Saw III Review Country : USA Year: 2006 Genre: Psychological /Horror Format: Cinema Running Time: 107 minutes Distributor: Lions Gate Jigsaw is pulling out all the stops with his latest game cat and mouse, in which he and his apprentice Amanda engage a young doctor in his most diabolical scheme yet.... Credits Directed by Darren Lynn Bousman. Written by Leigh Whannell and James Wan. Starring Tobin Bell, Shawnee Smith, Angus McFadyen, J. Larose, Bahar Soomekh and Debra Lynne McCabe. Special Appearances by Donnie Walhberg and Dina Meyer. A bit of marketing sleight-of-hand and (perhaps intentional) misdirection in the trailers notwithstanding, Saw III is the serrated series' equiavalent of Return Of The Jedi; we've been here before and we know the decor and the decay, but some old loose ends are cleverly tied up, and the new revelations are remarkably fresh. That is, if you've managed to ignore the damn internet spoilers. By now the cat is long out of the bag, and we know that the enigmatic manipulator Jigsaw is in actuality a dying man named John Kramer (Tobin Bell), whose disdain for those who don't value life has unhinged him and engendered a bit of self-made judge and jury. As revealed at the end of the previous film, his accomplice Amanda (Shawnee Smith) is a would-be previous victim who "passed" the unbearable test he inflicted upon her and, free of her drug-addled former life, has become a near-religious devotee to him and assists in his elaborate traps and games. Two parallel games are at play this time around. In the first, Lynn (Bahar Soomekh), a demure young doctor, is abducted by Amanda and forced to keep the dying and bedridden Jigsaw alive in a clandestine location just long enough for game number two to play out. In that second scenario, an embittered young man named Jeff (Angus MacFadyen) finds himself trapped in a seedy compound and is forced with the task of watching Jigsaw and Amanda's contraptions maim and kill various people, unless he endangers himself to save them. The catch is, each of these victims bear some responsibility in the death of his young son a few years earlier, whether directly or indirectly. As with Saw II, this installment takes the time to clear up some of the vagaries of its immediate predecessor--much better this time, in fact. Donnie Walhberg has a brief appearance, reprising his role as Detective Eric Matthews, so that his fate is finally revealed. Dina Meyer also has a cameo as Kerry, the surviving detective from the first two films who has this time reached the end of her lucky streak. Moreover, the initial set-up and pay-off of even the original Saw film are explored in flashback form, revealing the extent of Amanda's collusion with Jigsaw during the course of all three films. And as the carnage begins to mount this time around, a stark contrast becomes apparent: in some instances, victims are able to succeed in freeing themselves from their specific traps, only to end up dying anyway. Something has clearly changed in the Jigsaw paradigm. This early observation in the film is the first clue into the larger plan at play here. Lynn and Jeff may be getting played as pawns, but perhaps their roles are double-cast as pawns and principals. And the inevitable revelation of the their own connection together is yet another nifty piece of narrative prestidigitation that writers Leigh Whannell and James Wan (who were responsible for the original) are notable for concocting. And not to leave anyone out of the loop, the second film's director/co-writer Darren Lynn Bousman returns to helm here, keeping the staccato pacing and disorienting grit and grain that punctuated his previous effort. As Jigsaw, Tobin Bell's almost dark-comic turn is the strongest yet (though to be fair to the original film, he was merely a cameo that time around). Bahar Soomekh shines as Lynn, while Shawnee Smith keenly sells Amanda's tragic psycho-bitch posturings. If there's a weak link in the chain, it's Angus MacFadyen as the revenge-driven Jeff. His obsession with exacting vengeance seems a bit forced and unconvincing, although that fault lies more from the script than the performance. By the time the game has played the course, he has even evolved into a viable study in repentance tinged with unrequited madness. No Saw film would be complete without the obligatory "trap" and "game" setpieces. Here, there are some notable doozies, particularly a device which twists individual's limbs--one at the time--to the breaking point, or the literally chilling fate for one nude lass who is immobilized in a subzero-temperature room while freezing water is showered onto her, eventually becoming the, er, "icing" on the cake. And you'll never regard the term "hogwash" the same way after one particular disgusto sequence. Not to suddenly disambiguate itself from its predecessors, this film has its share "saw" imagery, and damn if the mechanized things don't twirl away and create one manner of havoc or another with aplomb. Where the original Saw wrapped up its bloody romp with a didn't-see-it-coming twist, and the second film did something similar--if less impacting--there are a series of twists at the end of Saw III which unfold in rapid succession; all but the last of these are called "false endings." Nevertheless, the finale of Saw III is easily the most unsettling of the franchise. And as for the "Hello, America....I want to play a game" puppet quote from the trailer, that's the misdirection I was talking about in the opening paragraph; the line does not appear in the film and has no bearing on the film's conclusion. Saw III is smart enough to be more intimate than that. And it wraps up the trilogy with an ending that can justifiably be called emotionally devastating. The genre would do well to throw a few more of those our way. OFFICIAL SITE DISCUSS ON OUR FORUMS Review by Petch Lucas, for Pitofhorror.com