*Disclaimer* If you haven’t seen Saw or Saw II the following review will spoil those films, there is no possible way to review this without doing so.
The games continue, as Saw III starts off where the previous film ended. We see (at least we think we see) the fate of Eric Matthews (Donnie Matthews), and a new game has begun. We see that ‘Jigsaw’ (Tobin Bell) is now on his death bed, his apprentice Amanda (Shawnee Smith) has taken over for the most part. They kidnap a doctor called Lynn (Bahar Soomekh), to try and help ‘Jigsaw’ alive. Meanwhile a man named Jeff (Angus Macfadyen) who is still grieving the loss of his son is put through a series of games relating to the incident which killed his son. What is ‘Jigsaw’s ultimate motive? Who will pass and who will die?
Quite simply there is actually a lot going on here, the police know who ‘Jigsaw’ is but they are unable to find him. Kerry (Dina Meyer) is still on his trail, discovering yet another game which ended badly. However the rules seemed to have changed, the game this victim was apart of what seemed to be impossible to survive. As the audience we know why it has changed, ‘Jigsaw’ is not acting alone, he has Amanda with him now. We see her relationship with ‘Jigsaw’ and just how early on it started, it is obvious she is not a stable woman and she does not entirely share the same ideals as her mentor. Enter Lynn the Doctor, put in a situation where she must keep ‘Jigsaw’ alive, a trap is placed on her, so if ‘Jigsaw’ dies she also will die. However ‘Jigsaw’ tells Lynn that if the man playing their other game gets through it, the trap will be removed and she will be free to go. Enter Jeff, we see he is a very sad man, having lost his son in a tragic accident. He seems suicidal, and perhaps his daughter is the only thing from stopping him from doing the deed. His trials are different, as he is faced with seeing people in traps who had something to do with his son’s death. The ultimate game for Jeff was forgiveness as we soon find out, but can he do it? There is so much at stake here, and unlike the previous film we only have a handful of characters to invest in, and this makes for a better film. The consequences seem so high here, and as the audience we want to see Jeff get through his trial. Lynn didn’t come off as well but I didn’t want to see her fail either. Amanda is suffering too, and there seems to be more going on then we are initially led to believe. This film still brings us back to the beginning, we see the fate of Adam as well as Amanda’s role in that game. It all actually does make sense, and it feels like maybe this was planned all along. Saw III brings the series to a full circle, with a conclusion that surely should have ended the series. I chose to look at these first three films as a trilogy on their own, and it’s a damn good one.
Again the acting is for the most part great stuff, with Tobin Bell again stealing the show. He’s made this character his own, and it shows, ‘Jigsaw’ is both the villain but also some what of a sympathetic character. Bell plays all the right notes, and he manages to have strong chemistry with his co-stars. Shawnee Smith delivers a very strong performance, while she might look like a cutie, she’s ultimately the real sick one. She doesn’t quite grasp the mentality behind the games, and she definitely puts her own spin on them. Dina Meyer was great again, while her story arc does come to an end it was necessary to happen. Bahar Soomekh was on and off for me, while at times she was really good, other times she just didn’t quite make it work. Her character was a bit hit and miss, it was a little hard to sympathise with her at times. Angus Macfadyen put on a strong performance, Jeff is a character we can relate to, would we react any different if we were in his shoes? He was convincing, and he made us care about Jeff’s journey. Costas Mandylor shows up briefly, and whether or now at this stage Saw IV had been written it felt strange until you see that film.
With the same team behind the previous film at work here, I felt this even surpassed that film. I liked the less is more approach with the characters, it gives us as the audience more of a chance to invest in them. The script was tight and clever and it wrapped itself up nicely. While we still have some twists and turns (remember, this is all still like putting a puzzle together), they all pretty much made sense and the clues again where there for us to find. While I did predict how this would go down because I paid attention to the clues it did not lessen the impact. Darren Lynn Bousman definitely matured and came into his own as a director with this film, he has a great eye and the talent to get good work out of his performers. Again the traps were probably even more gross and twisted (literally) then the previous films, and they were definitely a site to see. I also miss the traps lasting, like they did with the first film. This film at times felt a bit more emotional, and I felt like they wanted to wrap things up as nicely as possible. It is easy to stop at this film and enjoy Saw as a trilogy, however there are still unanswered questions, I can’t say for sure if that was on purpose or not. Part of me after seeing this did want to see yet another film, and part of me wished they hadn’t gone ahead with one. Highly recommended viewing after the other two films, I really got a lot out of this one.
Saw III was part of my Horror Films For October, you can find the entire list here.
The Super Network 