Bites off more than it can chew

Rating: 3/10 (16 January 2005)

Two men wake up in room, chained to the wall, a dead guy on the floor with a tape recorder and a gun next to him. That's the premise of Saw, a film that thinks it's more clever than it is.
Obviously having borrowed inspiration from Seven (and other similar films), Saw is very entertaining for half an hour or so. Once the characters are established and the rules of the game are set up, the film stops dead. The story goes nowhere, relying on an onslaught of flashbacks to tell the story, leaving time for the audience to reflect upon the gaping plot holes, bad acting, and inane dialogue.
Screenwriter Whannell unwisely casts himself as one of the leads, and from time to time, it feels more like a comedy watching him, Elwes, and Glover chewing up the scenery while delivering bad, albeit unintentionally funny, lines. The plot is also so reliant on characters doing (or not doing) certain things at a specific time that it just ends up defying all common sense.
At first sight, Saw also seems to be a very gory film, but upon closer inspection you realise that it isn't true. Things are implied, but never really shown. I'm not saying that I'm thirsting for blood, but it would at least have made the film a bit different, rather than a rehash of old ideas and tired clichés. A promising start followed by, more or less, crap does not make a good film. However, the final minute was bloody brilliant - I'll give them that. [3/10]