Saw 7
Encyclopedia
Saw 3D is a 2010 3D
horror film directed by Kevin Greutert
, written by Patrick Melton
and Marcus Dunstan
, and starring Tobin Bell
, Costas Mandylor
, Betsy Russell
, Sean Patrick Flanery
, and Cary Elwes
. It is the seventh and final installment of the Saw film series, and the only film in the series to be in 3D. The film focuses on a man who claims to be a Jigsaw survivor and writes a book detailing his experience, becoming a local celebrity. He soon finds himself part of a real Jigsaw game where he must ultimately save his wife. Meanwhile, Jill Tuck
explains to an internal affairs officer
that rogue Detective Hoffman is the man responsible for the recent Jigsaw games; Tuck is put under police protected custody while officers search for Hoffman.
An eighth installment was planned, but the decrease in the box office performance for Saw VI compared to previous installments led to Saw 3D being the final planned film in the series, and the plot concept for Saw VIII being incorporated into Saw 3D. Saw V
director David Hackl
was to direct the film, but two weeks before filming Lionsgate announced that Greutert, who directed the sixth film, would direct. Principal photography
took place in Toronto
, Ontario
from February to April 2010 and was shot with the SI-3D digital camera system, as opposed to shooting with traditional cameras and later transferring to 3D in post-production
.
Saw 3D was originally scheduled to be released on October 22, 2010, but was pushed back a week to October 29, 2010, in the United States and Canada; it was released a day earlier in the United Kingdom and Australia. The film was initially rated NC-17 (no children 17 and under admitted) by the Motion Picture Association of America
(MPAA) and had to be edited and re-submitted six times to finally receive an R rating while in Australia, the film received an R18+ rating despite all the previous installments having an MA15+ for their theatrical release. Saw 3D opened at number one making over $22.5 million. It received largely negative reviews from critics.
sequence following the first film
, Lawrence Gordon
(Cary Elwes
) crawls from the bathroom to find help after sawing off his foot. Along the way, he reaches a steam pipe and uses it to cauterize his ankle stump. In the present, Ryan (Jon Cor) and Brad (Sebastian Pigott) awaken in a storefront window in a shopping area in front of a crowd of people, their wrists bound to a worktable. In front of each man is a buzz saw, and their mutual lover, Dina (Anne Lee Greene) is suspended above a third saw. Jigsaw's puppet
tells them that they can either kill one another or allow Dina to die, and after realizing her betrayal, they decide to save themselves and allow her to lower onto the saw, killing her.
Jill Tuck
(Betsy Russell
) goes to Matt Gibson (Chad Donella
), an internal affairs
detective at Mark Hoffman's (Costas Mandylor
) precinct, and offers to incriminate Hoffman in exchange for immunity and protection. Meanwhile, Hoffman abducts four racist skinheads and places them in a trap in an abandoned junkyard that kills all of them. After a gathering of past Jigsaw survivors takes place, Hoffman abducts Bobby Dagen (Sean Patrick Flanery
), a self-help
guru who achieved fame and fortune by falsely stating that he survived a Jigsaw trap. Hoffman sends videos to Gibson throughout the film, offering cryptic clues to his location and promising to stop the games if Jill is given to him.
Bobby awakens in an abandoned insane asylum and is informed that his wife Joyce (Gina Holden
) has also been abducted and will die if he does not save her in sixty minutes. After escaping a cage hanging over a floor of spikes, Dagen navigates his way through the asylum, finding his publicist Nina (Naomi Snieckus), his lawyer Suzanne (Rebecca Marshall) and his close friend Cale (Dean Armstrong
) all in traps representing their respective sins. Despite his efforts to save them, all three are killed. Gibson soon discovers the location of the asylum and sends a SWAT team, who are sealed in one section of the asylum and killed by toxic gas. Gibson also finds Hoffman's command center, where he discovers that Hoffman has hacked the police security camera system, and is killed by automatic turret gun
along with both of his men. Hoffman, who had been posing as one of the junkyard corpses, infiltrates police headquarters and kills Dr. Heffner (James Van Patten), Detective Rogers (Laurence Anthony) and several officers before finding Jill. After a brief struggle, he restrains her the same way she restrained him, then secures the original Reverse Bear-Trap to her head, which kills her.
After removing two teeth to retrieve a combination to a locked door, Dagen reaches Joyce and is forced to drive two hooks through his pectoral muscles
, the trap he claimed to survive, then hoist himself up by the chains to deactivate her trap. However, the hooks rip through his muscles and he falls to the ground, and a brazen bull
capsule slams shut around Joyce and burns her alive. Moments after Hoffman destroys his workshop, he is attacked and captured by three Pighead-masked figures and the leader reveals himself as Lawrence Gordon. Flashbacks reveal that John Kramer
(Tobin Bell
) found Gordon by the steam pipe and helped him recover, and Gordon had worked in secret with John ever since. Tasked to watch over Jill after John's death and to take action if anything happened to her, Gordon brings Hoffman to the bathroom from the first film and shackles him by the ankle. He throws away the hacksaw he had once sawed off his foot with, then leaves Hoffman to die.
reported in July 2009 that Lionsgate greenlit Saw VII and announced David Hackl
would return to direct, his last film being Saw V
. Producers Mark Burg
and Oren Koules
, and writers Patrick Melton
and Marcus Dunstan
also returned. Brian Gedge replaced series' cinematographer
David Armstrong. Pre-production
began on September 14, 2009. According to Melton, there were plans to title the film Saw: Endgame. Originally two sequels were planned after the sixth, but in December 2009 Melton stated in a podcast
interview with the UK radio station Demon FM
that Saw VII was the final installment and would address unanswered questions from previous Saw films, such as the fate of the first film
's protagonist Dr. Lawrence Gordon
and other Jigsaw survivors from previous films, while bringing a final resolution to the series. The storyline for a Saw VIII was combined into Saw VII; this decision was primarily due to Saw VI below average box office performance. On July 22, 2010 in an interview with USA Today
the producers confirmed that Saw VII will officially end the film series. Burg told Reuters
that, "In every Saw movie, we left questions open and in Saw VII we answer every question the audience has ever had". He added that, "even new viewers will be able to follow and get caught up to speed".
In January 2010, Kevin Greutert
, who made his directorial debut with the sixth film, was about to begin work on Paramount
's Paranormal Activity 2
when Twisted Pictures
suddenly dismissed Hackl and forced Greutert on the project by exercising a "contractual clause" in his contract, much to Greutert's dismay. When Greutert arrived on set two weeks before filming began, he performed a "compressive re-write" of the script. Melton explained that, "He has a lot of ideas, but it’s a bit hard and extreme to implement all of these ideas because sets have been built, people have been cast, props have been bought or created, and with the Saw films they are so specific in set design because of the traps. It becomes very problematic and difficult to change things a whole bunch right in the middle of it".
was listed on the Toronto Film & Television's official list of personnel website for Saw 3D but on March 8 his name along with other cast members were removed from the list. The following month, Lionsgate confirmed his reprisal of the role of Lawrence Gordon
, last seen in the first film
. Dunstan and Melton said that Elwes filmed new scenes. The filmmakers wanted to bring Elwes back earlier, but Elwes wanted to wait until the last film. He described his character as having Stockholm syndrome
. Chad Donella
appeared in the film as Internal Affairs Detective Gibson, who was also Hoffman's former partner.
Gabby West
, who won the second season of Scream Queens
, plays Kara in the film. Chester Bennington
, the lead vocalist of the alternative rock
band Linkin Park
, has a role in the film playing Evan, a white power skinhead. Bennington met with an acting coach to prepare for his role. He said, "It was actually a little more difficult than I expected because it took a lot for me to figure out how to portray this guy and what exactly his motives were going to be throughout. I thought maybe I was overthinking it, and I met with this really great acting coach who helped me walk through and make sense of the, 'Motivation' ". Devon Bostick
was offered to reprise his role as Brent from Saw VI, but turned it down due to scheduling conflicts.
. Saw 3D was Greutert's first time directing a 3D film. He said in an interview with Popular Mechanics
that composing a shot in 3D was tricky compared to 2D; he explained, "If you've got both cameras looking at a subject and there's a very bright sheen on the side of the person's arm that only one camera can see, there's a good chance that when you look at a composite of the two images that sheen will not register in 3D space. It looks like a mistake. These things aren't an issue at all in 2D but in 3D are obsessively problematic". Given the cost of filming in 3D, Greutert said the budget was $17 million, the most expensive of the series. Principal photography
began on February 8, 2010 in Toronto
, Ontario
and wrapped
on April 12, 2010. Filming took place mostly at Toronto's Cinespace Film Studios.
