Jigsaw locks a few unlucky people in a booby trapped shelter and they must find a way out before they inhale too much of a lethal nerve gas and die. But they must watch out, for the traps Jigsaw has set in the shelter lead to death also.
When it comes to sequels it’s always a 50/50, it can either carry on the story well or it can be ruin everything. When it comes to SAW II it is definitely the former. We see Jigsaw carry on his work and this time things are more gruesome.
When I first heard about the casting of Donnie Wahlberg I was a bit dubious but he does give a terrific performance and the dialogue he shares with Jigsaw is some of the best I’ve seen. We can’t forget the return of Shawnee Smith who is a surprise turn up after the first film but it’s one of the great plot points of the film.
Also Tobin Bell returning as Jigsaw was just great and gives another classic performance, I wouldn’t want anyone else playing him. He oozes creepiness but also intellect and you just can’t take your eyes off him when he’s on screen. it may make him typecast for future roles but if I was Tobin I would think it was worth it.
Now I can’t write a SAW review without talking about the infamous traps and what crazy contraptions we have here, SAW II certainly doesn’t feature the best traps of the series but what traps are used do work well for the film and still make you cringe, like the needle pit & the hand boxes. The main focus here is the characters themselves and how each tries their own way to survive.
As always there’s a backstory to the films characters linking things together and plot twists that are jaw dropping. With a great cast and great script there’s no way this film could fail, This film shows Hollywood how a sequel should be done.
The film is a true thrill ride of a watching experience , and it more than lived up to it’s predecessor. It can be hard to watch at times, but in a good watching through your fingers way.
Miscellaneous facts about the film:
Was shot in 25 days.
The advertising posters for the film had to be recalled on orders from the MPAA because the two severed fingers forming the “II” in the posters did not meet guidelines for film advertising. The new poster makes it more obscure. Also, posters had listed the film as being rated R when at the time the film still hadn’t gone before the MPAA for a rating.
This film originally came from a script by the director Darren Lynn Bousman which was called “The Desperate”. After trying for years to get it made but being told repeatedly that it was too violent, finally a company wanted to do it because they suspected SAW which was becoming a hit at Sundance might blow out big and they wanted to capitalize on its success. Some producers even described Bousman’s script as “too Saw-ish”. Just before he was about to close a deal to make the movie, Saw opened huge at the box-office and the next day he received a call, and the producers asked if he could change it around to “Saw 2”. Leigh Whannell (who wrote the first “Saw”) was then brought on a little later to help Bousman with creating his original idea into a proper sequel to SAW.
In the very first scene, Darren Lynn Bousman is playing the cloaked figure putting the key in Michael’s eye.
It took around 120,000 syringes to complete the needle pit sequence.
When Danny takes out the syringes from Amanda’s arm, the crew used a fake animatronic arm.
The hall Det. Matthews walks down to pick up his son at the police office was actually a dressing room for the crew.
When Obi popped out of the furnace he hit Glen Plummers (Jonas’s) eye. They had to stop filming for half an hour to make sure he was okay. He can be seen turned around in one shot, and holding his eye in another.
Shawnee Smith was pregnant during filming, but kept it a secret from everyone, including the director and producers. Her daughter gave the secret away one day during lunch, but only to the director/writer
Most of the actors were not given the last 25 pages of the script in order to conceal the ending. Only the principal actors involved in the sequence knew.
It took four days for four people to replace all of the needle tips with fiber tips for the needle pit scene.
The whole film was shot in one building.
Jigsaw’s puppet was originally controlled by fishing line (in SAW). This time around, the crew had a slightly larger budget and decided to completely redo the puppet and make it mechanically controlled.
Henry Rollins was originally cast to play the role of Xavier. Due to scheduling conflicts he was replaced with Franky G.
