Saw Vi! (review)

[shadowx 0]

Da da da........da da da.. da da da da daThat my friends is the tinkle of Jigsaw's genius in song form. Yes, this is the shadox official SAW VI review, exclusive (at the time of writing!) to Xisto. I dont know if thats good or not but i digress! SPOILER ALERT!!! WOOP WOOP WOOP!The film opens in familiar fashion, blurry shakiness resolving into a gritting view of mechanics. a lone woman with a device to her head screams as realisation sets in, the games have begun....We were promised the goriest SAW yet, and they have delivered. This, even to my standards is absolutely extreme. The previous films have nothing on this one, im trying to think of a more brutal trap from the previous films that i can compare to one from this film, but it fails me... There simply is no equal. Allow me to run though them:Opening trap, the "temple" trap (according to the net, thats its name!)This is the one where the woman has a thing strapped to her head, turns out there are screws/bolts either side of her head, in 60 seconds they will crush her skull and tighten about 20 seconds causing immense pain. There is a fat guy opposite behind a grill fence who has the same task and trap, to be freed they must each deposit their own flesh, via a chute onto scales. The one who cuts off the most flesh is released. the fat guy starts slicing at his flab with a knife (provided on a table to each contestant along with a meat cleaver. Both are securely chained so they cant be used as weight) The fat guy has two chunks of flab on the scales. the woman is slowly slicing into her arm with the knife. 10 seconds left....Fat guy is nearly at flab chunk 3 so she grabs the cleaver and hacks her arm off, using her arm to amusingly deposit her severed arm on the scales. The camera angles avoid the cleaver striking her arm, instead showing the facial expressions. And the arm lands vertically on the scales with the severed part hidden, which in all fairness the SAW crew couldnt have made a convincing arm prop, so this works very, very well! She is freed, and we never see her again.Gas mask trap:This film centers around a health insurance exec called William (i think) and how he is bad for not letting the ill get help (we later see Jigsaw was denied life saving treatment) He awakes chained, arms and feet, upright a hospital type mask on with a tube running out of shot. Two large blocks rest either side of his waist holding him securely. The video plays explaining he has explosive shackles on his wrists and ankles that detonate in one hour. we later see that after completing each game he is given one key to remove one shackle, thus 4 games for him. A light illuminates his counterpart in the same device opposite. Jigsaw explains that each breath they take is measured, via the mask/tube and a machine, and that each time they breathe the blocks either side of them close in a bit, crushing them to death at the waist (a particularly horrible death as it would only snap your bones and cause horrific bleeding, not instant death like a real crushing or shooting) Jigsaw explains that Williams formula for judging someones chance of a long life (which he uses to choose who gets life insurance) says that William should survive, as his opposite is an avid smoker who will hence have less lung capacity. So after holding their breath as long as they can each must breath and sure as jigsaw says the blocks crush them slightly. we soon see William bleeding, and then a little later and a few more breaths and his opposite's rib cage is snapped in two leaving him dead and William is freed, obtaining his first key for his shacklesHanging trap:He walks in a room, see two handles attatched to chains infront of him with a window in front and a sign: "Take me" eventually he does hold each one in each hand, one either side. It is revealed that two people stand infront of him with barbed wire nooses standing on hinged platforms. The chains tighten and basically he must hold on to just one chain, saving the corresponding person from a grizzly death. if he doesnt then the chains have such force that one or both will slip from his grasp anyway. It is explained one victim has no family but better health and the other has worse health but a family, she gets saved. The loner dies. William walks on... Obtaining his second key and releasing a shackleSteam room:Nasty nasty place.... grid/grill fencing type dividers lay out a path of crawling and standing parts, leading past jets of steam, hot plates and to a ladder out. The victim, a woman has a device strapped to her chest, basically a harpoon gun that will shoot through her brain in 60 seconds unless she gets the key. She starts her journey, William encourages her to crawl through a jet of steam, she