When determining the style of 3D shooting they wanted to use, Burg felt that the audience would want several moments where objects move into the audience, comparing this to My Bloody Valentine 3D. He acknowledged that this method would be used, but expressed an interest in shooting from the victim's perspective, similar to that of first-person shooter
video games being rendered in 3D. Dunstan added that "It adds a whole new layer of discipline and criteria to creating these moments. We've had a very flat surface to try to get a reaction out of you. Now, we get to push out a bit and envelop the viewer, still maintaining the patterns that have worked and been successful, but also to raise it up a notch." Commenting on the change to filming in 3D, Bell stated it would not affect his performance or methods of acting, noting that it would be an "interesting experience". Mandylor called the 3D shoot "more tedious and longer". Flannery described the 3D aspect as being "[not] shot in 3D so that you can, per se, see blood coming directly at you. It's in 3D for the texture and the depth, for the architecture, to get a sense that you're in the scene but there's no 'we want to see blood coming at the lens' it's nothing like that. But I think we made a good movie." Post-production
services were provided by Deluxe
.
in Toronto, Ontario, just outside of Roy Thomson Hall
, and included 400 extras
. In the trap, the circular saw blades were actually real and functional, but safety precautions were taken for the actors. One actor that was in the trap, Jon Cor, told Demon FM that he had scars on his hands from the shackles, and said the other actors, Sebastian Pigott chipped his tooth and Anne Lee Greene lost the feeling in her feet and had to receive medical attention.
Producer Oren Koules
told horror news website ShockTilYouDrop.com that there are eleven traps in the film, the most ever in the franchise. There is one "trap" scene in the film that producers would not allow in previous Saw films that they described as "too violent", "too disgusting", and "just wrong". Melton later confirmed that was the "Garage Trap", which involved a car and sets off a "chain reaction" with other characters. Gabby West was part of the trap. She told VH1
, "They molded my entire face, and basically my entire upper body after my belly button. They put layers and layers of different materials on you and you have two straws in your nose so you can breathe. It was so scary! They put so much of it on, you can't see and they put it in your ears so you can barely hear anything. That was part of the prep for the film, which was really cool, to have a dummy made of yourself. But scary." Over 25 gallons of fake blood
was used in the film, which was two and half times more than Saw II
.
, Boom Boom Satellites
, Saliva
, Krokus
, Hinder
, Karnivool
, My Darkest Days
and Chester Bennington
's Dead By Sunrise
. It was released through SonyMusic Independent Network (SIN) and Artists' Addiction Records on October 26, 2010. The film's score
was composed by Charlie Clouser
and released on iTunes
through Evolution Music Partners on November 2, 2010. The song "Life Won't Wait
" by Ozzy Osbourne
is played during the end credits.
Track listing
In the same interview, the producers addressed Saw presence at Comic-Con 2010 in San Diego. They said that the footage that was going to be used for the convention could not get approved for the audience; Koules explained, "It's going to be different than what we've done before, we're going to be at Comic-Con but we're not in Comic-Con"." The Comic-Con teaser trailer was released via IGN
on July 22, 2010. The next day of the convention, the first eight minutes of the film were screened for the press and a few fans.
The trailer shown in the United Kingdom during a break from The Gadget Show
was banned after a 10 year-old child complained that it was "distressing" and "inappropriately scheduled". Clearcast
had cleared the trailer for 19:00 GMT, but did not actually air until 20:29. In one scene of the trailer people in a cinema become trapped to the seats by metal restraints with a hand coming through the screen pulling a person in. The Advertising Standards Authority
said it was "likely to cause distress to young children". In Massachusetts
a branch of Showcase Cinemas
showed Saw 3D instead of the cartoon Megamind, which was being watched by a 7 year-old celebrating a birthday. It took several minutes before the cinema employees fixed the mistake.
in Canada. The film was originally scheduled to be released on October 22, 2010, but in July 2010 the date was pushed back to October 29. It also had preview screenings on October 28, 2010 in 2,000 locations. Since the release of Saw IV, each film has been released a day earlier in Australia and New Zealand; Saw 3D continued the tradition in Australia, though the New Zealand release was not released until March 3, 2011. The film was initially rated NC-17 (no children 17 and under admitted) by the Motion Picture Association of America
(MPAA) and had to be edited and re-submitted
six times to secure an R rating. In Australia, the Australian Classification Board
gave a heavy R18+ (restricted to 18 and over) for "high impact violence, blood and gore", whereas all previous Saw films were rated MA15+.
on October 25, 2010 that the DVD will only be released in the 2D version. Lionsgate Home Entertainment
released Saw 3D: The Final Chapter on January 25, 2011 in three versions. The first is a standard DVD release consisting of the theatrical version of the film, a selection of bonus features and a second disc with a digital copy; a second edition is a 2D combo pack that includes an unrated Blu-ray
, DVD and digital copy
of the film. The last edition of the release is a 3D combo pack consisting of an unrated Blu-ray 3D, Blu-ray, DVD, and digital copy version of the film. According to the Nielsen VideoScan
chart, the DVD and Blu-ray formats placed number three in its first week.
the following day in 2,808 locations playing on 3,500 screens, the second smallest release behind the first Saw
. The film earned $8.9 million its opening day taking the number one spot from Paranormal Activity 2
. It grossed $22.5 million its opening Halloween weekend, with 92% of tickets coming from more than 2,100 3D-equipped locations and 57% of the audience was under the age of 25. It had the fifth best opening weekend in the Saw series. After only four days of wide release Saw 3D had out-grossed Saw VIs $27.7 million final domestic gross. On its second weekend the film dropped 66% in ticket sales and made $7.7 million, moving to the number five spot with Megamind taking its number one spot. Saw 3D was closed out of theaters on December 2, 2010, after 35 days of release in the United States and Canada.
Saw 3D opened in 25 territories with $14.4 million (including preview screenings) placing first place in the United Kingdom
(UK) with $5.8 million, beating Saw III
$4.7 million UK opening. It opened in second place in Russia with $2.2 million; Australia and Japan grossed $909,000 and $864,800, respectively. Saw 3D grossed $12.8 million in the United Kingdom
, Ireland and Malta
; $10.9 million in Germany
; $7 million in Italy
; $5.3 million in Russia
; and $2.4 million in Australia
. The film has grossed $45.7 million in the United States
and Cinema of Canada, with $90.4 million in other markets, for a worldwide total of $136.1 million. This makes Saw 3D the highest grossing film in the series in the foreign market. Also, it made more than double the amount of the previous installment Saw VI
and is the most successful film in the franchise since Saw IV
.
reports that 10% of 67 critics have given the film a positive review, with a rating average of 3.1 out of 10, making it the poorest reviewed film in the series. Metacritic
, which assigns a weighted average score out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, gives the film a rating score of 24, based on 17 reviews. CinemaScore
polls reported that the average grade moviegoers gave the film was a "B-minus" on an A+ to F scale.
Luke Thompson of E! Online gave the film a "B". He called the film's gore "over-the-top" and "in your face" while admitting the film had an "unusual amount of self-parody". He said the central storyline of the films was beginning to feel "played out". Rob Nelson of Variety
gave the film a negative review. He called the film "relentlessly repugnant" that would please fans, but offer no surprise. He went on to say, "Apart from these limb-pulling setpieces, tech credits appear fairly shoddy, as do any 3D effects that don't include flying viscera. The editing relies on lazy flashbacks, while the dialogue remains as horrific as the killings." Kim Newman of Empire gave the film two out of five stars, calling it a "a step down from last year’s much more pointed Saw VI
". He criticized the repetition of the plot but thought bringing back Jigsaw survivors was a "nice idea". He closed his review with, "There are a scattering of infallibly cringe-making horrors, but on the whole Saw 3D could do with more depth".
Eric Goldman of IGN Movies gave the film two out of five stars. He was unhappy with the little screen time Bell and Elwes had been given, saying that the time the film did spend with them, didn't have much impact. He said the traps were a step down from Saw VI, but did point out his favorite and highlight of the film as the "garage trap". About the film's 3D effects, Goldman said "The 3D is used as you might expect it to be - which is to say, this is no James Cameron
immersive experience. Instead, blades jut out of the screen, and there is some fun had with blood and guts literally shooting forward at several points". Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter
gave the film a mixed review. He said Saw 3D is "consistent both stylistically and thematically with previous editions", but said most of the film's traps lack the "Rube Goldberg
-style cleverness that marked the series". Scheck went on to say that it was "unfortunate" the creators killed Bell's character so early in the series and called Mandylor's character (Hoffman) an "exceedingly bland stand-in". He called the visual impact of the 3D "negligible".
Roger Moore of the Orlando Sentinel
gave the film one out of five stars saying, "It’s all bunk and has been for years. These are all no-win scenarios. Whatever moral lessons were presented in the earliest Saw films seem to have been dispensed with as the movies grow more and more gruesome, with filmmakers caught up in 'What would it look like if somebody’s jaw was ripped out, or their skin was glued to a car seat?' Pandering to the 'Cool, let’s see that again' crowd has made Lionsgate rich but done nothing for this unendurable endurance contest of this long-enduring film franchise". Mike Hale of The New York Times
called the film the most "straightforward" of the series and the "most consistently (though not inventively) violent". He ended his review saying, "If you see the film in a theater equipped with RealD 3D and Dolby sound
, you’ll come away with a pretty good idea of what it would feel like to have flying body parts hit you in the face".
