Saw

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Saw

Saw II

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Saw is a horror film directed by James Wan and written by Leigh Whannell. It was the first film in the Saw franchise and was released on October 29, 2004.

Plot

Freelance photographer Adam Stanheight and oncologist Dr. Lawrence Gordon awaken in a dilapidated bathroom, chained by their ankles to pipes on the opposite sides of the room. Between them lies a corpse, holding a revolver and a microcassette recorder. Both men find recorded tapes in their pockets, and Adam quickly retrieves the tape player. Upon playing his cassette, a distorted voice urges him to escape. In contrast, Gordon's recording tells him to kill Adam by 6:00, as otherwise, his wife and daughter, Alison and Diana Gordon, will be executed.

Adam then finds a bag containing two hacksaws inside a toilet tank. However, Adam's saw breaks apart as they try to cut through their chains. Gordon realizes the saws are not meant to cut through their chains. Instead, they are supposed to cut off their feet, leading him to conclude that they were abducted by a wanted serial killer nicknamed Jigsaw. As he tells Adam about the killer, who tests his victims' will to live by forcing them to fight for their survival in his deadly games, Gordon admits that he was a former suspect in the case.

Flashbacks reveal how the doctor got involved in the homicide investigation in the first place. Five months earlier, Gordon had introduced his medical students to John Kramer, a terminal cancer patient, when Detective David Tapp and Detective Steven Sing visited him at the Angel of Mercy Hospital. They had found his penlight at the scene of Jigsaw's latest game. Although Gordon's alibi cleared him, he agreed to listen to the testimony of Amanda Young, a heroin addict and the only known survivor of one of Jigsaw's games.

Shortly afterward, Tapp and Sing discovered a clue on a videotape used by the killer during Amanda's game. They subsequently found the Jigsaw Killer's hideout in an abandoned mannequin factory. Upon arrival, they found Jigsaw and took him by surprise, saving another victim named Jeff Ridenhour. However, the killer slashed Tapp's throat with a hidden blade, allowing him to escape custody. While pursuing him, Detective Sing accidentally triggered a booby trap and was killed by four shotguns.

In the present, Alison and Diana Gordon are held captive in their apartment while their captor watches Adam and Dr. Gordon via a hidden camera. Simultaneously, the house is observed by David Tapp, who suffered a mental breakdown after Sing's death and was subsequently discharged from the Metropolitan Police Department. However, he decided to continue the investigation and end Jigsaw's games for good. Therefore, he rented a run-down flat across the street from Gordon's apartment, as Tapp still considers him the primary suspect.

Meanwhile, Gordon finds a hidden box in the bathroom. It contains two cigarettes, a lighter, and a one-way cell phone. As time passes, he and Adam both remember how they were abducted by a mysterious figure with a pig mask the night before but are suddenly interrupted by the ringing phone. As Gordon answers the call, Alison, held at gunpoint by her captor, warns her husband not to trust Adam. When Gordon confronts his fellow prisoner with Alison's warning, Adam eventually admits that Tapp had hired him to spy on the doctor. He shows him his photos of Gordon, which he found in the same bag as the hacksaws. Upon doing so, Adam reveals his knowledge of Gordon having an affair with one of his medical students, Carla, whom the doctor had met at a hotel on the night of his abduction. However, he notices that one of the photos was not taken by him. It shows Alison and Diana's captor standing at a window in Gordon's apartment. Upon looking at the picture, Gordon identifies the man as Zep Hindle, an orderly from the Angel of Mercy Hospital.

Seconds later, the clock strikes six, marking the end of their game. As Adam is still alive, Zep prepares to execute Gordon's family. Before doing so, he calls the doctor and forces Alison to inform him about his failure. However, Alison frees herself and desperately fights with her captor. The struggle attracts Tapp's attention, who storms into the apartment and opens fire on Zep, giving Alison and Diana a chance to escape. Zep flees the scene and sets out for the bathroom to kill Gordon. Tapp pursues his opponent to an underground tunnel network where the bathroom is located and brutally batters him, but he is ultimately shot in the chest and succumbs to his wound.

Meanwhile, Gordon suffers a mental breakdown as he is unaware of his family's survival. In a last desperate attempt to save them, he uses his hacksaw to cut off his foot. Then, he takes the gun from the lifeless body in the middle of the room and shoots Adam, who collapses immediately. Moments later, Zep enters the bathroom. He aims his gun at Gordon but is attacked by Adam, who survived the gunshot. After a brief fight, Adam gains the upper hand and bludgeons Zep to death with the toilet tank lid.

