Movie: Saw from 2004 by Director James Wan

I can’t believe I am doing this to myself. It’s 10:00 at night. I’m sitting upstairs in the dark all by myself watching Saw. I’m so freaked out. Everybody told me this was a totally freaky movie.

It’s put out by Twisted Pictures.

These camera shots and lighting are really good.

Adam and Lawrence Gordon, a doctor(a surgeon, actually) just woke up in this place. They have no idea how they got to this place. Lawrence was on his way home from work. And Adam was in his “shit hole” apartment. They are both chained to the wall. There is a dead guy in the center of the room holding a gun with blood coming out of his head.

Adam woke up in a tub of water.

It is 10:20 on the clock.

Adam has a tape in an envelope in his pocket. It says play me. Lawrence has a key and a bullet in his envelope, along with a tape.

The dead guy is holding a recorder that would play the tape. It’s out of reach. He uses the tub plug attached to his shirt to grab the tape player.

The tape gives Adam an ultimatum… will his watch himself die in this room or will he do something about it. Lawrence’s tape says he has to kill Adam by 6:00. Alice and Diana will die if he doesn’t kill him.

The cast includes: Leigh Whannell, Cary Elwes, Danny Glover, Ken Leung, Dina Meyer, Mike Butters, Paul Gutrecht, Michael Emerson, Benito Martinez, Shawnee Smith

In the toilet there are two hack saws. They both try to cut the thick chains. It doesn’t work. Lawrence realizes the guy wants them to cut through their feet.

Lawrence thinks he knows who it is… indirectly.

Paul, another person, was given two hours to climb through barbed wire.

This is all being done by: “The Jig saw Killer” – he finds ways for his victims to kill themselves.

I don’t know if it is because I’m writing this but I’m actually not totally freaked out right now. I watched “The Grudge” last week and I was a mess. I’m totally interested in this movie. But I’m not completely a wreck.

Lawrence was a suspect in the murder of Paul. They want to know where he was between 11:00-1:00 the night before. His pen knife was at the murder scene. Lawrence was seeing someone.

This was all five months previous to the current situation.

We meet Amanda who escaped from the Jig Saw killer. She remembers only beign able to taste blood and metal. Ok, this mask she’s got on is freaky. She sees a totally freaky masked person on a tv screen… it’s the killer. She has a reverse bear trap on her face. It will rip her face apart before dawn if she doesn’t get the key out of the stomach of her dead cell mate.

She took a knife and tore open this guy’s stomach. He was drugged with an opiat. She got the reverse bear trap off her face.

Amanda is a drug addict, that’s why he picked her. The killer tells her that she will now be greatful to be alive. She feels that he helped her.

Adam addresses now what we maybe all suspect… that possibly Lawrence is the killer. That’s clever of the movie. It’s taking Lawrence out of it right now.

Someone can see them from a camera.

Lawrence says, “To overcome something you have to understand what a perfect engine it is.” That’s a cool thought.

Lawrence thinks about the last thing he said to his daughter, Diana. She calmly goes to her mom and says, “there’s a man in her room.” Lawrence goes to check it out. He says there’s no such thing as the bad man. His daughter asks if he will ever leave it

I think the movies that really freak me out of the ones where things jump out of no where. It’s kind of a cheap thrill. But that’s the kind of movie that makes me a wreck. This movie is a little smarter than that, it seems. It’s more like “Seven”.

There’s a picture that Adam sees in Lawrence’s wallet of his wife and daugter tied up and gagged, on the back of the picture it reads: “X marks the spot. Sometimes you see more with your eyes shut.”

There was a man in her closet!! After Lawrence leaves, he jumps out and ties up his wife and kid. It’s wierd, there’s a black man surveyling Lawrence’s house. But someone else is in his house. I think the black man was the detective who thought Lawrence was the killer.

Tap, the detective, hear’s on the video tape, given to Amanda, a fire alarm and sees a graffiti tag on the video. He’s able to find the warehouse where the Jig saw killer produced his video. He and his partner are in there with no back up. They come acrossa 3-D model of the room where Lawrence and Adam are now. They also see the mask the killer used in the video.

Underneath a red cloth is a man who has a drill pointed to his head. The killer starts the drills. They will drill into the head of the person if they don’t pick the right key. The Asian detective shoots the drills stopping them. The killer slashes Tap’s throat. The Asian detective shoots a person in the rope the killer was in. (I somehow don’t believe it’s the killer.) The detective sets off a boobie trap and gets shot. Tap, stumbles down the stairs to see his partner dead. The killer escapes injured.