Elizabeth Weitzman of the New York Daily News gave the film one out of five stars. She criticized the lack of Bell's screentime saying, "What the filmmakers of the last four Saw movies have somehow overlooked is that Tobin Bell's Jigsaw is the linchpin of these films. It's right there in the title, so you'd think they'd realize what they lost when they killed him off in Saw III. But it's been downhill ever since, and we hit bottom today". She admitted that the performances have become "painfully stilted" and called the script "a jumble of nothing punctuated by barely-trying death traps". She went on to say, "It's also disappointing to watch a once-original franchise morph into a generic slasher series, in which random people are killed in banal ways just to up the body count" and closed her review with, "No matter how much money The Final Chapter makes over Halloween weekend, it's time to acknowledge that this game is over".
Wesley Morris
of The Boston Globe
called the film the "most gruesome and least coherent of the seven movies". He felt that some of the film's "games" were just randomly forced into the film, saying that kind of "episodic approach" and 3D works for a "far more innovative series like Jackass 3D
". Morris closed his review by saying "This alleged final edition trashes the perverse morality of [Jigsaw's] legacy to make him the Jerry Springer
of gore". Jason Anderson of the Toronto Star
gave the film two out of four stars. He praised Saw 3D plot for not being as confusing as previous films, for which he described as having to "generally require an encyclopedic knowledge of the series' many plot strands" in order to understand them. He thought Greutert gave the film a "pulpy energy" and described the film's traps and gore as having an "unpretentious sensibility" to films by Herschell Gordon Lewis
. Alan Jones of the Radio Times
gave the film four out of five stars saying, "though the film initially borders on parody, once the ever-ingenious trapping begins — using fishhooks, superglue, ovens and dental equipment — the chills run on turbo drive right through to the greatest hits flashback finale". He implied that the "shock scenarios" were borrowed from sources such as, A Man Called Horse
and the work of Lucio Fulci
. Jones said the 3D did not add to the experience saying "the CGI blood splatter something of a distraction to the almost Shakespearean crescendo of anguish and carnage".
3-D film
A 3-D film or S3D film is a motion picture that enhances the illusion of depth perception...
horror film directed by Kevin Greutert
Kevin Greutert
-External links:...
, written by Patrick Melton
Patrick Melton
Patrick Melton is an American screenwriter.-Early life:Melton was born in Champaign, Illinois. He attended Evanston Township High School, and graduated from the University of Iowa with a Bachelor's Degree in Communication Studies...
and Marcus Dunstan
Marcus Dunstan
Marcus Dunstan is an American screenplay writer and director.-Life and career:Dunstan was born in Macomb, Illinois...
, and starring Tobin Bell
Tobin Bell
Tobin Bell is an American film and television character actor. After years of work doing stand-ins and background work on films, he got his first major acting job in Mississippi Burning and went on to star in made-for-television films and guest star in television shows throughout the 1990s.Bell...
, Costas Mandylor
Costas Mandylor
Costas Mandylor is a Greek Australian actor. He is perhaps best known for his role as Kenny in Picket Fences, and for portraying Mark Hoffman in the Saw films.-Early life:...
, Betsy Russell
Betsy Russell
Betsy Russell is an American actress who is best known for her role in Private School, and as Jill Tuck, the ex-wife of the Jigsaw Killer in the Saw film series.-Early life:...
, Sean Patrick Flanery
Sean Patrick Flanery
Sean Patrick Flanery is an American actor known for such roles as Connor MacManus in The Boondock Saints, Greg Stillson in The Dead Zone and for portraying Indiana Jones in The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, as well as Bobby Dagen in Saw 3D.He is currently known for his role as Sam Gibson on The...
, and Cary Elwes
Cary Elwes
Ivan Simon Cary Elwes , known professionally as Cary Elwes, is an English actor. The son of Dominick Elwes and Tessa Georgina Kennedy, Elwes acted in off-Broadway plays during college and moved to the United States in the early 1980s. He is known for his role as Westley in the cult classic The...
. It is the seventh and final installment of the Saw film series, and the only film in the series to be in 3D. The film focuses on a man who claims to be a Jigsaw survivor and writes a book detailing his experience, becoming a local celebrity. He soon finds himself part of a real Jigsaw game where he must ultimately save his wife. Meanwhile, Jill Tuck
Jill Tuck
Jill Tuck is a fictional character in the Saw film series. She is the ex-wife of the series' main antagonist John Kramer, a.k.a. the Jigsaw Killer. She first appeared in the one-shot comic book Saw: Rebirth as John's ex-girlfriend, however her backstory and appearance were altered significantly in...
explains to an internal affairs officer
Internal affairs (law enforcement)
The internal affairs division of a law enforcement agency investigates incidents and plausible suspicions of lawbreaking and professional misconduct attributed to officers on the force...
that rogue Detective Hoffman is the man responsible for the recent Jigsaw games; Tuck is put under police protected custody while officers search for Hoffman.
An eighth installment was planned, but the decrease in the box office performance for Saw VI compared to previous installments led to Saw 3D being the final planned film in the series, and the plot concept for Saw VIII being incorporated into Saw 3D. Saw V
Saw V
Saw V is a 2008 Canadian-American horror film directed by David Hackl and written by Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan and stars Tobin Bell, Costas Mandylor and Scott Patterson...
director David Hackl
David Hackl
David Hackl is a Canadian film director and production designer.-Life and career:Hackl was the production designer and second unit director for Saw II, Saw III and Saw IV. Also the production designer for Repo! The Genetic Opera. He was once in talks to direct Saw IV, however, Darren Lynn Bousman...
was to direct the film, but two weeks before filming Lionsgate announced that Greutert, who directed the sixth film, would direct. Principal photography
Principal photography
thumb|300px|Film production on location in [[Newark, New Jersey]].Principal photography is the phase of film production in which the movie is filmed, with actors on set and cameras rolling, as distinct from pre-production and post-production....
took place in Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
, Ontario
Ontario
Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....
from February to April 2010 and was shot with the SI-3D digital camera system, as opposed to shooting with traditional cameras and later transferring to 3D in post-production
Post-production
Post-production is part of filmmaking and the video production process. It occurs in the making of motion pictures, television programs, radio programs, advertising, audio recordings, photography, and digital art...
.
Saw 3D was originally scheduled to be released on October 22, 2010, but was pushed back a week to October 29, 2010, in the United States and Canada; it was released a day earlier in the United Kingdom and Australia. The film was initially rated NC-17 (no children 17 and under admitted) by the Motion Picture Association of America
Motion Picture Association of America
The Motion Picture Association of America, Inc. , originally the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America , was founded in 1922 and is designed to advance the business interests of its members...
(MPAA) and had to be edited and re-submitted six times to finally receive an R rating while in Australia, the film received an R18+ rating despite all the previous installments having an MA15+ for their theatrical release. Saw 3D opened at number one making over $22.5 million. It received largely negative reviews from critics.
Plot
In a flashbackFlashback (narrative)
Flashback is an interjected scene that takes the narrative back in time from the current point the story has reached. Flashbacks are often used to recount events that happened before the story’s primary sequence of events or to fill in crucial backstory...
sequence following the first film
Saw (film)
Saw is a 2004 American independent horror film directed by James Wan. The screenplay, written by Leigh Whannell, is based on a story by Wan and Whannell. The film stars Cary Elwes, Danny Glover, Monica Potter, Michael Emerson, Ken Leung, Whannell and Tobin Bell...
, Lawrence Gordon
Lawrence Gordon (character)
Dr. Lawrence Gordon is a fictional character in the Saw film series. He is portrayed by Cary Elwes. He was first seen in the original film Saw as one of the main protagonists.-Saw: Rebirth:...
(Cary Elwes
Cary Elwes
Ivan Simon Cary Elwes , known professionally as Cary Elwes, is an English actor. The son of Dominick Elwes and Tessa Georgina Kennedy, Elwes acted in off-Broadway plays during college and moved to the United States in the early 1980s. He is known for his role as Westley in the cult classic The...
) crawls from the bathroom to find help after sawing off his foot. Along the way, he reaches a steam pipe and uses it to cauterize his ankle stump. In the present, Ryan (Jon Cor) and Brad (Sebastian Pigott) awaken in a storefront window in a shopping area in front of a crowd of people, their wrists bound to a worktable. In front of each man is a buzz saw, and their mutual lover, Dina (Anne Lee Greene) is suspended above a third saw. Jigsaw's puppet
Billy (Saw)
Billy is a puppet that has appeared in the Saw films. It was used by the series' primary antagonist John Kramer, a.k.a. Jigsaw, to communicate with his test subjects by delivering recorded messages, often appearing on a television screen or occasionally in person to describe the details of the...
tells them that they can either kill one another or allow Dina to die, and after realizing her betrayal, they decide to save themselves and allow her to lower onto the saw, killing her.
Jill Tuck
Jill Tuck
Jill Tuck is a fictional character in the Saw film series. She is the ex-wife of the series' main antagonist John Kramer, a.k.a. the Jigsaw Killer. She first appeared in the one-shot comic book Saw: Rebirth as John's ex-girlfriend, however her backstory and appearance were altered significantly in...
(Betsy Russell
Betsy Russell
Betsy Russell is an American actress who is best known for her role in Private School, and as Jill Tuck, the ex-wife of the Jigsaw Killer in the Saw film series.-Early life:...
