A brilliant debut

Rating: 7/10 (2 December 2004)

'So many people are so ungrateful to be alive. But not you - not anymore.'
'Saw' is the project of James Wan and Leigh Whannell; two Melbourne boys who between the two of them wrote, directed and starred in a psychological thriller that has made the big-time in Hollywood. Shot on a budget of a little over one million US dollars and shot in only eighteen days, this dark, grungy and bloody film is a true testament that the Hollywood dream of nobodies turning into somebodies overnight can come true  with the film currently grossing over US$53,000,000 and being screened world-wide.
The film opens with Adam (Whannell) and Lawrence (Elwes) waking up in the dark, only to find that they are chained in a filthy bathroom with a dead body between them, a tape recorder, two hacksaws, a gun and one bullet. It is the beginning of a game by a disturbed serial killer who asserts that unless Lawrence kills Adam by six o'clock, his wife (Potter) and daughter will be killed. With that said, we now historically backtrack through the killer's games he has played with other victims, and follow the exploits of Detective Tapp (Glover) as he attempts to apprehend the violent psychopath.
Whannell's performance, with the exception of occasionally slipping back into an Australian accent, was very good  much better, unfortunately than Elwes performance  whom I think was mis-cast. James Wan's feature film directorial debut is excellent - very horror noir-ish  with most of the violence implied rather than shown  although you still feel quite uneasy during many of the flashback scenes despite not actually seeing the gore.
During an interview, Wan mentioned that he was limited due to timing constraints rather than budget constraints, and that the idea for the film was deliberately produced as a low-budget film. He said that what you see in the film is only about thirty percent of the vision he had for the film  having said that, I'm not sure if I could handle his full hundred percent and found the thirty to be plenty for me.
I did enjoy this film and absolutely adored the ending  with the exception of one spoken clichéd line of script at the very end  which, if you go and see this film, will find out what it is.
If you're after a violent storyline, don't get turned off by a bit of blood and loved films like Se7en, then Saw will probably really appeal to you.