We now go back to Tap in a dingy apartment with tons of pictures. He is obsessed with the case.

Back in the room, Adam has Lawrence turn off the lights. They find an X made out of glow in the dark paint. Behind it, in the wall, there’s a box. It’s locked. The key from Lawrence’s envelope opens it. There’s a cell phone, cigarette, and a note. The note basically says that the cigarette will kill Adam. Adam really wants the cigarette.

The night before, there was someone in Lawrence’s car with a red robe and a horse mask. That’s who got him.

Lawrence finally sees the photo of his kidnapped family.

The cigarette will poison Adam.

Lawrence and Adam plan something in the dark.
They try to trick the killer by making him think Adam smoked the deadly cigarette. He pretends to die. But the killer has thought of this and has electric current running through Adams chain. The killer shocks Adam and he is forced to show he isn’t dead.

We learn that Adam was kidnapped by a person in the same costume as Lawrence’s kidnapper. He was hiding in Adam’s closet.

Lawrence’s wife tells him on the cell phone to not beleive Adam’s lies. His wife says Adam knows all about Lawrence.

Apparently Adam does know Lawrence. Adam takes pictures of guys who cheat on their wives. Lawrence was going to cheat on his wife. But he thinks better of it. While he’s in the room with the potential mistress he gets a call there. The person says, “I know what you’re doing, Docter.”

A guy named Bob paid Adam $200 per night to track Lawrence. This “Bob” is Detective Tap. Tap was discharged. He broke down after his partner was killed.

Lawrence’s wife was able to get off her gag. While the killer was out of the bedroom, she tries to get loose of her ropes.

Zep, an orderly at the hospital, was in one of the pictures. Lawrence knows it was Zap.

Lawrence’s wife breaks free. She gets his gun. She gets the cell phone Larry is on. She talks to Larry and asks where he is. The killer gets a chance to attack Mrs Gordon. They fight. Tap comes in. There’s a gun fight. Tap is out of bullets. He rushes Zep. Lawrence is crying on his floor. Tap is injured. Zep has a leg injury. Tap runs after him.

Lawrence is shocked badly by his leg chain. He is passed out. Adam tries to wake him up. It works.

Zep races to the warehouse where they are to kill Lawrence. Tap is right behind him.

There is another gun fight. A cell phone is ringing in the room with Lawrence. But it is out of reach. Lawrence is breaking down pulling on his chain. Lawarence pulls off his shirt, makes a turnikit around his leg. Lawrence starts cutting off his foot.

Tap and Zep in in a hand fight. Tap struggles with Zep. Tap gets shot in the struggle.

Zep is on his way. Lawrence cuts off his foot, loads the gun in the middle of the room and shoots Adam.

Lawrence’s wife and child are safe, but Lawrence doesn’t know.

Zep comes into the room, he is abot to kill Lawrence. Zep is about to kill Lawrence.

Adam’s not dead, he attacks Zep. Lawrence crawls off to get help. He is going to bleed to death if he doesn’t. His face is white.

He crawls off out of the room.

Adam finds a wallet in Zeps pants. He’s looking for a key. Here is a recorder in his pocket. Zep is actually a pawn in this too. Zep has poison in him that only the killer has the antidote. Zep had to kill Lawrence’s family.

All along, the person laying in the middle of the room was alive. He is the killer.

John has an inoperable frontal lobe tumor. John has been controlling this whole thing from that place all along. A certain disease that was eating him from the inside.

The key for his leg chain was in the tub from where he was originally. The key went down the drain.

Most people are so ungreatful to be alive, but not you, not anymore. Game over.

John turns off the light and slams the door.

***********************
Now that was an exciting movie. I never guessed that the person in the middle was the killer. Pretty clever.

It also wasn’t just pandering to jumpy scared moments.

The movie was shot in 18 days.

Leigh Whannell was the screen writer and also played Adam in the film. They had a “certain” budget and had to get things done within that.

I think this movie was a success. It was captivating, provacative and interesting.

I really enjoyed it. And actually, I’m kind of glad I wasn’t being scared for scared sake. It reminds me of when sometimes I eat something that is so hot I can even appreciate the flavor. Spice is nice as long as it isn’t too much. I felt like this movie was scarey but not so scarey with jerky quick scenes that I was only being scared by that. This was, I think, closer to a triller. Which is actually a better genre than pure horror.

Nice work guys!