) goes to Matt Gibson (Chad Donella
Chad Donella
Chad E. Donella is a Canadian actor who has appeared in several movies and television shows.-Life and career:He attended the Arts York Drama Program, in which he participated in such plays as Oedipus Rex, Waiting for Godot, and The Collected Works of Billy the Kid. He has performed at Toronto's...
), an internal affairs
Internal affairs (law enforcement)
The internal affairs division of a law enforcement agency investigates incidents and plausible suspicions of lawbreaking and professional misconduct attributed to officers on the force...
detective at Mark Hoffman's (Costas Mandylor
Costas Mandylor
Costas Mandylor is a Greek Australian actor. He is perhaps best known for his role as Kenny in Picket Fences, and for portraying Mark Hoffman in the Saw films.-Early life:...
) precinct, and offers to incriminate Hoffman in exchange for immunity and protection. Meanwhile, Hoffman abducts four racist skinheads and places them in a trap in an abandoned junkyard that kills all of them. After a gathering of past Jigsaw survivors takes place, Hoffman abducts Bobby Dagen (Sean Patrick Flanery
Sean Patrick Flanery
Sean Patrick Flanery is an American actor known for such roles as Connor MacManus in The Boondock Saints, Greg Stillson in The Dead Zone and for portraying Indiana Jones in The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, as well as Bobby Dagen in Saw 3D.He is currently known for his role as Sam Gibson on The...
), a self-help
Self-help
Self-help, or self-improvement, is a self-guided improvement—economically, intellectually, or emotionally—often with a substantial psychological basis. There are many different self-help movements and each has its own focus, techniques, associated beliefs, proponents and in some cases, leaders...
guru who achieved fame and fortune by falsely stating that he survived a Jigsaw trap. Hoffman sends videos to Gibson throughout the film, offering cryptic clues to his location and promising to stop the games if Jill is given to him.
Bobby awakens in an abandoned insane asylum and is informed that his wife Joyce (Gina Holden
Gina Holden
- Early life :Holden was born in the small town of Smithers, British Columbia, Canada, and moved often while growing up. With every move, Holden would join whatever community group she could so she could follow her passion for acting. At fifteen, she was signed to a modeling contract and moved to...
) has also been abducted and will die if he does not save her in sixty minutes. After escaping a cage hanging over a floor of spikes, Dagen navigates his way through the asylum, finding his publicist Nina (Naomi Snieckus), his lawyer Suzanne (Rebecca Marshall) and his close friend Cale (Dean Armstrong
Dean Armstrong
Dean Armstrong is a Canadian actor and coach for performers in film and television.-Career:The Actor.Dean works in film, TV and stage...
) all in traps representing their respective sins. Despite his efforts to save them, all three are killed. Gibson soon discovers the location of the asylum and sends a SWAT team, who are sealed in one section of the asylum and killed by toxic gas. Gibson also finds Hoffman's command center, where he discovers that Hoffman has hacked the police security camera system, and is killed by automatic turret gun
Turret gun
A turret gun is a type of multi-shot hand-held firearm. It is a variation on the percussion revolver, designed with chambers in a drum mounted so it would rotate horizontally , rather than around a horizontal axis, in an attempt to circumvent the patent by of Samuel B. Colt...
along with both of his men. Hoffman, who had been posing as one of the junkyard corpses, infiltrates police headquarters and kills Dr. Heffner (James Van Patten), Detective Rogers (Laurence Anthony) and several officers before finding Jill. After a brief struggle, he restrains her the same way she restrained him, then secures the original Reverse Bear-Trap to her head, which kills her.
After removing two teeth to retrieve a combination to a locked door, Dagen reaches Joyce and is forced to drive two hooks through his pectoral muscles
Pectoralis major muscle
The pectoralis major is a thick, fan-shaped muscle, situated at the chest of the body. It makes up the bulk of the chest muscles in the male and lies under the breast in the female...
, the trap he claimed to survive, then hoist himself up by the chains to deactivate her trap. However, the hooks rip through his muscles and he falls to the ground, and a brazen bull
Brazen bull
The brazen bull, bronze bull, or Sicilian bull, was a torture and execution device designed in ancient Greece. Its inventor, metal worker Perillos of Athens, proposed it to Phalaris, the tyrant of Akragas, Sicily, as a new means of executing criminals. The bull was made entirely of bronze, hollow,...
capsule slams shut around Joyce and burns her alive. Moments after Hoffman destroys his workshop, he is attacked and captured by three Pighead-masked figures and the leader reveals himself as Lawrence Gordon. Flashbacks reveal that John Kramer
Jigsaw Killer
John Kramer is a fictional character and the central character of the Saw franchise. Jigsaw made his debut as the primary antagonist in the first film of the series, Saw, and he's later portrayed as an antihero in Saw II, III, IV, V, VI and 3D...
(Tobin Bell
Tobin Bell
Tobin Bell is an American film and television character actor. After years of work doing stand-ins and background work on films, he got his first major acting job in Mississippi Burning and went on to star in made-for-television films and guest star in television shows throughout the 1990s.Bell...
) found Gordon by the steam pipe and helped him recover, and Gordon had worked in secret with John ever since. Tasked to watch over Jill after John's death and to take action if anything happened to her, Gordon brings Hoffman to the bathroom from the first film and shackles him by the ankle. He throws away the hacksaw he had once sawed off his foot with, then leaves Hoffman to die.
Development
VarietyVariety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
reported in July 2009 that Lionsgate greenlit Saw VII and announced David Hackl
David Hackl
David Hackl is a Canadian film director and production designer.-Life and career:Hackl was the production designer and second unit director for Saw II, Saw III and Saw IV. Also the production designer for Repo! The Genetic Opera. He was once in talks to direct Saw IV, however, Darren Lynn Bousman...
would return to direct, his last film being Saw V
Saw V
Saw V is a 2008 Canadian-American horror film directed by David Hackl and written by Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan and stars Tobin Bell, Costas Mandylor and Scott Patterson...
. Producers Mark Burg
Mark Burg
Mark Burg is an American film producer and actor, perhaps best known for his work on the SAW series of films and on the CBS sitcom Two and a Half Men.-Career:...
and Oren Koules
Oren Koules
Oren Koules is an American entertainment industry and professional sports industry executive. He was president of Evolution Entertainment, producer of the Saw film series...
, and writers Patrick Melton
Patrick Melton
Patrick Melton is an American screenwriter.-Early life:Melton was born in Champaign, Illinois. He attended Evanston Township High School, and graduated from the University of Iowa with a Bachelor's Degree in Communication Studies...
and Marcus Dunstan
Marcus Dunstan
Marcus Dunstan is an American screenplay writer and director.-Life and career:Dunstan was born in Macomb, Illinois...
also returned. Brian Gedge replaced series' cinematographer
Cinematographer
A cinematographer is one photographing with a motion picture camera . The title is generally equivalent to director of photography , used to designate a chief over the camera and lighting crews working on a film, responsible for achieving artistic and technical decisions related to the image...
David Armstrong. Pre-production
Pre-production
Pre-production or In Production is the process of preparing all the elements involved in a film, play, or other performance.- In film :...
began on September 14, 2009. According to Melton, there were plans to title the film Saw: Endgame. Originally two sequels were planned after the sixth, but in December 2009 Melton stated in a podcast
Podcast
A podcast is a series of digital media files that are released episodically and often downloaded through web syndication...
interview with the UK radio station Demon FM
Demon FM
Demon FM is a community radio station and student radio station for De Montfort University.Demon FM is simulcast on FM and online on a 24/7 basis...
that Saw VII was the final installment and would address unanswered questions from previous Saw films, such as the fate of the first film
Saw (film)
Saw is a 2004 American independent horror film directed by James Wan. The screenplay, written by Leigh Whannell, is based on a story by Wan and Whannell. The film stars Cary Elwes, Danny Glover, Monica Potter, Michael Emerson, Ken Leung, Whannell and Tobin Bell...
's protagonist Dr. Lawrence Gordon
Lawrence Gordon (character)
Dr. Lawrence Gordon is a fictional character in the Saw film series. He is portrayed by Cary Elwes. He was first seen in the original film Saw as one of the main protagonists.-Saw: Rebirth:...
and other Jigsaw survivors from previous films, while bringing a final resolution to the series. The storyline for a Saw VIII was combined into Saw VII; this decision was primarily due to Saw VI below average box office performance. On July 22, 2010 in an interview with USA Today
USA Today
USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
the producers confirmed that Saw VII will officially end the film series. Burg told Reuters
Reuters
Reuters is a news agency headquartered in New York City. Until 2008 the Reuters news agency formed part of a British independent company, Reuters Group plc, which was also a provider of financial market data...
that, "In every Saw movie, we left questions open and in Saw VII we answer every question the audience has ever had". He added that, "even new viewers will be able to follow and get caught up to speed".
In January 2010, Kevin Greutert
Kevin Greutert
-External links:...
