Saw 3-D (2010)

"Game over."

Before we begin, and celebrate with huge relief having been through em the whole damn franchise, a point of order; I saw this on DVD, and thus both in glorious 2-D and under a different title. That aside, we have a puzzle, a film that, despite its box office success, has been panned by critics both professional and amateur. I have no idea why this should be so, other than a preconceived desire to bash the franchise; this may be no classic but it's a neat resolution and a good little film in its own right.

We begin with a spot of nostalgia, as we return to Cary Elwes as the surviving Dr Gordon  from way back on the first film. Perhaps, given that this is the first sign of the franchise beginning to eat it's own mythology, this is a sign that now is a good time to stop but, for now, the intrigue of Gordon's return works, as does the inevitable eventual realisation that he's been working with Jigsaw all the time. And it's fitting that he should be the one to finally dispatch Hoffman and bring the killings to an end.

Even the opening ordeal, with the two men and a woman in the shop window, is almost nostalgic in its basic structure and the use, once more, of that cute little puppet. On a bike, no less. In sure the children love that scene.

Oh, and the woman, Dina. Dies. Painfully, via her intestines. With loads of blood. How charming. 

Still, the film is mainly about the comeuppance of fake Jigsaw survivor and purveyor of typically vacuous self-help shite Bobby Dagen, a neat concept, as he has to navigate a typically ghoulish series of traps which result in his and others' deaths. Again, lovely, although not as satisfying as Hoffman's eventual comeuppance at the hands of, fittingly, Gordon. It's a very neatly plotted series of events. That's a good thing, I suppose, but it strikes me that we never ever seem to find people surviving Jigsaw's little traps by thinking outside the box that is his narrow little mind. That, I think, would be truly satisfying. My main criticism of the films is that they operate entirely within Jigsaw's rules, which could be said to be a sort of endorsement of said amoral psychopath.

That's not all; a bunch of neo-Nazis are tortured in the usual way, too; only with neo-Nazis do I have to actually remind myself that Kramer and Hoffman are both equally psychopathic bastards with no redeeming features between them.

The ending is ironic, and sort of justifies they franchise's increasingly inaccurate title: Hoffman is put in to the same trap as was Gordon at the end of the the first film. But this time there is no saw...

Saw VI (2009)

"What am I supposed to learn from this?"

It's a little odd, perhaps, to see a Saw film with a left wing message. Like the Punisher and Dirty Harry, these films have always carried a transparently reactionary attitude to crime and punishment in which brutal revenge matters and to hell with due process, rehabilitation or the unjustly convicted. Yet here the left wing, communitarian message is combined with these reactionary views on crime and punishment. This reminds us of two things: firstly, the social democratic left has never been particularly liberal; and secondly, people in real life are more complicated in their politics than to adopt the standard left wing or right wing package of views as a whole.

This film concerns how the recently late and unlamented John Kramer was unfortunate to live in a first world country with a third world health system, one in which, instead of the government buying in everything wholesale with huge discounts and passing the price on to the taxpayer, there is mostly a reliance on the private sector, the profit motive and dodgy insurers.

We know that William Easton,the health insurance bloke who turns down John, is inevitably facing a grisly fate. He may, strictly speaking, simply be a cog in a larger machine, but the plot takes care to emphasise both his personal culpability for, in effect, sentencing John to death, and shows him to be the sort of cad who cheats on his wife on her birthday for good measure. He's doomed.

Meanwhile, in the present day, our old friend Hoffman finds himself investigating his own crimes, and the scapegoating of the late Strahm seems to be going perfectly. And, of course, Jill has been left a box by her serial killer husband, no doubt intended as some sort of "lesson". Sensibly, she has some red wine before opening it. Oh, and Perez (remember her?) is awkwardly still alive. We know full well that Hoffman is going to get rumbled. He deserves it; flashbacks reveal his involvement from a very early stage.

Hoffman and Jill are working together. There are envelopes. There are frightening views expressed about drug addiction (and wrong- look at Amanda). The plot, meanwhile, is as delightful a puzzle as always, and as usual the saving grace of the film.

William's test is, I suppose, grimly appropriate; he is pitted against a Man who neglects his health, and forced to restrict his breathing. William is the one who lives and, of course, learns nothing from this pointless ordeal. I'm beginning to suspect that, for this film at least, the authorial voice agrees with me.

