And now we’ve come to Saw III, which had so much promise to it, but also starts to show the cracks that would eventually split the Saw franchise wide open. Weirdly enough, this is the only one of the first seven films not done by Descriptive Video Works, so even the narrator changes. It’s strange how noticeable that is once you’ve settled into a rhythm with these movies. I’m not sure the writing itself suffered because of it, but the film definitely feels heavier. More cluttered. Like the franchise is starting to collapse under the weight of its own mythology.
What still works is the central setup. Jigsaw has created this trap maze for a grieving father whose son was killed by a drunk driver, and he has to move through a series of people connected to the death in some way. At every stage, he can either forgive them or let them die. The choices affect whether he’ll even make it to the final room, where he believes he’ll confront the man responsible for killing his child.
That’s a genuinely strong idea. There’s something ugly and human about watching this broken man grief-stalk his way through the maze, facing one asshole after another while trying to decide who deserves mercy. The movie even flashes back to how consumed he became after the accident, shutting down emotionally and barely being present for his remaining daughter. For a while, Saw III almost feels like it wants to be about grief and punishment instead of just elaborate gore delivery systems.
Meanwhile, the other half of the film has John Kramer (Tobin Bell) basically on his deathbed while Amanda (Shawnee Smith) kidnaps a doctor to keep him alive long enough to see the game play out. The doctor has to operate on him with almost no equipment while wearing an explosive collar around her neck, because subtlety left this franchise years ago.
The problem is that the movie keeps pushing itself too far. The idea that a dying cancer patient and Amanda somehow engineered all of these industrial torture devices starts to become impossible to ignore. Saw III is where the franchise finally loses the ability to hand-wave that stuff away.
I also think I wanted more from the ending. Part of me wanted the final room to just contain a mirror. Jigsaw reveals that the father’s final test is whether he can punish or forgive himself. That would’ve actually tied the whole movie together emotionally. But the film isn’t that slick. There’s an actual person waiting there, and the reveal doesn’t hit nearly as hard as the movie thinks it does.
Still, this is probably the closest the series ever came to balancing its torture obsession with an actual thematic core. John Kramer, for all his hypocrisy, at least believed in the idea of redemption. He thought people could change, or at minimum deserved the chance to right a wrong. Saw III still carries traces of that idea around inside all the blood and screaming.
Unfortunately, the next four movies become The Tales Of Hoffman, which is maybe the worst time I’ve ever had watching a replacement character slowly run a franchise into the ground. Imagine if the last Halloween trilogy ended with Michael Myers dying, and then Billy from the first film got handed four sequels. That’s basically what Saw IV-VII feels like.
Compared to what comes after, Saw III almost deserves to be graded on a curve. Its flaws are starting to suffocate the movie, but at least there’s still a pulse underneath all the gore. Still, part of this was watching them in sequential order, and after watching this film, I asked myself if I would recommend it, without having seen any of the films past it. The answer was No. A soft No, but a No.
Saw 3 had the right idea, but begins the era of too much lore, and chasing twist endings that will never be as impressive as what they pulled off in the original.
Rotten: 5.8/10
