Pajiba

With each installment of the Saw series, I've had the same reaction. Loved the original, pissed off cuz I figured they were going to ruin it with a sequel (like they did with The Ring, the bastards), and then found myself pleasantly surprised by that next film. Saw II and Saw III both elicited sighs of disdain that faded as I found myself thoroughly entertained by each.
So, when I saw Saw IV coming, my reaction was the typical "Oh God, not again!" Here's hoping that when I do decide to see Part 4 (rental for sure, not in theaters) I will again be surprisingly entertained.
Unfortunately, your review leaves me firmly seated on the fence, rather than leaning one way or the other. Pretty sure I'll have to eventually see this one for myself.

What story? Some selfish prick grabs a bunch of other selfish pricks and thinks he can teach them a lesson. Kill Kill Kill, Die Die Die. All but one or two of the selfish pricks are dead, but apparently they don't learn their lesson because they end up in the following sequel. The End. Outside of the tortures, there is no story. Bousman certainly tried to make one, but it looks like he tried too hard. He tried to make a serial killer who wears a pig's head and makes people swim in dirty needles somehow end up on the moral high ground.

You bitch about Lust, Caution, but at least in that movie there were other emotions to feel besides seething rage or mild surprise. Oh yeah, and your 'investors' remark was ridiculous, too. They put money in a subtitled Asian movie that didn't have martial arts or monsters and released it into America. Including the sex scenes (which I still see no evidence of being overtly violent) was doing them a favor. Those investors said goodbye to their moolah a long time ago.

But back on topic. No, Robert, you are not stupid. You simply enjoyed the movie. Just don't expect this section to be too civil for the next few days. As far as the 'story', it has just one flaw: it hinges on the victim's sense of self-preservation. Most of the tortures revolved around them finding a way to escape. What is someone just said 'fuck it' and sat there? Just decided not to play, since either way he could die? What happens to the great lesson then?

Did I watch the same "Saw" that the rest of you did? It was quite possibly one of the dumbest movies I ever saw, and definitely the most poorly acted. Plus, it was just lame.

When are we going to get back to the basics of horror movies? Blood and boobs. I want to see cheerleaders get killed while banging their boyfriends, not the same cheerleader being tortured gratuitously for an hour and a half. These movies just aren't fun anymore, they're just gross. How can anyone be entertained by this shit?

Why, why, WHY do people watch this crap?
Am I the only one who is remotely concerned with the fact that people actually enjoy watching torture?
THAT IS F*CKED UP!

There's a lot more to horror films than just torture and violence, and Saw IV (thankfully) at least tries to show this. The violence is way toned down from Saw III and the film is told pretty much from two perspectives: the police (now FBI) investigation into who Jigsaw's other assistant was, and Jigsaw's ex-wife explaining how he wound up the way he wound up. The torture, outside of the first sequence, is presented in a new way for the series that seemed far more important than the previous entries.

And Kate: horror didn't start out with blood and boobs. That was never the basics of the genre. The European exploitation films and eventually the US exploitation films of the 1960's began to push themselves into the horror genre and attain some mainstream success, which then changed what the genre had been. And still, most of the truly great horror classics, from Nosferatu of the silent film era to Academy Award winning films like Rosemary's Baby and The Exorcist were not built on blood and boobs. It's a horrible misconception to think that is all horror was and ever should be.

As for gore: I've had my say before on other sites. I've linked to that article below. Simply put: no. Horror doesn't need it. When used properly, it can enhance a horror film, but it's certainly not a requirement.

Jay, thank you (I was starting to feel a little twilight-zone-ish).

Caught this yesterday at a capacity-filled show.

I think we're making this out to be more than what it is. It's not some great drama or some major movie event. It's a cheap horror movie that's made to come out right at the time when we're accepting of its kind.

Like bad cartoon action movies during the summer or horrid family movies at Christmas time. We let them slide because they come right around the time we want them.

As for the film's qualities, it's intriguing that the only character worth investing is the killer, Jigsaw himself. Unlike Halloween or any of the kids Freddy killed, there isn't a single "victim" worth giving two craps about. I'd love to attribute that to a decision by the creators as opposed to just really shoddy writing.

