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Saw (2004)

Director: James Wan

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Movie review

From Time Out London

Why see ‘Saw’? Because it has teeth and it cuts to the bone. Two men wake up in an underground bathroom, chained to the pipework. Neither knows the other, or why they are there. The audience is equally in the dark, knowing only what they know: they may be victims of The Jigsaw Killer, who devises cruelly inventive ways for his victims to kill themselves. In the middle of the room is the body of man who has blown his brains out. While video-taping them, their captor torments the men with clues about how they might escape.
Veteran cop Danny Glover is so obsessed with the Jigsaw case, he’s lost the plot while trying to fit the pieces together. You may find yourself doing the same, as director Wan and actor/scriptwriter Leigh Whannell ratchet up the twist quotient, then floor you with their final sucker punch. Like David Fincher’s ‘Seven’ and Dario Argento’s inventively nasty gialli, ‘Saw’ fuses an intricate thriller plot with a gruesome horror sensibility. The former sucks you in, the latter chews you up and spits you out.

Author: NF

Time Out London Time Out Issue 1780: September 29-October 6, 2004

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User reviews of this film

Sam said...

Posted on Oct 12 2007 23:06 Damned clever, its clear explotation of the fact that you fear the gore works to make the tension in the film buid up and give you some, and i say some, relief at the end. but its a rollercoaster ride all the way through and the acting is impressive. In a different ballpark to its sequels.

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