'Jigsaw' REVIEW: New traps, new victims, new game, but ultimately follows the same old rules

'Jigsaw' is the eighth film in the Saw franchise and this time it is directed by The Spierig Brothers, the minds behind films such as Daybreakers (2010) and Predestination (2014). I like Predestination, so I was looking forward to see what they could do in resurrecting the Saw franchise. When it comes to me and these films, I genuinely think that the first Saw film is a very competent and psychological horror flick that spawned a trend of horror films with extreme gory, grisly torture. The rest of the films I'd say are mostly guilty pleasures for me, except Saw 3D (2010) which was just plain awful with terrible acting and unforgivably bad special effects. I never thought I'd see one of these films again. The trailers to this film however were intriguing. It looked fun and seemed like it was going in a different direction. Unfortunately, this Saw is kind of rusty.

In this film's world it has been 10 years since the death of John Kramer a.k.a The Jigsaw Killer. New dead bodies have been appearing around the city and two detectives Halloran (played by Callum Keith Rennie) and Keith (played by Clé Bennett) are on a cat and mouse chase to find out who is doing these murders that are seemingly close to how John Kramer would kill these victims. While all this is happening, apparently 5 other victims are put to Jigsaw's game in a farmhouse somewhere and must play by the rules. If it seem familiar to you, it is. It's just done more dully than I thought.

The biggest compliment that I can give to this particular Saw film is that it most certainly doesn't seem as cheap-looking as the previous films. It has the best production value among all the films we've had so far with much better cinematography and set design. As with any Saw film, this film has the torture and the gore you would expect from these films by now if you're into that. I certainly was amused when somebody dies from a cool looking trap. The special effects are much improved from the last film, but occasionally they'd be noticeable. The new traps are interesting, but you never take the time to really take in the moment while the victims are still stuck in them. For those who aren't as strong with their stomachs, this most certainly is not the most revolting film of the Saw franchise. To be honest, there's not much good to say about this film. If you've liked all of the Saw films, then you're in good hands here.

This is a Saw film that I can describe with one word: boring. A Saw film is boring? I couldn't believe that myself. The characters in this film are stock. They are just there to be killed and that's all. For most of the film's running time I couldn't remember the names of the victims nor did I care to hear their backstories.The film never takes its time to make us care about these victims, but the problem is that they are all bad which is why they are stuck in this predicament. There's nothing redeeming about these characters in the slightest from the writing and the sub-par acting. Even the detective character are boring too. It essentially is a typical Saw sequel. With a new film made 7 years after the last one, I thought they'd have the time to really evaluate and think of what they could do to improve or to at least stand out from the rest of them. Even the traps here aren't all that memorable except the one in the very end of the film, but even that isn't really worth sitting through 90 minutes of boredom. What I found most unbelievable about this film is the twist that these films are most famous for. The twist here is muddled, contrived and left me scratching my head with confusion. It's not very compelling either as it gets lost in all of the prior continuity of the franchise so far. I wanted to yell 'Bullshit!' in the theater when the credits rolled. While I won't say too much, but apparently John Kramer from all the way back before the first Saw film had a secret-secret apprentice who was a victim of his and has helped him invent the first film's signature reverse bear trap. We've never seen this character before from any previous film and it feels like one big cheat from the screenwriters. As a horror film, it's not scary at all. It has a few jolts and maybe a couple of white-knuckle intense scenes, but it's not enough to sustain the whole entire film.

Overall, for those gore-hungry hounds who like this sort of stuff, you'll like it. It's the same old thing we've seen before for better and for worse. For me, I was massively disappointed with this newest installment of the Saw franchise. I thought that with the direction of The Spierig Brothers they could've learned from the mistakes of the previous films. It could've had interesting characters that we should be rooting for, more traps that was linked psychologically to the main characters and had a better payoff for it's mystery.

'Jigsaw' gets a C