Gordon, albeit severely injured, promises to get help and crawls out of the room. Once alone, Adam searches Zep's body for a key to his shackle but finds another audiotape instead. When playing the recording, he discovers that Zep was a Jigsaw victim himself. The latter had injected him with a slow-acting poison and ordered him to capture and kill Gordon's family if the doctor failed his test. In return for that, Zep would have been given the antidote.

When the tape ends, the corpse in the middle of the room arises and is revealed to be John Kramer, the real Jigsaw Killer. The latter began his murder series after being diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor. He informs Adam that the key to his chain is in the bathtub behind him. However, it went down the drain when Adam scrambled from the tub upon waking up in the bathroom. Horrified by these events, Adam grabs Zep's gun and tries to shoot Kramer but is incapacitated by an electric shock. Deciding that Adam did not learn his lesson, Kramer turns off the lights and closes the door, leaving the screaming young man to die.

Cast

Production

After finishing film school in Australia, James Wan and Leigh Whannell started working on their script for the first Saw film. Planning to finance the film themselves, they opted for the rather minimalistic idea of having only a contained set with as few actors as possible. However, during the script's development, it became apparent that they did not have sufficient funds to shoot the film independently.

A producer in Sydney optioned the script for a year, but the deal ultimately did not come about. After other failed attempts to get the screenplay produced in Australia from 2001 to 2002, literary agent Ken Greenblatt read the script and suggested they travel to Los Angeles, where they had better chances of finding a studio interested in their concept. Wan and Whannell initially refused due to a lack of travel funds, but the pair's agent, Stacey Testro, convinced them to go. To help studios take an interest in the script, Whannell provided $5,000 to make a short film based on the scene of Amanda Young's interrogation, which they thought would prove most effective. Whannell played David, a hospital orderly tested by Jigsaw. Working at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Whannell and Wan contacted camera operators who were willing to provide technical assistance for the short film. Wan shot the short movie with a 16mm camera within two days and transferred the footage to DVDs to ship along with the script. Whannell wanted to play the lead character in the feature film, while Wan intended to be the director.

Eventually, the short film and the script attracted the attention of Oren Koules, Gregg Hoffman, and Mark Burg, who worked as producers for Twisted Pictures. As they were fascinated with the film's concept, they decided to produce it, with Whannell playing the leading role of Adam while Wan directed the film. The film was granted a production budget between $1 million and $1.2 million. On September 22, 2003, the principal photography started at the Lacy Street Production Center in Los Angeles and lasted 18 days. The bathroom was the only set that had to be built from scratch. Danny Glover completed his scenes within two days. Due to the tight shooting schedule, Wan could not shoot more than a couple of takes per actor. Wan found he did not have enough shots or takes to work with during post-production because he mainly shot rehearsals. With many missing gaps in the final product, he and editor Kevin Greutert created shots to mend together during editing.

Release

Lions Gate Entertainment picked up worldwide distribution rights for Saw when the film was shown at the Sundance Film Festival only days before its premiere on January 19, 2004. It was the closing film at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 18, 2004. Lionsgate initially planned to release the movie direct-to-video but eventually released it theatrically on Halloween due to the positive reaction at Sundance.

The film initially received an NC-17 rating from the Motion Picture Association of America for its graphic depiction of violence. However, after being re-edited, it was eventually released with an R-rating. It was released on October 1, 2004, in the United Kingdom, on October 29, 2004, in the United States, and on December 2, 2004, in Australia. In addition, Lionsgate held the first annual "Give Til It Hurts" blood drive for the Red Cross and collected 4,249 pints of blood.

On October 31, 2014, Saw was re-released in honor of its 10th anniversary. However, it earned only $650,051 in its opening weekend, making it the third lowest-grossing wide opening. At the end of its run, the release grossed $815,324, bringing the film's overall domestic gross to $56,000,369.

The theatrical version of the film was released on VHS and DVD on February 15, 2005, in the United States. After its first week, it earned $9.4 million in DVD rentals and $1.7 million in VHS rentals, making it the week's top rental. A two-disc "Uncut Edition" was released on October 18, 2005, to tie in with the release of Saw II. The original short film, also titled Saw, was included on the DVD.

Subsequently, the film was included in a boxed set with the first six sequels. The box was released in September 2014 to celebrate the film's 10th anniversary. It contained the unrated editions of the first seven Saw films, though it lacked any unique features from previous releases.