I don't get it? Two people have made very mild anti-tortue porn comments. Two.
Where is all the outrage? Where are all the dire prognostications about the future of this genre?

My guess is that it's because the review wasn't that harsh on the movie and a large number of commenters only like to agree with the reviewers here.

This is just a guess, however. I'm just recalling the gigantic shitstorm of comments about the Captivity review, and wondering where all that vitriol went.

Or maybe they, like the rest of the country, just stopped giving a flying fuck?

I mean, I did agree with you on the vitriol getting ridiculous, especially the folks who wanted to do such horrible things to the film's makers, without a hint of irony or hypocrisy.

Oh and to answer the "who got screwed?" question: wouldn't that be both Lee and the investors? I mean, we both know the MPAA have their heads up their asses when it comes to rating movies with sex in them, especially female sexuality. And they have punked the theaters (who couldn't be bothered to keep kids out of a goddamn R movie) into thinking that rating would be the death knell. Even with an R rating, there is no guarantee that any franchise theater would show it, leaving it up to the arthouse theaters, and they usually don't give a fuck about the ratings.

Quite frankly, if you really wanted to see the movie, you could go through a myriad of ways (legal or no) to do so. Isn't it better for the creators to get their vision across than to sell out seats, especially in the age of DVD and digital downloading?

Uh, I was going to let that go, but then you called me a jackass.

Your little rant about the self preservation: The victims never have a real sense of self-preservation, otherwise they wouldn't do the stupid shit they do to get killed. The "self-preservation" he tries to instill in them is merely human instinct washing over rational thought, thereby rendering his lesson moot.

The movies themselves say that Jigsaw is trying to get these people to appreciate their lives more by forcing them to face their own mortality. Only it never works. He has to constantly find the last survivor and torture him all over again. Another supposed reason he does this is to get them to appreciate their family and friends more, but all his traps suggest that in order to survive, you have to main, mutilate, and even kill the people near you, or they will get you first.

And supposedly he also picks up people who are suicidal. If they were truly suicidal, instead of whiny babies who wanted attention, they would have let him off them however they wished. As I said, they tried to make him morally superior, except he has no morality to build it on. He is just a short-sighted sadist who, like other serial killers real and imagined, rationalized it with some bullshit psychobabble. He wasn't sympathetic, he wasn't all that smart, and he over-complicated things to a ridiculous extreme (while still being relatively easy to figure out FOR SOME), even in the non-Saw 3 films.

So maybe you should just accept that some people don't like the films, and not because of groupthink, but because they suck. If you are going to make a slasher flick with dumb characters, then do it. If you are going to make a cerebral thriller with people that can find their asses with both hands, then do it. But don't try to mix the two together, because one of two things will happen. Either the victims will have no hope, rendering any real fear of death or attempt to escape meaningless, or your killer will do really stupid stuff and only the gold medalists in suspending belief can buy that he hasn't been caught yet.

The reason for the lack of anger/vitriol is simple: It's not worth it.

Movies like Captivity and Hostel Part 2 deserve vitriol because they are set up to be nothing more than torture-fetishists fantasies.

The Saw movies are more in-line with more traditional horror films, even if they're not done any better than the old Hellraiser movies.

Does anybody agree with me that some of these modern torture films such as Hostel and Saw are aiming not just to demonstrate acts of torture from which we can alienate ourselves but to actually force us to consider the brutal aspects of human nature that we all possess and that spring up under adversity (see Abu Ghraib). We are to be disgusted by this type of torture and the people who enjoy administering it while we ourselves are watching it as entertainment. The villain is not some deranged dude with money or gadgets. The villain is you and I. Whether or not they are successful (apparently they are not) is a different story.

Hostel is torture porn because you don't ever see the killers from the neck up.

Unless you are speaking metaphorically (ie: we don't get inside their head), I have no idea where you are getting that idea. The killers are all known quantities, and in the second movie (which I didn't see) one of the major plotlines involved two businessmen that were paying to be able to murder someone.

I've only posted a couple times before, but I read pajiba on a daily basis and I have to say: I don't get some of you.