tries but cant. He sees a lever and a sign and knows he can stop the steam, he pulls the lever and gets a jet of steam in the face. hot hot steam, his skin blisters... But alas, he has to help her, so he suffers the pain to help her, this happens a couple of times and she climbs the ladder, he tells her to a look for a key, she sees x-rays of william with a key inside him, he sees them and lifts his shirt to see a long scar near his kidney (hence the blood from the gas mask trap) She has a circular saw in the ladder room grabs it, opens the grid door and slashes for him. A Short fight and he fights her off, the device fires and she is dead. William walks on, getting his 3rd key. one to go....Carousel trap:Any avid saw fan knows this one by now.. all over the internet. A childrens carousel play thing (like a rondabout at a play park) inside a gridded cage spinning with 6 people chained sitting on it facing outwards. A tape explains that a shotgun will fire 6 times at whoever stops infront of it (once per person) like russian roulette it stops randomly. William can save two people by pressing a button. When he does so a spike goes right through his hand, the button is in a device so he cant press it any other way. he saves two people. The rest die. Nuff said!!! a lot of arguing and *BLEEP*ing going on between the victims to try and persuade William they are the best and everyone else is against him. he moves on with the 4th key, free from his shacklesAt all points in these traps there is extreme gore. Even i, a HUGE saw fan, was remarking how harsh cruel and evil this episode was. Very, very nasty!! There is however another game. The grand scheme. Through flash backs we see that William denied a man insurance for heart disease because he didnt mention oral surgery on his application form, and when he needed treatment for heart disease William turned him down. Killing him. This mans wife and kid were in a gridded cage with a vat of acid and a lever with one side "live" and the other "die" on the wall and the same timer that is in each room that William walks in. When the timer says 2 minutes the boy decides to flip the switch to "live" nothing happens. He flips it about but nothing happens at all. A reporter, who turns out to be Williams sister, is in a similar room, but with no switch. She has a tape which she foolishly destroys. William runs through a door with one second to go and find himself in a gridded cage. he is happy to have survived. then the solid metal outer walls of the cage are lifted and it is revealed that Williams cage is between the two other cages, a tape explains that William is the man who led to the death of the boys dad and wifes husband and that the live/die lever is designed for William, the widow and fatherless son must decide if he lives or not.... A verbal battle ensues and the widow decides he should die, she grabs the lever but cant pull it, she cries... The boy says he can, walks forward and pulls the lever. A light above William lights up, showing a roof made of long spikes. A crushing you may think, but no!! the spikes are on an arm (metal arm, not bodily!) and swing downwards, slamming into Williams back. He screams but isnt dead. then a pump starts in each cage under the acid and the acid is pumped into Williams body through the spikes. I should explain that the acid is seen bubbling on the concrete floor, its very strong... over the course of a minute his body dissolves, blood stains come through his shirt, and his body literally melts. At the end we see from behind as his lower body falls away from the rest and his intestines squirm on the floor. I laughed, but not many others did :PAt the same time as this ends various flashbacks have revealed that Jigsaw sent jill, his wife, 6 envelopes, each containing details of a victim, she gives 5 to Hoffman, who sets the traps. Now she has the 6th envelope and is in Hoffmans control room behind him, he sits in his chair, she uses a remote to electrocute him and stun him on the chair. While passed out she puts the reverse bear trap on his face and straps his arms to the chair with leather belts. As she slams the door the pin is pulled and he is aware of his situation. he struggles before realising his escape route... He smashes his hands with the front of the bear trap, crushing and breaking his hands so he can pull them out of the straps (remember SAW I? the guy smashes his foot so he can slip it out of the shackle... uhhu...) but the trap is on and a screwdriver doesnt help. he looks at the door and sees it is glass with metal bars, he smashes the flash, puts the front of the bear trap between the bars and it springs open, bending the bars but only opens a few inches. He is injured but alive. he frees himself, falls to his