Bookmonkey Saw: Day 7

Saw II in a nutshell - everything I really liked about the first film seemed absent from the sequel.

Saw II in a slightly longer synopsis - a year after the events of Saw, eight people are trapped in a house and must make horrifying live-or-die-style choices to escape, while a police officer (and the father of one of the eight) captures and questions the jigsaw killer.  Although the film was not well received by critics, it did quite well and therefore another sequel was quickly ordered.

The original movie poster actually drew a bunch of media interest as it was banned by the MPAA - in the original picture (not shown right), it was apparent that the two fingers are severed.  The approved poster (as seen to the right), is therefore quite acceptable to put in the same theatres where kids were going to see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire around the same time. (Quick side note, my oldest daughter is equally upset by both the banned and approved posters, entirely due to the ragged fingernails - apparently manicures are not that expensive and even severed fingers deserve a little extra care).

The story was originally written as The Desperate, by Darren Lynn Bousman (who would go on to direct Saw III and IV), but due to it’s inability to get green lit on its own, due to it's violent nature and being considered "...too saw-ish" (1) it was passed over until the sequel to Saw was green-lit and it was found that The Desperate could be adapted into a workable script.

Also I feel it is important to note that Saw II was a Canadian-American Horror film (as were the rest in the series, with Lions Gates Films partnering with the Ontario Production Services Tax Credit) so on behalf of my nation, sorry.

Eight months after the film was released, star Tobin Bell was nominated for an MTV Best Villain award (along with Voldemort from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, The Scarecrow from Batman Begins, The White Witch from The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe) but lost out to Hayden Christensen in Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith for best on-screen villain.

The only thing I really liked about the sequel?  Just as Saw had a bizarre reference to Alice in Wonderland, Saw II does the same with The Wizard of Oz (the 1939 MGM film, not the original novel) when the Jigsaw killer informs his eight victims that “ The Clue to their [escape] can be found Over the Rainbow” 

Internet Movie DataBase. "Trivia" in Saw II.  Retrieved October 7 from http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0432348/trivia

Bookmonkey Saw: Day 4

After Saw was released in 2004 to great commercial success, a sequel was quickly green lit and the release date of October 28, 2005 was announced.  

Fans of the series didn’t have to wait the entire year however, as Lionsgate films had a website The House of Jigsaw available for fans to chat and discuss both the original film and places the sequel might go.

Saw’s writer Leigh Whannel stated about the website that “...one of the best things for James (Wan) and I is watching people take ownership of the film and arguing about it, you're thinking oh my god, they’re discussing heatedly something [James and I] thought up.”(1)  Early posts in the forum range from spotting technical errors and conjecture about the motives of the killer, to ideas about what the second film might be about.

In October of 2005, a comic book, Saw: Rebirth was released as well as the uncut edition of Saw, which included two commentary tracks, a behind the scenes documentary called "Hacking Away at Saw" and a feature called "Full Disclosure Report: Piecing Together Jigsaw", which in the guise of a nightly news report,  was effectively a recap of the first film, and, for the dedicated fans watching all the special features, the first appearance of Detective Eric Matthews (played by Donnie Wahlberg) is actually in this short film, introducing him before his lead role in Saw II.

The Comic Book, Saw Rebirth, written by Renato Guedes, R. Eric Lieb, and Chris Oprisko, this single-issue comic is a prequel to the original film, attempts to explain the creation of the Jigsaw Killer from a civil servant to the mastermind he appears to be in the first film.  The comic didn't continue as a series, which isn't surprising, as it made no reference to Saw II, and really feels like conjecture on what must have occurred before the events of the first film rather than an attempt to tell as story in it's own right.

Works Cited:

Lions Gate Film, "Hacking Away at Saw" on Saw: Uncut Edition. 2005