All of the moral indignation would come across as a lot more plausible if, in the very next breath, you didn't go on to list a bunch of examples of other movies you've seen that are based in torture porn.

"Oh, the horror! But surely if I keep watching each new flick that comes out in this genre, they will get better! And besides, if I didn't watch them all, then I couldn't bitch about them." Whaaat? How is this logical? If you are so outraged by the torture porn genre, the solution is simple. Stop watching. Stop going to the theater. Stop renting at the video store. Stop downloading online.

Just. Stop.

But as long as people continue to watch, the torture porn genre will continue to march along, flourishing all the while, safe in the knowledge that even the people who proclaim such disdain are some of their most loyal viewers.

I can't even say with certainty that movies like Hostel or Turistas or the Saw sequels disgust me. You know why? Because I've never seen them. I've read about them, they sound ridiculous and entirely pointless, therefore I choose not to waste my viewing time on them.

Is that concept really so hard to grasp?

I've never seen them. I've read about them, they sound ridiculous and entirely pointless, therefore I choose not to waste my viewing time on them.

Ditto that. Haven't seen, won't see, any of this crap.

I've seen the original Saw, haven't seen any of the sequels in their entirity, not because they offend me in any way... far from it, I just haven't had the oompf to see them. I actually usually enjoy these movies quite a bit, and it's not because I'm sick in the head, or so I'd argue pretty vehemently.

I get plenty annoyed with people that presume to assume that because I or anyone else enjoys these movies, we are deviant, sick, or somehow less than. I think it's quite an arrogant assumption that because there is an audience for these films that our culture is fucked up.

But without getting all huffy about it, I'll answer the previous commenter's question about why?, at least from my perspective. I enjoy stimulating my fear factor, I like the adrenaline rush. I get a similar high when I ride a rollercoaster. I got the same sort of feeling when I jumped out of a plane. It's also why I work in the ER. The best way to characterize it would be to say it's a tendency towards the extreme. These films are part of my overall "adventure".

And I'm certainly not desensitized to any of it. A well-made "torture porn" will elicit the same sort of response from me that it might elicit in you. I gag, I cringe, I look through my fingers once in a while. I'm very jumpy, you don't want to sit next to me in the theater. But I embrace that, I don't reject that part of my psyche. And I like seeing how a director is going to challenge me next, which button he is going to push to get a response.

That being said, a bad movie is a bad movie. Just because I enjoy this doesn't necessarily mean every movie that employs torture is an A+ in my book. Captivity, for instance, just sucked. It wasn't inventive, it wasn't well made, it wasn't well acted. So forget that, it doesn't really deserve the attention it seemed to have gotten.

Anyway, that was sort of long and probably incomprehensible, since I'm writing in between actual work. In closing though, I think it's totally great that people don't enjoy these movies. I don't really enjoy romantic comedies. Each has their own picks and misses. But to immediately judge someone that might enjoy a horror film akin to Saw and classify them as morally corrupt and deviant is rather arrogant. I, for one, think I have some pretty upstanding morals, and I certainly don't go around maiming people. In fact, I'm very much in the opposite business. But I'll still be at the front of the line to see a movie that pushes me back to my limits any day of the week.

muz, I find your comments to be really interesting, particularly the inability to understand the common humanity between yourself and the people who watch and enjoy these movies.

These movies bother me in a very sharp way. I have friends who really love these kinds of movies, and I find myself constantly wondering what makes these otherwise caring, interesting people tick in this way.

The strongest reaction I have ever had to a movie like this came when I watched Grindhouse: Death Proof with my husband. He enjoyed it, while I became so distressed by it that I had tears in my eyes as I explained what I found so horrible about it. I thought the whole movie was about rape, with a leaning toward the enjoyment and glorification of said rape, and the whole "rape back the rapist" switch in the end just felt like bullshit, pornographic, fake "girl power" to me. He kept saying "yeah, but they fight back in the end," and I thought one of us really wasn't getting something.

Was I reading too deeply into it? I felt like I wasn't reading anything, as it was such a gut reaction - I've never had such a physical reaction to a movie before, and such a sense of sadness and confusion about our culture settled over me that night.

