Posts Tagged ‘saw’

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0489270/

Dir. Darren Lynn Bousman

A masterclass in narrative failure and pointless grossness.

Scenes appear, then vanish without a trace or point. The narrative skips around between what feels like two separate, tangentally connected films. Proving again that the Saw series is a single half-decent idea poorly explored and extended for monetary purposes.

I will say that the acting in this is a LOT better and consistant than in Saw II. The character of the doctor is… dull, her reasons for being chosen by Jigsaw are lame and her scenes trying to keep the dying Jigsaw alive can never be tense because we know, as an audience, that her death can only really occur at the end of the film, too soon would leave us solely with Amanda watching Jeff undergo his test. Still, she is performed decently.

Amanda is, as she was in the second film, the more vocal and whiny expression of Jigsaw’s angsty quest. There are multiple sequences that retcon her into the first movie as being part of original game, which are simply there to pad the movie out. I am unsure of whether the film is trying to evoke sympathy for her, but if so it’s failing horribly. She is mostly annoying and spending so much time chronicling  her rubbish story drags the film down. Even with the ending twist.

Jeff, played by Angus Macfadyen, is one of the better performances in the series. His motivations are clear and understandable, his emotions abley portrayed in each test, but he is strangely relegated to the background when he is the more interesting than Amanda. Coming in at the end he still feels strangely unrelated.

Tobin Bell is, as always, playing a shitty character well.

The traps are disgusting, the gore is much more of a focus in this one and it’s the first point in the series where I could say the “torture porn” reputation is completely accurate. The pig trap was foul and the “angel trap” (as the DVD feature is currently telling me) that pointlessly killed Kerry was gross AND fake looking. This is film entirely for gore fans, nothing more, and it has the same sort of “eternally teenage” mood that created Backyard Wrestling.

It has many of the same problems as the second film and compounds them with an increasing mess of continuity. There’s no point in going into it.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0432348/

Dir. Darren Lynn Bousman

It’s time for Saw II and another tour with Jigsaw the whiny dying murderer who is impossibly skilled at avoiding consequences for his convoluted deathtraps.

I’m roughly seven minutes in and the cops have already been stupid beyond words, going into Jigsaw’s lair without checking for traps. He’s been doing this for eight, nine years and they hurf-a-durf their way through the doors and into certain death. Brilliant.

Now I’ve been introduced to our staple of victims being watched on the monitors of blatant after effects filters. They’re uninteresting and unlikeable from the off and I already don’t care about any of them, which is a very poor start to the proceedings. My guess right now is that actual horror and fear is far from the aim of this, it’s acting more like a gore-hungry slasher where the victims are mere meat. I’m not against slasher movies themselves, I enjoy a good laugh through an Elm Street or Friday the 13^th sequel (and genuinely love the original Nightmare), but the few good slashers that exist are either clever and actually scary or very dark comedy. This is currently neither.

What isn’t working for me in terms of horror is that the situations are so completely ludicrous that I am not afraid. In the first film the main setup in the room is improbable, but it is just grounded enough to feel possible, unfortunately the other flashback stories are somewhat idiotic (especially code flambé) and quickly detract from the idea that could have worked much better.

The performances are pretty awful from a lot of the victims in this, especially captain rough and tumble Xavier, he’s so horribly overplayed and poorly written. Out of all of them the kid, Erik Knudson is by far the best but Shawnee Smith is ok. Donnie Whalberg and Dina Meyer are passable, the other cops are poor. Finally Tobin Bell is actually quite good as Jigsaw, he’s just a stupid character with idiotic motivations, but I can see why he’s being latched onto as a new horror icon character.

I’ve just hit the point where they’ve stumbled into the original bathroom from the first film which is a dumb link. It’s a very lucky property he found with the massive house, secret underground passages to a bizarre underground bathroom, and an apparent upstairs floor so deep you could dig a pit into it.

Now the film is over and had a mixture of a decent idea and utter stupidity for the finale. The video feed not being live was a great idea, an actual clever twist in a film that was otherwise idiotic. It set up an incredible amount of plotlines that went no-where, the “link” they all had was never explored, the game itself was never really looked into, they barely touched on Jigsaw’s point, the characters were just meat and the whole film was built around the bloody overblown traps.  The final twist with Amanda becoming the new Jigsaw is painfully stupid.

The film just doesn’t work, it’s not scary, it’s not tense and it’s not particularly enjoyable. The direction and editing was pretty dire, the enormous flashback sequence was almost as painful as Silent Hill’s “All the plot in the final 10 minutes” pacing. Despite all these problems I am, partly for the purpose of study, but partly out of a weird curiosity to see how the series develops, going to watch Saw III when I can get my hands on it for cheap.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0387564/

Dir. James Wan

I’m not much for the ‘torture porn’ genre of films, they’re there mostly just appease gore hounds and usually have no point. Still, in the interest of furthering my understanding of films I’m watching Saw right now. As such my paragraphs will be somewhat disconnected as points occur to me.

I’m around 50 minutes in and what is hitting me the most is that there is a total lack of atmosphere. Things are happening and while they’re competently directed the editing and music choices are ruining any atmosphere the piece could have, especially the awful fast-motion with nu-metal sequences, they’re more comical than scary. There is the germ of a good idea in here, unfortunately it’s underdeveloped and as such feels like the first draft of a student film which thinks it’s cleverer than it is.

I cannot believe a bloody minute of this film. The idea that jigsaw has been doing these ludicrous rube-goldberg traps for years on end without being caught is completely stupid, there would be a critical mass of forensic evidence given how much preparation is required. I know it’s a film and you’re meant to be more forgiving, but this is just idiotic. The cops are so stupid it hurt; after successfully finding Jigsaw they just act moronic, forget all their training and let him get away. In this scene there are many times they could have easily disabled, caught or killed him but they don’t.

The performances in this are exceedingly hammy. I’d imagine if the scenery weren’t so covered in shit and rust they’d be chewed thoroughly. The most convincing has been Danny Glover and it’s a role he’s very prepared to play, the angry ex-cop. These hammy performances have meant that the build-up to the moment the title is referencing hasn’t worked at all, it’s not got the power they wanted.

The ‘moral challenge’ idea is awful  because it’s naive and childish, it would have needed much more time being developed with a lot more thought put into the idea. It could have been a proper moral challenge with a real motive instead of just a dying whiner who wants other people to ‘appreciate life’. It just feels like pathetic setup.

The ending montage was terrible, fast cuts of obvious reveals with loose ends flying everywhere. No resolution, no point and no satisfaction in watching it.

The film was not what I expected, its reputation as a torture-porn gore film is undeserved. It’s got torture as a theme but it is far from graphic, especially when you look at other films like Final Destination 3. It feels like James Wan and Leigh Whannel watched Seven, missed out on what made it great, and tried to copy it.