knees before looking up and screaming, half of his cheek is flapping wildly....and that my friends, will be how SAW VII will begin.. oh yes.... AMAZING!!Now, lets review this... There is another new director this time, hes been on the crew but not is directing, and it shows.... The traps are excellent, truly amazing! However, each one requires the death of one or more others... Which is NOT how jigsaw wouldve planned it in the first few films. Usually each victim has a way of getting out, by themselves or through team work. But this time there is no way for the looser to escape. It pits two people against each other and one MUST die or BOTH die, there is no teamwork to save both players (well, except the steam room i suppose) But apart from that the film fits very well, much better than 5 and on the level with 4. Exceptionally good! The storyline is excellent, the thing to remember with SAW is that the storyline is behind the gore. The gore is there to be fun, but the story is very deep and huge. It is shown that Jill was in on virtually all the traps, at least 3 onwards, she doesnt seem that bothered by it all, and almost helps. It is clear she is more important than just the wife, but how? The story reveals a hell of a lot about her and her importance, it answers many questions and also shows why Amanda is tested in 4/5. It's not just the self harm, she is infact responsible for the death of Kramer's baby, indirectly but its still her fault. Hoffman really works in this film, in 5 it was uncomfortable, he didnt fit in, he couldnt be Jigsaw, it didnt work. But he has embraced his role here, really filling Kramers shoes, he really is excellent. The gore is very intense like i said, but personally i laughed, i have to admit that SAW is no longer a horror flick to me, its amusing, sometimes hilarious (floppy arms in saw 5 anyone? Haha!) but like i said, the fact that the traps are inescapable for the looser ruins it. I am tempted to send an email to the director and find out why this is so... the sets are amazing, different in style to the older films and yet they work so well, much bolder, more light/shadow and a lot more colour. The props are amazing, the fake blood etc... is brilliant, make up is superb and generally the film is very visual and very visually appealing, truly a treasure for the eye. The flashbacks are effective, there are a lot but it doesnt detract from the film so it really really works. the timescale seems linear in that the beginning really does seem to follow on from 5 (you see Straums mangled body being dumped by Hoffman, but of course, the SAW films are never that straight forward....) and the end where hoffman is tested is while he watches the ending scenes of the big game on his screens, but that doesnt mean it is pre-recorded, so there is scope for hoffman actually being far away from the games themselves. there are a few twists such as the fact that the tapes and film suggest the wife and child at the end are his, however it is revealed that they arent. also Jill testing Hoffman in that way was very unexpected. And really, it wasnt a test as Jill never wanted, nor expected him to free himself. Indeed she didnt see the ending so she thinks he is dead. She would be a fool to carry on her life assuming she is safe however as he is sure to make a comeback... Of course the fact that Amanda was responsible for Johns son's death is a huge twist (shee was the reasoin the addict guy went back into the clinic and left in a hurry, killing the baby, so indirectly its her fault as she wanted drugs from him, or was selling them to him), the fact Hoffman kills 2 FBI people (his boss and Perez, who's death was faked to keep her safe) and a researcher who decodes the tapes audibly, so that all 3 hear it is indeed him that made them. But actually, the twists arent as huge as saw 3/4 with the whole screwed up time scales and Hoffman being in on it.Out of 10 i give this an 8.5, it would get 9/9.5 if the traps were more Jigsaw like (IE escapable, and not deadly to one person, more like the "you can escape, but itll hurt" rather than "one of you WILL die, you decide who") I really think you should see it in the cinema with surround sound, high quality etc... not on DVD. Really people, see it. final thoughts:The SAW series has come a long, long way from the fairly simple leg in a shackle thing, its elaborate, hugely complex, and visually stunning. It is however veering away from what Jigsaw would have wanted. I hear there may be 9 films.. I welcome each one but they need to get back on track with Jigsaw and the genius that is.. JOHN KRAMER!

[ProGamer2010 0]

I really thought that this would be the last one this series is good but the anticipation is killing me when will this end when im 80