, who made his directorial debut with the sixth film, was about to begin work on Paramount
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
's Paranormal Activity 2
Paranormal Activity 2
Paranormal Activity 2 is a 2010 American supernatural horror film directed by Tod Williams and written by Michael R. Perry. The film is a parallel prequel to the 2007 film Paranormal Activity, beginning two months before and following up with the events depicted in the original film...
when Twisted Pictures
Twisted Pictures
Twisted Pictures is an independent production company, mainly creating films of the horror genre. The company was founded in 2004 by Evolution Entertainment's Mark Burg, Oren Koules and Gregg Hoffman...
suddenly dismissed Hackl and forced Greutert on the project by exercising a "contractual clause" in his contract, much to Greutert's dismay. When Greutert arrived on set two weeks before filming began, he performed a "compressive re-write" of the script. Melton explained that, "He has a lot of ideas, but it’s a bit hard and extreme to implement all of these ideas because sets have been built, people have been cast, props have been bought or created, and with the Saw films they are so specific in set design because of the traps. It becomes very problematic and difficult to change things a whole bunch right in the middle of it".
Casting
Casting began in mid-December 2009. On February 22, 2010, Cary ElwesCary Elwes
Ivan Simon Cary Elwes , known professionally as Cary Elwes, is an English actor. The son of Dominick Elwes and Tessa Georgina Kennedy, Elwes acted in off-Broadway plays during college and moved to the United States in the early 1980s. He is known for his role as Westley in the cult classic The...
was listed on the Toronto Film & Television's official list of personnel website for Saw 3D but on March 8 his name along with other cast members were removed from the list. The following month, Lionsgate confirmed his reprisal of the role of Lawrence Gordon
Lawrence Gordon (character)
Dr. Lawrence Gordon is a fictional character in the Saw film series. He is portrayed by Cary Elwes. He was first seen in the original film Saw as one of the main protagonists.-Saw: Rebirth:...
, last seen in the first film
Saw (film)
Saw is a 2004 American independent horror film directed by James Wan. The screenplay, written by Leigh Whannell, is based on a story by Wan and Whannell. The film stars Cary Elwes, Danny Glover, Monica Potter, Michael Emerson, Ken Leung, Whannell and Tobin Bell...
. Dunstan and Melton said that Elwes filmed new scenes. The filmmakers wanted to bring Elwes back earlier, but Elwes wanted to wait until the last film. He described his character as having Stockholm syndrome
Stockholm syndrome
In psychology, Stockholm Syndrome is an apparently paradoxical psychological phenomenon wherein hostages express empathy and have positive feelings towards their captors, sometimes to the point of defending them...
. Chad Donella
Chad Donella
Chad E. Donella is a Canadian actor who has appeared in several movies and television shows.-Life and career:He attended the Arts York Drama Program, in which he participated in such plays as Oedipus Rex, Waiting for Godot, and The Collected Works of Billy the Kid. He has performed at Toronto's...
appeared in the film as Internal Affairs Detective Gibson, who was also Hoffman's former partner.
Gabby West
Gabby West
Gabrielle D. "Gabby" West is an American actress. She won a role in Saw 3D in a competition on the reality show Scream Queens.-Life and career:West was born in Bismarck, North Dakota; she graduated Century High School in 2003...
, who won the second season of Scream Queens
Scream Queens (TV series)
Scream Queens is an American reality series on VH1 produced by Joke Productions and Lionsgate Television that premiered in October 2008. The show chronicles a group of unknown actresses competing for a role in the Saw franchise. Tanedra Howard won the first season and gained a role in Saw VI...
, plays Kara in the film. Chester Bennington
Chester Bennington
Chester Charles Bennington is an American musician, singer-songwriter and actor. He is best known as the lead vocalist and songwriter of the rock band Linkin Park....
, the lead vocalist of the alternative rock
Alternative rock
Alternative rock is a genre of rock music and a term used to describe a diverse musical movement that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1980s and became widely popular by the 1990s...
band Linkin Park
Linkin Park
Linkin Park is an American rock band from Agoura Hills, California. Formed in 1996, the band rose to international fame with their debut album, Hybrid Theory, which was certified Diamond by the RIAA in 2005 and multi-platinum in several other countries...
, has a role in the film playing Evan, a white power skinhead. Bennington met with an acting coach to prepare for his role. He said, "It was actually a little more difficult than I expected because it took a lot for me to figure out how to portray this guy and what exactly his motives were going to be throughout. I thought maybe I was overthinking it, and I met with this really great acting coach who helped me walk through and make sense of the, 'Motivation' ". Devon Bostick
Devon Bostick
Devon Bostick is a Canadian actor, best known for playing the lead role in the Atom Egoyan-directed film Adoration and Rodrick Heffley in the Diary of a Wimpy Kid movies.- Life and career :Bostick was born in Toronto, Ontario...
was offered to reprise his role as Brent from Saw VI, but turned it down due to scheduling conflicts.
Filming in 3D
Saw 3D was shot entirely in RealD 3D using the SI-3D digital camera system; rather than filming on set traditionally and later transferring the footage to 3D. Before choosing 3D, Burg and others viewed a minute of the original Saw film rendered in 3D and were pleased, which led to them choosing 3D for the seventh film. The sets and traps were designed to take advantage of 3D. To continue the fast pace of the previous films, the SI-3D cameras' lightweight allowed three-quarters of film to be shot handheldHand-held camera
Hand-held camera or hand-held shooting is a filmmaking and video production technique in which a camera is held in the camera operator's hands as opposed to being mounted on a tripod or other base. Hand-held cameras are used because they are conveniently sized for travel and because they allow...
. Saw 3D was Greutert's first time directing a 3D film. He said in an interview with Popular Mechanics
Popular Mechanics
Popular Mechanics is an American magazine first published January 11, 1902 by H. H. Windsor, and has been owned since 1958 by the Hearst Corporation...
that composing a shot in 3D was tricky compared to 2D; he explained, "If you've got both cameras looking at a subject and there's a very bright sheen on the side of the person's arm that only one camera can see, there's a good chance that when you look at a composite of the two images that sheen will not register in 3D space. It looks like a mistake. These things aren't an issue at all in 2D but in 3D are obsessively problematic". Given the cost of filming in 3D, Greutert said the budget was $17 million, the most expensive of the series. Principal photography
Principal photography
thumb|300px|Film production on location in [[Newark, New Jersey]].Principal photography is the phase of film production in which the movie is filmed, with actors on set and cameras rolling, as distinct from pre-production and post-production....
began on February 8, 2010 in Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
, Ontario
Ontario
Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....
and wrapped
Wrap (filmmaking)
Wrap is a phrase used by the director in the early days of the film industry to signal the end of filming. Nowadays, the call is more commonly "that's a wrap!"...
on April 12, 2010. Filming took place mostly at Toronto's Cinespace Film Studios.
When determining the style of 3D shooting they wanted to use, Burg felt that the audience would want several moments where objects move into the audience, comparing this to My Bloody Valentine 3D. He acknowledged that this method would be used, but expressed an interest in shooting from the victim's perspective, similar to that of first-person shooter
First-person shooter
First-person shooter is a video game genre that centers the gameplay on gun and projectile weapon-based combat through first-person perspective; i.e., the player experiences the action through the eyes of a protagonist. Generally speaking, the first-person shooter shares common traits with other...
video games being rendered in 3D. Dunstan added that "It adds a whole new layer of discipline and criteria to creating these moments. We've had a very flat surface to try to get a reaction out of you. Now, we get to push out a bit and envelop the viewer, still maintaining the patterns that have worked and been successful, but also to raise it up a notch." Commenting on the change to filming in 3D, Bell stated it would not affect his performance or methods of acting, noting that it would be an "interesting experience". Mandylor called the 3D shoot "more tedious and longer". Flannery described the 3D aspect as being "[not] shot in 3D so that you can, per se, see blood coming directly at you. It's in 3D for the texture and the depth, for the architecture, to get a sense that you're in the scene but there's no 'we want to see blood coming at the lens' it's nothing like that. But I think we made a good movie." Post-production
Post-production
Post-production is part of filmmaking and the video production process. It occurs in the making of motion pictures, television programs, radio programs, advertising, audio recordings, photography, and digital art...
services were provided by Deluxe
Deluxe Entertainment Services Group Inc.
Deluxe Entertainment Services Group Inc. is a leading company in the business of traditional and digital cinema services.By focusing on both theatrical and home entertainment, Deluxe sets up complete digital workflow solutions for such major motion-picture groups as The Walt Disney Company, 20th...
.
Traps
Filming of the trap scenes, which was done last, began in March. The film's opening trap scene was filmed at Metro HallMetro Hall
Metro Hall is a 27-storey Postmodern office tower at the corner of Wellington and John Streets in Toronto, Canada. It looks out onto Pecaut Square. Part of the three-tower Metro Centre complex, the building was completed in 1992 to house the Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto and its employees...
in Toronto, Ontario, just outside of Roy Thomson Hall
Roy Thomson Hall
Roy Thomson Hall is a concert hall located at 60 Simcoe Street in Toronto, Ontario. It is the home of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir. Opened in 1982, its circular architectural design exhibits a sloping and curvilinear glass exterior. It was designed by Canadian...
, and included 400 extras
Extra (actor)
A background actor or extra is a performer in a film, television show, stage, musical, opera or ballet production, who appears in a nonspeaking, nonsinging or nondancing capacity, usually in the background...
