victims trapped.  It makes sense, somehow, despite the mythos and plot lines being threaded through what were, at first, completely unconnected stories.  I think that says something positive about the creative team behind the Saw series.

If I had to say something negative about this film, it's that the amount of violence and torture in it is far too gruesome for its own good.  But, as the ending revealed, it was entirely necessary to both the plot and the film's penultimate twist.  It's just that getting there was almost as traumatic for this viewer as it was for Jigsaw and Amanda's victims.  If you choose to see this movie, and if you liked the first two, then this is a must see, just prepare yourself for some gory trauma.  There were some moments so grotesque and painful that I had to cover my eyes and turn away.  But I still love the movie and look forward to purchasing the inevitable Saw Trilogy DVD Box Set, when it hits shelves some time next year.  Just in time for Halloween, I'd wager.

Saw II (2005)

"Oh yes, there will be blood."

The Jigsaw killer (Tobin Bell) has struck again, this time leaving a personal message for Detective Eric Mason (Donnie Wahlberg) that leads Mason right into Jigsaw's booby-trapped lair.  But it has all been an elaborate ruse.  Jigsaw reveals that he has trapped several people, all of whom have some sort of connection to Mason, inside a house.  With those people is Mason's estranged son.  A deadly nerve agent has been released into the house and those inside have a limited amount of time to figure a way out before they start dying gruesome deaths.  Let the new game begin.

The Jigsaw killer has officially joined the pantheon of great horror/slasher movie villains.  He's right up there with Hannibal Lecter and John Doe on the perverse genius level.  Like Doe, Jigsaw singles out his victims for a specific reason and always reveals to his victims that he has been in utter control of the game since minute one.  Some viewers might have had a problem with the first movie's ending.  I did not.  I loved it on an EC horror comic level.  It made perfect sense within the movie's insane (albeit contrived) story.  Walking into the theater to see the sequel (which was rushed into production so it could be made and released in time for the same Halloween weekend opening as Saw, not a good thing) I wondered if the movie would once again be able to capture that EC comic style lightning in the bottle.

Boy did it ever.

Saw II takes the stuff that worked in the first movie (the intricate mind games and brutal death traps) and disposes of the stuff that didn't (the flashback reveals and Plot Point Amnesia, where the characters suddenly remember something only when it is necessary to the plot for them to do so).  The result is a far stronger movie than the one whose story it manages to continue, despite Jigsaw, survivor Amanda (Shawnee Smith, giving a stunning performance) and Detective Kerry (Dina Meyer) being the only returning characters.  More so than in the first movie, it is each character's moral and/or emotional weakness that snares them in Jigsaw's gruesome and brutal death traps.  They truly bring it upon themselves.

Screenwriter Leigh Whannel, who wrote and acted in the first Saw, has done an excellent job of turning director Darren Bousman's original script into a sequel that expands and enriches the Saw mythos.  Showing that, whether this entry does well or not (and I hope it does very, very well), the Jigsaw killer will always remain unstoppable and in control of the game.  So you had best play by the rules.