We are not done with William; he has to choose, arbitrarily, which of his staff lives or dies, and he gets a philosophical chat with John. His penultimate test is to suffer physical pain to help an underling, or she dies. It is he, as the boss, who has the agency here, the power of life and death. Naturally, he refuses, what with her being an expendable pawn, and there is a fight, the unfettered free market red in tooth and claw. The left wing subtext here is extraordinary; it is interesting that this film was released shortly before Obama's still rather right wing health reforms became a thing.

William's final test is a massacre of his entire staff, except that he can save a maximum of two by painfully giving up his hands. Lovely. This is a nice little microcosm of what he does for a living, of course, and naturally they all die. In the final twist, his death comes atcthechands of a woman who holds a grudge against him and is not, as we assume, his wife.

We end with the usual stream of revelations, and Hoffman's fatal comeuppance at the end of Jill. I like this film a lot; Jigsaw remains a psychopathic, sanctimonious shit, but at least this time the film was about something.

Saw V (2008)

"They're connected. So in the end all of the pieces will fit together."

Veteran readers of this blog will recall that I blogged the first four of these films four years ago, and rather enjoyed the intricate plotting and clever final reveals that these films have always had. But I always had my qualms, being of a somewhat liberal bent, as to whether John Kramer's brutal attitude to law and order was endorsed by the authorial voice. I finally stopped watching, though, after the gore went a little too far. I'm not very squeamish, but I have my limits.

Still, it's time to return to the final few films in the series, starting with this one: I hate to leave a job unfinished. And it's a good 'un; the plotting is as intricate and superb as ever, with a cruel twist at the end in which Strahm not only dies horribly but is framed for Hoffman's crimes. It was surprisingly good to get back into this series of films; the familiar Twisted Pictures logo put a huge smile on my face.

We begin with a typical torture puzzle from Jigsaw, the details of which, I think, we shall draw a veil over. The difference, of course, is that he does what's required and dies anyway, as it is Hoffman, not Kramer, who is in charge. Crucially, those who, like myself, see absolutely no moral difference between Hoffman and Kramer. They're just different types of psychopath.

Strahm, the poor bloke, is certainly warned from the start not to enquire further, but he is certainly the good guy here. Sadly, though, he's no match for the late, evil, clever Jigsaw, whose control over his intricate plans, and indeed his wife, extend well beyond death. He reminds me very much, I think, of Ian Brady. It seems absurd that the films can continue on and on after the demise of the central character, but they do, and it never feels silly.

Mark Hoffman, meanwhile, is praised and promoted, the smug bastard. At least we know, even at this point, that he will eventually get his brutal comeuppance. We see flashbacks to his first meeting with Kramer, and everything is neatly retconned for him to have been Jigsaw's accomplice all the time. There is a discussion about "ethics" between these two evil men, as Kramer is under delusions that he is somehow less evil; he rages against a "corrupt legal system that puts murderers back on the streets" but, rather revealingly, conspicuously fails to give a monkeys about the wrongfully convicted.

The film centres around an intricate, sadistic trap for a group of people involved in corruption surrounding a building that proved to be a death trap, one if whom is Julie Benz from Angel. It's a clever sequence, in which it is their failure to work together, as intended, which dooms them; the Saw franchise is back on form.

I must say that Strahm's eventual death is needlessly horrific, but this is bloody good. I hope this standard can be kept up.

Saw IV (2007)

“You think it’s over, but the games have just begun…”

John Kramer is dead. Very dead. So dead, in fact, that the film begins with his autopsy. But that doesn’t mean that we’ve heard the last of Jigsaw. Things have been set in motion from beyond the grave, and an unsuspected individual is carrying on the nastiness.

This film covers some edgier themes than its predecessor, but in spite of some extreme gore it doesn’t feel as sadistic, perhaps because of these themes. There’s a slightly stronger focus (relatively speaking) on character, with even John himself being given some greater depth in flashback, not that his past remotely justifies his actions, of course. Nevertheless, Tobin Bell is excellent as ever.

As before, a supporting character in previous films (in this case Officer Rigg) is promoted to a starring role because of the disturbingly high death count amongst his colleagues. Intricate and sadistic situations happen. There is blood. There is suffering, much of vaguely ironic. You know the drill by now. The references to previous filmed are becoming increasingly intricate, as are the concluding revelations. The “everything you think you know is wrong” factor gets bigger and bigger with each entry in the series.

And yet… well made though this is, and less gory than its predecessor (that, of course, is a relative statement!), the very serious themes leave a bad taste in the mouth. Child abuse and miscarriage are used, without much in the way of subtext, to titillate, and this makes me feel a little uncomfortable.

Time for an extended break from the Saw films, methinks. I’ll eventually be back to do the rest.