So....your comments really struck me, muz.

Justify your liking of watching these movies by saying how offended you are that people that don't like this drivel make assumptions on your character, that we are "arrogant" for objecting to your "adventure."

But why do any fans of this genre have to JUSTIFY why they enjoy it? You don't like it, fine. Don't watch it. Perhaps you've seen Dave's argument a million times before, but your's isn't any less common. It really just boils down to "I find [blank] sick, therefore no one else should like it either or they are sick." You (and I mean this in the sense of anyone who is asking people to "justify" their taste in movies, music, literature, fandom, etc.) don't get to decide what is acceptable taste.

Right so after that rant that I wrote calling someone a jackass I went to see the 4th installment. Don't wanna get bed sores now do I!

Before I actually talk about the film I'd like to ask people to just stop posting about the fucking film if you haven't seen it or don't intend on seeing it or are not into the genre. WHY ARE YOU HERE?? WHY?? REASONS PLEASE??? NO?? THEN FUCK OFF! Are you just here to carry on "blah blah blah it's not moral blah blah blah"

Ahem, anyway, yes I saw saw. I came to the conclusion after that diabolical waste of 90 minutes that i'm never going to get back that the franchise is ACTUALLLY pointless. It's tried to be way way too clever. It should have stopped after the 2nd film. End of.
I can see what Jigsaw is TRYING to do here but one catch, the guy is a total fucking hypocrit!! Did anyone pick up on the fact that this guy is just bitter from losing his child??? And didn't one of his victims have exactly that problem???

I should have saved my rant about plot holes until after this film becuase this didn't have plotholes, it was just a gaping fucking abyss with a few threads acting as tightropes but alas, I fell into the abyss of zombies staring at fat guys raping teenagers and teachers playing jenga with their arteries......I lost the fucking plot.

What a waste. A total pointless waste. And no, it's not plain old torture porn, saw was supposed to be something better, but it just veered off in some crazy ass direction and what's worse, there is room for another one to be made - this could go on FOREVER and i'll feel compelled every time to see it hoping in vain that perhaps it will get better and it never will. Perhaps i will actually go insane and start building my own torture devices out of toothpicks and blue tack in preparation to kill maim and dismember the production crew!!!

Not to be totally naive about it but isn't there a *slight* difference between Hostel and Captivity brand torture porn and the horror bordering on torture porn that Saw brings us?

I love me some Freddy, Jason and Pinhead, and didn't really see much different between those fellows and Jigsaw. Bad dude, bad motives, really f-ed up ways of killing people (I still have the "I'm Johnny Depp in the bed" Nightmare every now and then). But I don't see a parallel between those Named Bad Guys (and I think identifying the name and face of the singular bad guy / their accomplices is important in the distinction) and the guys in Hostel, or the singular-victimness of Captivity.

I also know my limit for gore, and know that I'll be covering my eyes when the Cenobites are ready to go all hook and chain on a person, and therefore don't wish to see Hostel or Captivity as what I've read tells me the gore is pretty much non-stop.

Here we go again, more people talking about the fucking morals and values of hollywood and how bad it is to produce more torture porn.

RIGHT: So to you people, why are you here?? Well i'll tell you why you're here, it's because the "cash cow" will never run dry because if people don't go to see the films their morbid curiosity will bring them to the review pages and then they'll want to read up on all the gory details here instead of being a fucking hypocrit and seeing the film when they "don't agree". Frankly you probably toddled off to download it when you read this.

It's complete and utter shit, you are talking about hostel and captivity but not seeing it so how can you comment?? I saw hostel, I didn't bother after that pointless pile of wank. Saw has a story, albeit a moth eaten swiss cheese of a story after all the films we've had so far. And the train will keep on a rollin because the same arseholes that rubberneck RTAs are the assholes who think that this film is great.
it's morbid curiosity folks and sick it maybe but those clever directors are just cashing in on your human nature.
Deal with it or go live in a fucking monastery. I think most of the people who rant about this being sick are just the people who are embarassed by the fact they are fascinated by decaptiation.