Cinemavenger
The funniest, nastiest movie reviews anywhere.
Spiral: From the Book of Saw
Once upon a time, porn meant sex. Porno movies were for jacking off, porno theaters were for jacking off in public, and porno "arcades" were for buying porno mags and movies and, possibly, jacking off in public as well.
Somewhere along the way, the term "porn" went mainstream, and people started using it to give anything a more dangerous, cum-evoking sheen. Food porn is the most obvious example, and even though people have been talking about it for years I'm still fucked if I can tell the difference between a dish that's "normal" and one that's risen to the ass-to-mouth heights of "food porn."
The Saw movies helped birth the term "torture porn," which is now used to describe any movie that shows more love for sadists disemboweling, electrocuting, and otherwise doing serious bodily harm to their victims than most people show their families and friends.
The Saw formula is to have a killer - first a dude named Jigsaw, then his proteges or impersonators, and now just about any sick fuck with a grudge and/or lesson to teach about appreciating this fleeting life or some other such bullshit - put people into elaborate torture devices designed to kill them horribly unless they sacrifice some part of themselves, usually an eye, tongue, limb, or literal pound of flesh in order to escape.
After releasing a new Saw every Halloween season from 2004 through 2010, the franchise blessedly went silent for seven years. The reboot did middlin' business, so this year we get what can best be described as Phase 2 of the franchise, Spiral: From the Book of Saw. And fuck these bozos for being pretentious enough to claim "Book" status for these low budget splatter-fests.
In this one, Chris "Are You Ready To" Rock is Detective Zeke Banks, a cop on the trail of a Jigsaw-like killer. Zeke's dad, Marcus (Samuel L. "Does He Look Like A Bitch" Jackson), was a super cop. Zeke has a brand new partner, a stern boss, and is surrounded by cops who hate him for being a rat.
Any one of them could be the killer. Will you give even the smallest, most pitiful fuck who it is? You will not. The only thing Spiral has to offer, other than recycling the plots from a couple of the earlier movies, are New Jack City and Pulp Fiction references.
The real torture here is being in the audience.
September 3, 2021