In case you were unaware, the origin of the crudely labeled torture pron genre now has its entire franchise on Netflix with audio description for the first time apparently ever. I was not really excited, but Alex Howard, of the Dark Room Podcast certainly was. He urged me to jump into the series. Prior to losing my sight, I did technically watch the first two films, but that was it. The original Saw was actually a low budget indie hit at Sundance, which was picked up, and distributed. its most. Marketable stars at the time were Danny Glover and Cary Elwes, because no one knew what a Jigsaw killer was yet, and Tobin Bell wasn’t an icon. He was a character actor working for decades, but who knew this would be the role that would make him an icon. This is also the film that would launch the career of James Wan, who would go onto kickstart The Conjuring franchise for Warner Bros, as well as helm Aquaman. It is the only film in the franchise, ten films strong, that he directed.

I remember watching this film, because it was one of those rare occurrences where I saw a movie without actually sitting down to watch it. When Saw came out in 2004, I was working at a pretty rowdy theater, and often we would have to position ushers in films like Saw to keep an eye on the crowd.I’ve seen some truly crazy shit in my time, but the disrespect of some audiences was baffling. i remember when our manager made the decision to stop Master Of Disguise because all the tweens who had been dropped off to be babysat by theater staff, filled the theater, and I guess the four actual humans who wanted to see the movie were upset that 200 kids just wanted to talk and throw popcorn. We also had the occasional fights breakout,and it was quite common to be asked to watch an audience on a Friday night.That’s how I got to see Saw.

Truly, I was unimpressed at the beginning, because gore never sells me on anything. I need my plot. I thrive on characters. I can take a film like The Substance because it has things like that. If it was just gory for the sake of being gory, I’d tap out. Saw felt like that, but there’s this story that is slowly developing. There’s a mystery unfolding, particularly in this bathroom with two men who don’t know each other, or do they? Can they trust each other? Some serial killer named Jigsaw, who doesn’t believe he’s a killer, because everyone has a choice, has trapped them in here. Meanwhile, the cops are trying to solve some Jigsaw style murders, with his signature traps.

Now let me tell you, the reason I’ve always respected Saw as a horror classic, is James wan. This man directed himself into a near perfect twist ending that has become the stuff of legend. It’s up there with Keizer Soze and I See Dead People. Being in the theater on opening weekend, when word of mouth had not hit, and no one knew what was coming, was something truly special. If my theater had placed tables in front of all the chairs, all would have been flipped. The final moments got such a reaction, not just because of the choice that one makes near the end, but because of the reveal of where Jigsaw was the whole time.

And my God. Sometimes people try to act cool after, and pretend like they saw it coming, but this crowd, lost their absolute shit. People jumped up, screamed, looked around for their friends, laughed, cried, yelled at the screen, and reacted widespread. They weren’t necessarily a quiet audience, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen or been in a theater with an audience reaction like that. It wasn’t rowdy kids, it was an audience fully invested in this film, who just had their minds blown.

So now that it is on Netflix with audio description, I support it. It’s so weird this film doesn’t have a fresh score on the TomatoMeter. I can understand the sequels, but this film started it all. Other films exist because Saw went there first, for better or worse. No matter how exploitative you may think the violence is, or how over the top, the movie is like a Helen Of Troy, and launched a thousand ships. I have a hard time with The Blair Witch Project, but it is hard for me to ignore the films historical significance, and its impact on film. If these films, Blair Witch and saw ended up in the National Film Registry, I would not be surprised.

I think Cary Elwes even does a nice job in the film, as the tension ratchets up in his favor. considering his scenes are pretty universally with a less experienced actor, Elwes certainly does as James Wan wishes and carries a lot of the film from an acting perspective. It’s even interesting to have now seen all ten films, and to see how obsessed they are with connecting to the things that came before, weaving parts of the story so its like easter eggs you missed. Of course, they didn’t initially plan ten films, but they certainly wanted to leave a mark.

Descriptive Video Works, with Paula Hoffman performing the narration, was responsible. And did a lovely job portraying the gore, and also this rapid flash-cut thing that the Saw movies became known for. They do have their own style to them, one which others, like Eli Roth, tried to replicate.

I think some detractors need to revisit Saw, the surprise indie hit that built a franchise, and a subgenre, and still has one of the great movie twists of all time.Sadistic and brutal, Saw isn’t for everyone, but don’t cut off your nose to spite your face. Saw is a classic.

Fresh: 7.5/10