. In the trap, the circular saw blades were actually real and functional, but safety precautions were taken for the actors. One actor that was in the trap, Jon Cor, told Demon FM that he had scars on his hands from the shackles, and said the other actors, Sebastian Pigott chipped his tooth and Anne Lee Greene lost the feeling in her feet and had to receive medical attention.
Producer Oren Koules
Oren Koules
Oren Koules is an American entertainment industry and professional sports industry executive. He was president of Evolution Entertainment, producer of the Saw film series...
told horror news website ShockTilYouDrop.com that there are eleven traps in the film, the most ever in the franchise. There is one "trap" scene in the film that producers would not allow in previous Saw films that they described as "too violent", "too disgusting", and "just wrong". Melton later confirmed that was the "Garage Trap", which involved a car and sets off a "chain reaction" with other characters. Gabby West was part of the trap. She told VH1
VH1
VH1 or Vh1 is an American cable television network based in New York City. Launched on January 1, 1985 in the old space of Turner Broadcasting's short-lived Cable Music Channel, the original purpose of the channel was to build on the success of MTV by playing music videos, but targeting a slightly...
, "They molded my entire face, and basically my entire upper body after my belly button. They put layers and layers of different materials on you and you have two straws in your nose so you can breathe. It was so scary! They put so much of it on, you can't see and they put it in your ears so you can barely hear anything. That was part of the prep for the film, which was really cool, to have a dummy made of yourself. But scary." Over 25 gallons of fake blood
Theatrical blood
Theatrical blood or stage blood is anything used as a substitute for blood in a theatrical or cinematic performance. For example, in the special effects industry, when a director needs to simulate an actor being shot or cut, a wide variety of chemicals and natural products can be used...
was used in the film, which was two and half times more than Saw II
Saw II
Saw II is a 2005 Canadian-American horror film directed by Darren Lynn Bousman and co-written by Bousman and the first film's co-writer Leigh Whannell. It is a sequel to 2004's Saw and the second installment in the seven-part Saw film series...
.
Crew
- Kevin GreutertKevin Greutert-External links:...
– director - Gregg HoffmanGregg HoffmanGregg Hoffman born in Phoenix, Arizona, was a film producer responsible for developing Saw and Saw II. He studied communications, law and economics at American University in Washington, D.C. Hoffman was working on Saw III and other films for Twisted Pictures when he died in a hospital in...
– producer - Mark BurgMark BurgMark Burg is an American film producer and actor, perhaps best known for his work on the SAW series of films and on the CBS sitcom Two and a Half Men.-Career:...
– producer - Oren KoulesOren KoulesOren Koules is an American entertainment industry and professional sports industry executive. He was president of Evolution Entertainment, producer of the Saw film series...
– producer - Patrick MeltonPatrick MeltonPatrick Melton is an American screenwriter.-Early life:Melton was born in Champaign, Illinois. He attended Evanston Township High School, and graduated from the University of Iowa with a Bachelor's Degree in Communication Studies...
– screenwriter - Marcus DunstanMarcus DunstanMarcus Dunstan is an American screenplay writer and director.-Life and career:Dunstan was born in Macomb, Illinois...
– screenwriter - Brian Gedge – cinematographer
- Andrew Coutts – editor
- Charlie ClouserCharlie ClouserCharles Alexander "Charlie" Clouser is an American musician whose activities include playing keyboard, synth, theremin, and drums. He is known for his abilities in music programming, engineering, mixing, and remixing. He was a member of the band Nine Inch Nails 1994–2000. Before he was in Nine...
– music composer - Anthony A. Ianni – production designerProduction designerIn film and television, a production designer is the person responsible for the overall look of a filmed event such as films, TV programs, music videos or adverts. Production designers have one of the key creative roles in the creation of motion pictures and television. Working directly with the...
- Peter Grundy – art directorArt directorThe art director is a person who supervise the creative process of a design.The term 'art director' is a blanket title for a variety of similar job functions in advertising, publishing, film and television, the Internet, and video games....
- Alex Kavanagh – costume designerCostume DesignerA costume designer or costume mistress/master is a person whose responsibility is to design costumes for a film or stage production. He or she is considered an important part of the "production team", working alongside the director, scenic and lighting designers as well as the sound designer. The...
Music
The Saw 3D soundtrack is "inspired by the film" and features music from rock bands including Dir En GreyDir en grey
Dir En Grey is a Japanese metal band formed in 1997 and currently signed to Firewall Div., a sub-division of Free-Will. As of 2011, they have recorded eight full-length records...
, Boom Boom Satellites
Boom Boom Satellites
is a Japanese electronic music duo consisting of guitarist and vocalist Michiyuki Kawashima and bassist and programmer Masayuki Nakano. While their music can be mostly classified as big beat or nu skool breaks with heavy jazz influences, they are famous for the heavy usage of electric guitars in...
, Saliva
Saliva
Saliva , referred to in various contexts as spit, spittle, drivel, drool, or slobber, is the watery substance produced in the mouths of humans and most other animals. Saliva is a component of oral fluid. In mammals, saliva is produced in and secreted from the three pairs of major salivary glands,...
, Krokus
Krokus (band)
Krokus is a hard rock/heavy metal band from Switzerland. They enjoyed moderate success in North America during the 1980s.Krokus was founded in Solothurn in 1974 by bassist Chris von Rohr and guitarist Tommy Kiefer...
, Hinder
Hinder
Hinder is an American rock band from Oklahoma that was formed in 2001 by drummer Cody Hanson, guitarist Joe Garvey, and singer Austin Winkler. The band was inducted into the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame in 2007.-Formation and early history:...
, Karnivool
Karnivool
Karnivool are an Australian progressive rock band formed in Perth in 1997. The group currently consists of Ian Kenny on vocals, Drew Goddard and Mark Hosking on guitar, Jon Stockman on bass guitar, and Steve Judd on drums. Karnivool emerged from a band Kenny and Goddard formed during high school...
, My Darkest Days
My Darkest Days
My Darkest Days is a Canadian rock band based in Toronto, consisting of lead singer Matt Walst, lead guitarist Sal Costa, Bassist Brendan McMillan, Drummer Doug Oliver, and keyboardist Reid Henry...
and Chester Bennington
Chester Bennington
Chester Charles Bennington is an American musician, singer-songwriter and actor. He is best known as the lead vocalist and songwriter of the rock band Linkin Park....
's Dead By Sunrise
Dead by Sunrise
Dead by Sunrise is an American rock band. It is the side project of Linkin Park's lead vocalist and songwriter, Chester Bennington. The band also features Amir Derakh, Ryan Shuck, Brandon Belsky, Elias Andra, and Anthony "Fu" Valcic from Julien-K and Orgy...
. It was released through SonyMusic Independent Network (SIN) and Artists' Addiction Records on October 26, 2010. The film's score
Saw 3D (Original Score Soundtrack)
Saw 3D is the film score soundtrack to Saw 3D. It was composed by Charlie Clouser, who composed the score to all of the previous films.The soundtrack was released on iTunes on November 2, 2010 and included 30 tracks....
was composed by Charlie Clouser
Charlie Clouser
Charles Alexander "Charlie" Clouser is an American musician whose activities include playing keyboard, synth, theremin, and drums. He is known for his abilities in music programming, engineering, mixing, and remixing. He was a member of the band Nine Inch Nails 1994–2000. Before he was in Nine...
and released on iTunes
ITunes
iTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad....
through Evolution Music Partners on November 2, 2010. The song "Life Won't Wait
Scream (Ozzy Osbourne album)
-Tour Edition CD2:-Personnel:Musicians*Ozzy Osbourne – vocals, production*Gus G – guitars*Rob "Blasko" Nicholson – bass*Tommy Clufetos – drums, percussion*Adam Wakeman – keyboardsAdditional personnel*Kevin Churko – production, engineering, mixing...
" by Ozzy Osbourne
Ozzy Osbourne
John Michael "Ozzy" Osbourne is an English vocalist, whose musical career has spanned over 40 years. Osbourne rose to prominence as lead singer of the pioneering English heavy metal band Black Sabbath, whose radically different, intentionally dark, harder sound helped spawn the heavy metal...
is played during the end credits.
Track listing
Marketing
On July 8, 2010, in some press materials for San Diego Comic-Con, the film was referred to as Saw 3D: The Traps Come Alive, which led to the media assuming it was the final name. The following day, Burg and Koules said that "The Traps Come Alive" was simply a tagline that had been misinterpreted as part of the title. Koules said that if they included the seventh roman numeral followed by "3D" (Saw VII 3D), it would have been "cumbersome" and not made the impact they wanted. He explained, "It was such a process in 3D, so much hard work was put in. Saw VII 3D is too much. This is like a new movie. [...]"In the same interview, the producers addressed Saw presence at Comic-Con 2010 in San Diego. They said that the footage that was going to be used for the convention could not get approved for the audience; Koules explained, "It's going to be different than what we've done before, we're going to be at Comic-Con but we're not in Comic-Con"." The Comic-Con teaser trailer was released via IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
on July 22, 2010. The next day of the convention, the first eight minutes of the film were screened for the press and a few fans.
