'Saw' is a popular horror franchise which is notorious for its gory scenes. The initially emerged as a short movie directed by James Wan . In 2004, the movie was re-made as a full-length movie, and currently there are 6 sequels which all released subsequently every October. Although the movies did not received rave reviews from critics, it actually gain monetary success at the box office.
Although this franchise is well known for its stomach churning scenes, is gore the only thing that the movie viewers, as in the ones who could actually stomach the disturbing scenes that can be found throughout the movie, really seek from these movies?
I was initially exposed to this franchise when a friend of mine challenged me to watch Saw III, and that was when I was still in the 8th grade. There are no official restrictions applied for minors to watch R-rated movies on movie theaters in Indonesia, which explains why a middle schooler like me at that time was able to watch it.
After I watched the movie, I was quite disturbed by it. But at the same time, I was really fascinated by it. The extremely gory scenes were edited out, which probably lessen the overall impact of the movie on me. I managed to see the whole scene on the DVD later though, and my opinion is still the same with the first one: it was awesome, in its own way.
The gore scenes, although it really is disturbing, never fail to fascinate me. The special effect team that were employed did a really great job on creating those scenes as realistic as possible. The actors and actresses seems as if they were really in pain, which increase the realistic impact.
Saw's plot revolves around Jigsaw, a covert serial killer who is being represented by a puppet doll in front of his victims. All his victims were caught for a reason. Rather than killing them instantly, he used psychological and physical torture to push the victims beyond their limit. Throughout the movies, the mastermind behind the puppet doll along with his motive for his crime, and his legacy which carried by his apprentices will be revealed slowly in an unpredictable way. There is always a nagging feeling on wanting to know whether this menacing legacy would eventually meets its ends or not, which keeps me interested with Saw movies.
The psychological aspect shown on these movies is what fascinates me the most. From these movies, I was able to see humans in a situation where they were pushed beyond their limit, mentally and physically. Such situation cannot be easily seen in our daily lives. The victims were trapped in a horrifying death device that would eventually kill them, either instantly or in the most excruciating way after certain amount of time passed if the condition(s) that were required to unbound themselves from the devices were not met. Some were determined to survive that they would do literally anything to escape death, even if they have to deceive others.
'Saw' is not completely a gore fest, although it is one aspect that appeal the watchers the most. Other aspects from these movies more worthy to watch, although you need to have strong mentality to be able to not skip any scenes from the movies.
I have seen all of the SAW movies as well. I think that the Saw movies had a great marketing scheme. Releasing those movies during Halloween was the best idea. For me, it became more of a tradition, to go and watch a SAW movie because it was Halloween, and the original Halloween movies werent being released anymore. Through the short period of time it became nostalgic to see another Saw movie during Halloween. I always knew what to expect, blood, gore, and a plot twist near the end of the movie which made me want to know what happened next. I agree that people were really excited about the gore content of the Saw films, and it really contributed to their success as well. I even dressed up as the Billy doll for Halloween for a few years in a row, and it has induced more fear than any other costume I have ever worn! I really like this post because it reminds me of other major scary movies, like the Halloween movies, or Nightmare on Elm street. For this reason, I think Saw has made its place in horror film history.
ReplyDeleteI learned a lot from reading your post! Personally, I never got into watching these movies because I was afraid of the horrible things Jigsaw put his victims through in the sequels that followed the first film. I did watch the first one and it was interesting the mind games he put the people through now that I think of it. I liked that you focused your argument away from the predictable blood and gore in these shows and mainly focused on the psychological aspect. I thought this post was very insightful!
ReplyDeleteStella -
ReplyDeleteThis entry is more explanatory than argumentative. For this assignment you were supposed to really work on taking an argumentative position. Next time work on making your position stronger and using evidence from the films and other sources to support your point of view.
- Ruth