Saw II (*)
review by Jon
Waterman
Tough-headed cop Eric Matthews is hot on the trail of one
of the most clever, elusive and dangerous criminals out there.
He has to hurry up, because somewhere, the mastermind Jigsaw
has trapped a group of people in a house as part of his sick
game. Each person in there is constantly breathing in toxic
gases that will kill them if they don’t figure out the
clues to the locked antidotes. But of course, many of the clues
are booby trapped, and so they must be careful and watch every
move.
Now, I know most of the time you want the bad guy to win in
horror movies, because that will mean you are treated to more
of the death and gore that you paid good money to see. With “Saw
II” that desire grew very strong, very fast. In the first
movie, I simply didn’t care about any body. This time
around, I found them to be excruciatingly stupid and mind-numbingly
annoying. And there were more of them to hate. Not only was
the gang in the house unbearable, but so was Donnie Wahlberg’s
character, Eric. I never thought I would legitimately sympathize
with a villain like I was forced to do in this feature.
What made the first one watchable were the creative situations
and ultimatums that arose. Here there’s a hint of that,
but it hardly comes to fruition. Seemingly important questions
brought about through the course of the film weren’t
answered when there was no good reason for them to be left
that way. I don’t think I’m necessarily ruining
anything by saying that the main puzzle leading to their survival
(along with a couple less significant ones) never gets solved
(and not for the reason you might think).
The editing and script were equally terrible. I think the
first scene had more cuts in it than the first movie had in
its entirety. It relies so heavily on the rapid cutting to
not only force a sense of discomfort, but also to attempt to
force the audience in thinking the movie is cooler than it
really is. I do applaud the movie by showing Jigsaw and turning
him into a decent character. If the back and forth between
him and Eric wasn’t so lame, maybe I’d enjoy him
more.
Everything about this movie seemed forced and completely sub-par.
For example, the relationship they establish between Eric and
his son (who is trapped in the house, thus forcing more unneeded
tension) is done in one quick scene and a rapid cutting between
a few still snapshots; all of them consisting of the two sitting
on a curb talking. Is that really the best they can do? Is
that his most cherished memory of his son? Why are there multiple
pictures of that one instance instead of several different
events that would seem actually important? It may seem like
I’m nitpicking here, but that simple sequence acts as
a running metaphor for the pathetic production churned out.
Some how, this falls far short of the already low standards
of its predecessor.
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