The trailer shown in the United Kingdom during a break from The Gadget Show
The Gadget Show
The Gadget Show is a British television series focusing on technology and is broadcast on Channel 5. Originally a thirty minute show, it was extended to forty-five minutes, then later to fifty five minutes. Repeats have also aired on the digital channels 5*, Dave and Channel 5's Internet on-demand...
was banned after a 10 year-old child complained that it was "distressing" and "inappropriately scheduled". Clearcast
Clearcast
Clearcast is an NGO which pre-approves most British television advertising . It came into being on January 1 2008 and took over the responsibilities of the Broadcast Advertising Clearance Centre...
had cleared the trailer for 19:00 GMT, but did not actually air until 20:29. In one scene of the trailer people in a cinema become trapped to the seats by metal restraints with a hand coming through the screen pulling a person in. The Advertising Standards Authority
Advertising Standards Authority (United Kingdom)
The Advertising Standards Authority is the self-regulatory organisation of the advertising industry in the United Kingdom. The ASA is a non-statutory organisation and so cannot interpret or enforce legislation. However, its code of advertising practice broadly reflects legislation in many instances...
said it was "likely to cause distress to young children". In Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
a branch of Showcase Cinemas
Showcase Cinemas
Showcase Cinemas is a movie theater chain owned and operated by National Amusements. Operating more than 1,354 indoor screens in the United States, United Kingdom and Latin America.-USA:* Connecticut* Massachusetts* Ohio* New Jersey* Rhode Island...
showed Saw 3D instead of the cartoon Megamind, which was being watched by a 7 year-old celebrating a birthday. It took several minutes before the cinema employees fixed the mistake.
Release
Saw 3D was distributed theatrically by Lionsgate Entertainment in the United States and through Maple PicturesMaple pictures
Maple Pictures Corporation is the distribution arm of Alliance Films. It was formed on April 25, 2005 when Lions Gate Entertainment demerged to two companies -- Lions Gate Entertainment and Maple Pictures...
in Canada. The film was originally scheduled to be released on October 22, 2010, but in July 2010 the date was pushed back to October 29. It also had preview screenings on October 28, 2010 in 2,000 locations. Since the release of Saw IV, each film has been released a day earlier in Australia and New Zealand; Saw 3D continued the tradition in Australia, though the New Zealand release was not released until March 3, 2011. The film was initially rated NC-17 (no children 17 and under admitted) by the Motion Picture Association of America
Motion Picture Association of America
The Motion Picture Association of America, Inc. , originally the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America , was founded in 1922 and is designed to advance the business interests of its members...
(MPAA) and had to be edited and re-submitted
Re-edited film
A re-edited film is a film that has been edited from the original theatrical release.-Types of re-editing:Films edited for format, length, and content....
six times to secure an R rating. In Australia, the Australian Classification Board
Australian Classification Board
The Australian Classification Board is a statutory classification body formed by the Australian Government which classifies films, video games and publications for exhibition, sale or hire in Australia since its establishment in 1970. The Australian Classification Board was originally incorporated...
gave a heavy R18+ (restricted to 18 and over) for "high impact violence, blood and gore", whereas all previous Saw films were rated MA15+.
Home media
Burg said in an interview with Bloomberg TelevisionBloomberg Television
Bloomberg Television is a 24-hour global network broadcasting business and financial news. It is distributed globally, reaching over 200 million homes worldwide. It is owned and operated by Bloomberg L.P...
on October 25, 2010 that the DVD will only be released in the 2D version. Lionsgate Home Entertainment
Lionsgate Home Entertainment
Lionsgate Home Entertainment is the home video and DVD distribution arm of Lions Gate Entertainment and most former Artisan Entertainment releases. Its library of more than 8000 films owes some of its size to output deals with other studios...
released Saw 3D: The Final Chapter on January 25, 2011 in three versions. The first is a standard DVD release consisting of the theatrical version of the film, a selection of bonus features and a second disc with a digital copy; a second edition is a 2D combo pack that includes an unrated Blu-ray
Blu-ray Disc
Blu-ray Disc is an optical disc storage medium designed to supersede the DVD format. The plastic disc is 120 mm in diameter and 1.2 mm thick, the same size as DVDs and CDs. Blu-ray Discs contain 25 GB per layer, with dual layer discs being the norm for feature-length video discs...
, DVD and digital copy
Digital copy
Digital Copy provides consumers who purchase a film on DVD or Blu-ray Disc with an additional, digital copy of the movie for devices capable of operating with a file in contrast to a DVD.-Features:...
of the film. The last edition of the release is a 3D combo pack consisting of an unrated Blu-ray 3D, Blu-ray, DVD, and digital copy version of the film. According to the Nielsen VideoScan
Nielsen VideoScan
Nielsen VideoScan is the partnership formed between the VideoScan and ACNielsen companies, each of which is owned by The Nielsen Company. Nielsen VideoScan provides detailed point-of-sale data regarding sales of VHS videotape cassettes, DVDs, HD DVDs and Blu-ray Discs...
chart, the DVD and Blu-ray formats placed number three in its first week.
Box office
Saw 3D had preview screenings on October 28, 2010 in 2,000 locations and made $1.7 million. It opened in wide releaseWide release
Wide release is a term in the American motion picture industry for a motion picture that is playing nationally . Specifically, a movie is considered to be in wide release when it is on 600 screens or more in the United States and Canada.In the US, films holding an NC-17 rating almost never have a...
the following day in 2,808 locations playing on 3,500 screens, the second smallest release behind the first Saw
Saw (film)
Saw is a 2004 American independent horror film directed by James Wan. The screenplay, written by Leigh Whannell, is based on a story by Wan and Whannell. The film stars Cary Elwes, Danny Glover, Monica Potter, Michael Emerson, Ken Leung, Whannell and Tobin Bell...
. The film earned $8.9 million its opening day taking the number one spot from Paranormal Activity 2
Paranormal Activity 2
Paranormal Activity 2 is a 2010 American supernatural horror film directed by Tod Williams and written by Michael R. Perry. The film is a parallel prequel to the 2007 film Paranormal Activity, beginning two months before and following up with the events depicted in the original film...
. It grossed $22.5 million its opening Halloween weekend, with 92% of tickets coming from more than 2,100 3D-equipped locations and 57% of the audience was under the age of 25. It had the fifth best opening weekend in the Saw series. After only four days of wide release Saw 3D had out-grossed Saw VIs $27.7 million final domestic gross. On its second weekend the film dropped 66% in ticket sales and made $7.7 million, moving to the number five spot with Megamind taking its number one spot. Saw 3D was closed out of theaters on December 2, 2010, after 35 days of release in the United States and Canada.
Saw 3D opened in 25 territories with $14.4 million (including preview screenings) placing first place in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
(UK) with $5.8 million, beating Saw III
Saw III
Saw III is a 2006 Canadian-American horror film directed by Darren Lynn Bousman from a screenplay by Leigh Whannell and story by James Wan and Whannell. Wan and Whannell directed and wrote Saw and Bousman wrote and directed Saw II. It is the third film in the seven-part Saw film series and stars...
$4.7 million UK opening. It opened in second place in Russia with $2.2 million; Australia and Japan grossed $909,000 and $864,800, respectively. Saw 3D grossed $12.8 million in the United Kingdom
Cinema of the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom has had a major influence on modern cinema. The first moving pictures developed on celluloid film were made in Hyde Park, London in 1889 by William Friese Greene, a British inventor, who patented the process in 1890. It is generally regarded that the British film industry...
, Ireland and Malta
Malta
Malta , officially known as the Republic of Malta , is a Southern European country consisting of an archipelago situated in the centre of the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya, with Gibraltar to the west and Alexandria to the east.Malta covers just over in...
; $10.9 million in Germany
Cinema of Germany
Cinema in Germany can be traced back to the late 19th century. German cinema has made major technical and artistic contributions to film.Unlike any other national cinemas, which developed in the context of relatively continuous and stable political systems, Germany witnesses major changes to its...
; $7 million in Italy
Cinema of Italy
The history of Italian cinema began just a few months after the Lumière brothers had patented their Cinematographe, when Pope Leo XIII was filmed for a few seconds in the act of blessing the camera.-Early years:...
; $5.3 million in Russia
Cinema of Russia
The cinema of Russia began in the Russian Empire, widely developed under the Soviet and in the years following the fall of the Soviet system, the Russian film industry would remain internationally recognised...
; and $2.4 million in Australia
Cinema of Australia
Cinema of Australia, more commonly referred to as the Australian film industry, refers to the system of production, distribution, and exhibition of films in Australia. Film production commenced in Australia in 1906 with the production of The Story of the Kelly Gang, the earliest feature film made...
. The film has grossed $45.7 million in the United States
Cinema of the United States
The cinema of the United States, also known as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. Its history is sometimes separated into four main periods: the silent film era, classical Hollywood cinema, New Hollywood, and the contemporary period...
and Cinema of Canada, with $90.4 million in other markets, for a worldwide total of $136.1 million. This makes Saw 3D the highest grossing film in the series in the foreign market. Also, it made more than double the amount of the previous installment Saw VI
Saw VI
Saw VI is a 2009 horror film directed by Kevin Greutert from a screenplay written by Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan. It is the sixth installment of the seven–part Saw film series and stars Tobin Bell, Costas Mandylor, Betsy Russell, Mark Rolston, Peter Outerbridge, and Shawnee Smith...
and is the most successful film in the franchise since Saw IV
Saw IV
Saw IV is a 2007 Canadian-American horror film and midquel to 2006's Saw III. It was directed by Darren Lynn Bousman and written by newcomers Patrick Melton, Marcus Dunstan and Thomas Fenton. The film was released in North America on October 26, 2007...
