Making a Sequel to Saw Without Being Redundant Would Do What Saw II Has No Choice But to Do, Which is to Air Out the Mystique That Made the Original What It Is.

Rating: 7/10 (10 November 2008)

This is the sequel to the horror film that mortified me more than any other horror film to this day. That horror film's sequel is the shocker that has come closer to making me ill more than any other horror film. It is either chance or a universal understanding of certain disgusting things of which I am hyperaware. As Twisted Pictures's $4 million survival horror sequel opens, someone finds out that a very important key has been implanted behind his right eye. He finds a scalpel nearby. The biggest doozy is when a group of victims comes upon a pit filled with thousands of used and bloody hypodermic syringes, with a key to an antidote hidden within. I have never come so close to passing out during a movie. And I have seen one whole hell of a lot.
Saw II is a lot of impact in its brutality, but does not compare to its predecessor in terms of sheer fright. James Wan and Leigh Whannell's original Saw is claustrophobic, fear of the dark, fear of clowns, a horrific villain we only scarcely know thus one we only scarcely understand thus one that scares us. Making a sequel to this film without being redundant would do what this film has no choice but to do, which is to air out the mystique that made the original what it is.
It is a very enjoyable film because the film features the Jigsaw Killer finally being apprehended, but trapping the thoroughly unscrupulous arresting officer, played by Donnie Wahlberg, in one of his own games while showing another one of his twisted machinations involving eight people in progress at the same time. It also explores Jigsaw's philosophical back story, which seems to feel more coherent in concept rather than in execution.
Co-writer and director Darren Lynn Bousman, the Splat Pack newcomer who, beginning here, was tied to the Saw franchise for three of its outings, gives the film a brooding graininess and relentless grit, and frankly he does not resort to unnatural editing to manufacture a peak of intensity like James Wan did with the original, though Wan made a better film. There is, nonetheless, a feeling of expediency given to Saw II that undercuts the intensity anyway.
Characters like Xavier, played by bouncer-turned-actor Franky G, a ruthless drug dealer among the eight victims, provoke shock and angst from us but that doesn't stop him from being ridiculous. Consider a character who, having abandoned the other seven, realizes that one number of the combination to the safe which holds an antidote they all urgently need, has been written on the back of each of their necks. He begins to endeavor upon stalking and killing them to see the numbers on the backs of each neck, rather than hastening their escape by notifying them all of what he knows, which would have them all working together as quickly as possible to achieve their common interest to survive this nightmarish situation. I can understand a character who is cold, selfish and ruthless, but I can't understand why such a person wouldn't keep his fellow captors alive if it would benefit him.
By and large, Saw II is pure gorefest entertainment. There is more ferocious cruelty at a higher frequency than its ancestor, and less of a chill by the end which you cannot rationalize.