As a massive and avid SAW fan since its inception in 2004, I thought the film overall was pretty poor, which seriously pains me to say in a review. The film is lifeless and had no SAW-like qualities from the previous seven films in it.
I totally understand Lionsgate reasoning rebooting the franchise and bringing SAW to the modern world with new characters, new colour palette, direction etc; however as an avid fan I felt robbed of all the hype I had in my own mind and expectation since the film was announced last year.
Take nothing away from Charlie Clouser and his soundtrack, once again it is spot on! A very unusual take of the film to begin with, unlike previous instalments, it felt like a TV crime drama was just copied and pasted from a CBS show onto the editing software Kevin Greutert uses; at the time i'm there thinking what the hell is this i'm watching here!
100% not scary, jump scares weak. Hardly any gore or that SAW-style visceral piece of storytelling that made the franchise what it is.
I understand the reasoning and story behind the traps they produced, but it felt like the writers made them all up in the space of 2 minutes without actually thinking about how to add that violent tension which makes the trap scenes unsettling to watch.
To be fair, for me it does have one of the best twists in the franchise... but the ending was very cheap and stingy from a fans point of view. You come to expect that decent climax and the "wtf" moment like the previous seven films, but all I saw was nothing but garbage which was truly unsatisfying. The film clearly does not push itself further.
I even shook my head slightly when it ended.
I dunno, maybe i'm too hung up on the previous story/characters, and maybe I'm gonna have to watch it again to try and reap some benefits. But for me it is one, maybe the worse film in the franchise. Even after the film I kept thinking that I could have done a better job. The Spierig Brothers did an okay job with a very tacky script with only scene that stands out the most.
I totally understand Lionsgate reasoning rebooting the franchise and bringing SAW to the modern world with new characters, new colour palette, direction etc; however as an avid fan I felt robbed of all the hype I had in my own mind and expectation since the film was announced last year.
Take nothing away from Charlie Clouser and his soundtrack, once again it is spot on! A very unusual take of the film to begin with, unlike previous instalments, it felt like a TV crime drama was just copied and pasted from a CBS show onto the editing software Kevin Greutert uses; at the time i'm there thinking what the hell is this i'm watching here!
100% not scary, jump scares weak. Hardly any gore or that SAW-style visceral piece of storytelling that made the franchise what it is.
I understand the reasoning and story behind the traps they produced, but it felt like the writers made them all up in the space of 2 minutes without actually thinking about how to add that violent tension which makes the trap scenes unsettling to watch.
To be fair, for me it does have one of the best twists in the franchise... but the ending was very cheap and stingy from a fans point of view. You come to expect that decent climax and the "wtf" moment like the previous seven films, but all I saw was nothing but garbage which was truly unsatisfying. The film clearly does not push itself further.
I even shook my head slightly when it ended.
I dunno, maybe i'm too hung up on the previous story/characters, and maybe I'm gonna have to watch it again to try and reap some benefits. But for me it is one, maybe the worse film in the franchise. Even after the film I kept thinking that I could have done a better job. The Spierig Brothers did an okay job with a very tacky script with only scene that stands out the most.