SAW II (2005)

Saw II (2005) – Jigsaw locks a few unlucky people in a booby-trapped shelter and they must find a way out before they inhale too much of a lethal nerve gas and die. But they must watch out, for the traps Jigsaw has set in the shelter lead to death also.

I was a huge fan of Saw. It came out of nowhere, had a tiny budget and just plain shocked everyone that went to see it. Not only was it an excellent thriller in the mould of other serial killer films like Se7en & Silence of the Lambs, but it brought a level of gore and torture to an audience that they weren’t used to seeing in mainstream cinema, and they lapped it up. Of course, too much of a good thing leads to countless rip-offs and they dilute the market, resulting in films like Saw and Hostel getting blamed for creating the torture porn craze. Despite that, and looking past the critical mauling these films tend to get, I am here today to continue my reviews for the franchise. After all, part 1 of my review came out on Halloween, so it’s only been 7 months in coming……

As always, when reviewing a franchise there may be spoilers. I won’t give away the twists or anything crazy, but sometimes if you havent seen any of the series all I can recommend is that you go watch part 1 and work through them before reading anything. Or maybe just scroll to my scores and see how highly I rate them.

Still here? Ok, here we go.

After the financial success of Saw, a sequel was immediately green-lit. Leigh Whannell and James Wan were busy preparing for their next film and were unable to write or direct. Luckily a young man named Darren Lynn Bousman wrote a script called “The Desperate” before Saw was released and was looking for a producer but many studios rejected it. Another man who was a producer named Gregg Hoffman (RIP good sir) received the script and showed it to his partners Mark Burg and Oren Koules. It was decided that, with some changes, it could be made into Saw II. Leigh Whannell became available to provide re-writes of the script, and along with Bousman they wrote Saw II.

The film opens with one of Jigsaw’s latest victims, in this case a police informant, in a bit of a quandary. Will he mutilate himself in order to get to a key and unlock a deadly venus flytrap-like contraption secured around his head, or will he be unable to tear himself apart in order to ultimately survive? Immediately we are thrust into this world, and seeing how far someone will go to stay alive.

Guess where the key is?

After his escape and revelations at the end of the first movie, we now catch up and find out our Jigsaw killer is slowly dying of cancer, and in much worse shape than we last caught  a glimpse of him. After goading the police, they find his hideout and storm in to capture him. What they find is Jigsaw hooked up to IV’s and he doesn’t put up a struggle when confronted.

The ‘Jigsaw’ Killer

The easy capture turns out to be part of his twisted plan. It seems Jigsaw’s already coordinated his next murders. He’s locked a group of eight people in an unknown location with a video feed set up for the police to watch. And to make things even more interesting, one of the potential victims is Detective Mathews’ (Donnie Wahlberg) son Daniel (Eric Knudson). If it wasn’t personal before, it definitely becomes that way after Mathews sees what’s happening to the strangers Jigsaw’s kidnapped and forced to fight for their lives. They are in an abandoned house that is rigged with elaborate murder devices. Matthews and his partner Kerry (Dina Meyer) can only watch on Jigsaw’s hidden cameras as the victims discover their fate.

Donnie Wahlberg as Detective Matthews

Inside the booby-trapped house are a collection of former drug addicts and convicts whom Jigsaw has chosen for his latest experiment in survival of the fittest. Trapped in the house with Daniel are Xavier (Franky G), Jonas (Glen Plummer), Addison (Emmanuel Vaugier), Laura (Beverly Mitchell), Obi (Tim Byrd) and Amanda (Shawnee Smith). In a cruel twist of fate, Daniels destiny lies partly in the hands of Amanda, since she was a victim in the original movie. Despite escaping her original trap, she hasn’t learnt her lesson and has been punished by Jigsaw yet again and forced to play games for her life once more. How the antidote is hidden is part of Jigsaw’s sadistic pattern of complicated killing devices that allow the victims a role in deciding how far they will go to save their own life.

In the original film, Jigsaw (Tobin Bell) is only seen very briefly. Here in part two he is front and centre the whole time, and that was such a good thing to see. I remember clearly wondering how they would approach a sequel, and it was a novel twist to have our killer (who states he never actually kills) right up and front, taunting the watching police.

With a much larger budget (tiny in comparison to most hollywood movies) and larger cast, Saw II really excels and surprised me. So many times horror fans are treated to sub-standard cash-in sequels, and it’s so nice to see this movie not fall into that category. Only a couple of flaws stop this movie scoring an equal very high rating as the original.

Watching Bousman doing his thing as a director made me a fan of his for life. I’ve watched and reviewed his more recent work, and Mothers Day is still the best film he has made in my opinion. With Saw II he made his name, and showed off lots of skills, fast cuts, scene transitions and of course importantly with this kind of movie the man has an eye for blood and pain!!

The acting on show in Saw II is great. Wahlberg was so much better than I anticipated he would be, and it’s nice to see Shawnee Smith get a bit more camera time here. But the treat and highlight is watching Tobin Bell bring Jigsaw into our lives. He is such an iconic villain now, and the most remarkable (frightening) aspect is that he could be anyone of us. Just a normal man, with no superpowers or witchcraft to fall back on. Sure, his mind may be a little twisted, but the reasons (or his reasons) become clearer as the franchise progresses.

Shawnee Smith as Amanda. A drug addict who never learnt her lesson

Saw has become synonymous with gory traps and surprise endings. Both of those criteria are ticked off here. Plenty of blood and ingenious traps for the gore hounds, and an ending so spectacular and surprising it rivals the first one in my humble opinion.

The main thing that Saw movies are is really good horror movies. Bloody, brutal, squirm inducing, stomach churning horror movies. This is what you want from the blood and guts genre. Saw II delivers and then some, and the best thing about loving Saw II is that there was only 12 months to go until Saw III came out. Stay tuned for my thoughts on that soon.

Posted by Tysoncarter182 on June 1, 2013

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