.
| Release date (United States) |
Budget (estimated) |
Box office revenue | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| United States/Canada | Other markets | Worldwide | ||
| October 29, 2010 | $17,000,000 | $45,710,178 | $90,440,256 | $136,150,434 |
Critical response
As with the previous four Saw films, Saw 3D was not screened in advance for critics. The film received largely negative reviews from film critics. Review aggregation website Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
reports that 10% of 67 critics have given the film a positive review, with a rating average of 3.1 out of 10, making it the poorest reviewed film in the series. Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
, which assigns a weighted average score out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, gives the film a rating score of 24, based on 17 reviews. CinemaScore
CinemaScore
CinemaScore is a market research firm based in Las Vegas. It surveys film audiences to rate their viewing experiences with letter grades, reports the results, and forecasts box office receipts based on the data.-Background:...
polls reported that the average grade moviegoers gave the film was a "B-minus" on an A+ to F scale.
Luke Thompson of E! Online gave the film a "B". He called the film's gore "over-the-top" and "in your face" while admitting the film had an "unusual amount of self-parody". He said the central storyline of the films was beginning to feel "played out". Rob Nelson of Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
gave the film a negative review. He called the film "relentlessly repugnant" that would please fans, but offer no surprise. He went on to say, "Apart from these limb-pulling setpieces, tech credits appear fairly shoddy, as do any 3D effects that don't include flying viscera. The editing relies on lazy flashbacks, while the dialogue remains as horrific as the killings." Kim Newman of Empire gave the film two out of five stars, calling it a "a step down from last year’s much more pointed Saw VI
Saw VI
Saw VI is a 2009 horror film directed by Kevin Greutert from a screenplay written by Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan. It is the sixth installment of the seven–part Saw film series and stars Tobin Bell, Costas Mandylor, Betsy Russell, Mark Rolston, Peter Outerbridge, and Shawnee Smith...
". He criticized the repetition of the plot but thought bringing back Jigsaw survivors was a "nice idea". He closed his review with, "There are a scattering of infallibly cringe-making horrors, but on the whole Saw 3D could do with more depth".
Eric Goldman of IGN Movies gave the film two out of five stars. He was unhappy with the little screen time Bell and Elwes had been given, saying that the time the film did spend with them, didn't have much impact. He said the traps were a step down from Saw VI, but did point out his favorite and highlight of the film as the "garage trap". About the film's 3D effects, Goldman said "The 3D is used as you might expect it to be - which is to say, this is no James Cameron
James Cameron
James Francis Cameron is a Canadian-American film director, film producer, screenwriter, editor, environmentalist and inventor...
immersive experience. Instead, blades jut out of the screen, and there is some fun had with blood and guts literally shooting forward at several points". Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter
The Hollywood Reporter
Formerly a daily trade magazine, The Hollywood Reporter re-launched in late 2010 as a unique hybrid publication serving the entertainment industry and a consumer audience...
gave the film a mixed review. He said Saw 3D is "consistent both stylistically and thematically with previous editions", but said most of the film's traps lack the "Rube Goldberg
Rube Goldberg
Reuben Garrett Lucius Goldberg was an American cartoonist, sculptor, author, engineer and inventor.He is best known for a series of popular cartoons depicting complex gadgets that perform simple tasks in indirect, convoluted ways. These devices, now known as Rube Goldberg machines, are similar to...
-style cleverness that marked the series". Scheck went on to say that it was "unfortunate" the creators killed Bell's character so early in the series and called Mandylor's character (Hoffman) an "exceedingly bland stand-in". He called the visual impact of the 3D "negligible".
Roger Moore of the Orlando Sentinel
Orlando Sentinel
The Orlando Sentinel is the primary newspaper of the Orlando, Florida region. It was founded in 1876. The Sentinel is owned by Tribune Company and is overseen by the Chicago Tribune. As of 2005, the Sentinel’s president and publisher was Kathleen Waltz; she announced her resignation in February 2008...
gave the film one out of five stars saying, "It’s all bunk and has been for years. These are all no-win scenarios. Whatever moral lessons were presented in the earliest Saw films seem to have been dispensed with as the movies grow more and more gruesome, with filmmakers caught up in 'What would it look like if somebody’s jaw was ripped out, or their skin was glued to a car seat?' Pandering to the 'Cool, let’s see that again' crowd has made Lionsgate rich but done nothing for this unendurable endurance contest of this long-enduring film franchise". Mike Hale of The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
called the film the most "straightforward" of the series and the "most consistently (though not inventively) violent". He ended his review saying, "If you see the film in a theater equipped with RealD 3D and Dolby sound
Dolby Digital
Dolby Digital is the name for audio compression technologies developed by Dolby Laboratories. It was originally called Dolby Stereo Digital until 1994. Except for Dolby TrueHD, the audio compression is lossy. The first use of Dolby Digital was to provide digital sound in cinemas from 35mm film prints...
, you’ll come away with a pretty good idea of what it would feel like to have flying body parts hit you in the face".
Elizabeth Weitzman of the New York Daily News gave the film one out of five stars. She criticized the lack of Bell's screentime saying, "What the filmmakers of the last four Saw movies have somehow overlooked is that Tobin Bell's Jigsaw is the linchpin of these films. It's right there in the title, so you'd think they'd realize what they lost when they killed him off in Saw III. But it's been downhill ever since, and we hit bottom today". She admitted that the performances have become "painfully stilted" and called the script "a jumble of nothing punctuated by barely-trying death traps". She went on to say, "It's also disappointing to watch a once-original franchise morph into a generic slasher series, in which random people are killed in banal ways just to up the body count" and closed her review with, "No matter how much money The Final Chapter makes over Halloween weekend, it's time to acknowledge that this game is over".
Wesley Morris
Wesley Morris
Wesley Morris is a film critic at The Boston Globe where he reviews films alongside Ty Burr. Morris and Burr also make regular appearances on NECN to discuss the latest films and do the weekly Take Two film review video series on Boston.com...
of The Boston Globe
The Boston Globe
The Boston Globe is an American daily newspaper based in Boston, Massachusetts. The Boston Globe has been owned by The New York Times Company since 1993...
called the film the "most gruesome and least coherent of the seven movies". He felt that some of the film's "games" were just randomly forced into the film, saying that kind of "episodic approach" and 3D works for a "far more innovative series like Jackass 3D
Jackass 3D
Jackass 3D is a 2010 American 3D comedy film and the fourth film in the Jackass series. It was released on October 15, 2010 by Paramount Pictures and MTV Films to American theaters and marked the 10th anniversary of the franchise, which started in 2000...
". Morris closed his review by saying "This alleged final edition trashes the perverse morality of [Jigsaw's] legacy to make him the Jerry Springer
Jerry Springer
Gerald Norman "Jerry" Springer is a British-born American television presenter, best known as host of the tabloid talk show The Jerry Springer Show since its debut in 1991...
of gore". Jason Anderson of the Toronto Star
Toronto Star
The Toronto Star is Canada's highest-circulation newspaper, based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Its print edition is distributed almost entirely within the province of Ontario...
gave the film two out of four stars. He praised Saw 3D plot for not being as confusing as previous films, for which he described as having to "generally require an encyclopedic knowledge of the series' many plot strands" in order to understand them. He thought Greutert gave the film a "pulpy energy" and described the film's traps and gore as having an "unpretentious sensibility" to films by Herschell Gordon Lewis
Herschell Gordon Lewis
Herschell Gordon Lewis is an American filmmaker, best known for creating the "splatter film" subgenre of horror...
. Alan Jones of the Radio Times
Radio Times
Radio Times is a UK weekly television and radio programme listings magazine, owned by the BBC. It has been published since 1923 by BBC Magazines, which also provides an on-line listings service under the same title...
gave the film four out of five stars saying, "though the film initially borders on parody, once the ever-ingenious trapping begins — using fishhooks, superglue, ovens and dental equipment — the chills run on turbo drive right through to the greatest hits flashback finale". He implied that the "shock scenarios" were borrowed from sources such as, A Man Called Horse
A Man Called Horse (1970 film)
A Man Called Horse is a 1970 American Western film starring Richard Harris and directed by Elliot Silverstein.-Plot:The film is based on a short story, "A Man Called Horse", published in 1968 in the book Indian Country by Dorothy M. Johnson...
and the work of Lucio Fulci
Lucio Fulci
Lucio Fulci was an Italian film director, screenwriter, and actor. He is perhaps best known for his directorial work on gore films, including Zombie and The Beyond , although he made films in genres as diverse as giallo, western, and comedy...
. Jones said the 3D did not add to the experience saying "the CGI blood splatter something of a distraction to the almost Shakespearean crescendo of anguish and carnage".