Reception

Saw was a financial success. Shot on a meager budget of about $1.2 million, it made over $55 million at the box office in the US alone and $102,917,772 worldwide. It received a rating of 50% from Rotten Tomatoes, based on 193 reviews, while Metacritic gave it a score of 46 out of 100, based on 32 critics. Generally, the critical reactions to the film were mixed. Most of the criticism regarded the general plot and the ending, which were considered "convoluted."

Soundtrack

Composer Charlie Clouser completed the film's soundtrack within six weeks. Other songs were performed by Front Line Assembly, Fear Factory, Enemy, Pitbull Daycare, and Psycho Pumps. In addition, Megadeth's song "Die Dead Enough" was set to be featured in the film but was not used for undisclosed reasons. The soundtrack was released on October 5, 2004, by Koch Records.

Original Motion Picture Score

1. Tape Deck

2. Name/Clock/Play

3. Hello, Mark

4. Reverse Beartrap

5. Are You Daddy?

6. Drill & Trap

7. X Marks

8. Cigarette

9. Out Of Time

10. Tapp & Zepp

11. Fuck This Shit (A)

12. Fuck This Shit (B)

13. The Rules

14. Be Alright

15. Hello Zepp

16. Zepp Overture

Complete Motion Picture Score

1. Down The Drain

2. Spiral

3. Name/Clock/Play

4. Tape Deck

5. Hello Adam

6. Follow Heart

7. Last I Heard

8. Hello Paul

9. Razor Cage

10. Hello Mark

11. We'd Like

12. In Your Own Time

13. Reverse Beartrap

14. Then I Saw

15. You Are In Fact

16. I Can See You

17. Diana 1

18. Are You Daddy?

19. Regards

20. Diana 2

21. I See You

22. Sewer Runs

23. K2K (Part 1)

24. K2K (Part 2) + Warehouse

25. Drill + Tapp

26. Sing + Get You

27. X Marks

28. Last Night

29. How Did You Know?

30. Cigarette

31. Peephole

32. Bad Man

33. Who Are You?

34. Hotel Garage

35. Not A Cop

36. I Didn't Cheat

37. Zepp

38. Out Of Time (Part 1)

39. Out Of Time (Part 2)

40. Tapp + Zepp

41. Car Chase

42. Fuck This Shit (Part 1)

43. Fuck This Shit (Part 2)

44. I've Done It

45. The Rules

46. Be Alright + Lie

47. Hello Zepp

48. Zepp Overture

Music From & Inspired By

1. Stürm - Front Line Assembly

2. Eyes Of A Criminal - Chimaira

3. Bite The Hand That Bleeds - Fear Factory

4. Action - Enemy

5. You Make Me Feel So Dead - Pitbull Daycare

6. Wonderful World - Psychopomps

7. The Beloved And The Hatred - Caliban

8. Dark - Illdisposed

Trivia

Originally, Adam and Lawrence were supposed to be trapped on a lift or in a basement.
Director James Wan created Billy the Puppet for the film.
The film was shot within 18 days, with pre-production lasting only five days.
Shawnee Smith, who played Amanda, filmed all her scenes within a single day and was sick during the shooting.
Producer Oren Koules has an uncredited cameo as Donnie Greco.
All scenes in the bathroom were filmed in chronological order within six days.
While shooting the scene of Lawrence cutting off his foot, actor Cary Elwes accidentally scratched his foot despite the hacksaw being blunt.
Besides the role of Adam, Leigh Whannell also played Sing during reshoots when actor Ken Leung was unavailable. He plays Sing when he enters Jigsaw's hideout and during the scene where Sing is shot. In addition, during the close-ups of Amanda sifting through Donnie Greco's intestines, Whannell's hands were used as the stand-in for Shawnee Smith's hands.
Sing's chase after Jigsaw was the last scene to be filmed.
Director James Wan was not paid a fee but instead received a percentage of the movie's profits.
When reviewing the locations of recent fire reports, Tapp and Sing used a map of Washington, D.C.
In the scene where Lawrence tried to shoot Zep with an empty revolver, Cary Elwes wore a black baggy sock to cover his foot.
While filming the scenes of Paul Leahy's death and the subsequent crime scene investigation, camera operator David Armstrong accidentally bumped against the ceiling and had to be taken to a hospital due to a mild concussion.
When Lawrence Gordon finds the mobile phone in the bathroom, the date on the display is September 10, 2001.