Saw III

Saw III is a 2006 horror film written by the first film's writers/directors, James Wan and Leigh Whannell and directed by Saw II's writer/director, Darren Lynn Bousman and was released on October 27, 2006.

The film ends the first trilogy of the series that focuses on a bed-ridden John Kramer, and his apprentice Amanda's final tests before he dies. The film contains additional back-story about the two antagonists. The film was dedicated to Gregg Hoffman, producer of the first two films. Hoffman died on December 4, 2005, shortly after the official Lions Gate Entertainment announcement of Saw III.

Plot
Minutes after the conclusion of Saw II, Eric Matthews (Donnie Wahlberg) escapes the bathroom by breaking his foot with the remains of a toilet tank lid and slipping it out of the shackle. Six months later, another Jigsaw victim is discovered by Lt. Rigg (Lyriq Bent) and Detectives Kerry (Dina Meyer) and Hoffman (Costas Mandylor). In his test, Troy (J. Larose) had to rip chains from his flesh in order to escape from a bomb; however, the door to the room was sealed, making the trap inescapable. This is observed by Kerry, who feels guilty over Matthews' disappearance; she later awakens in a harness hooked into her ribs. She retrieves a key to the harness from a beaker of acid, but the device tears her ribcage out anyway.

Jeff (Angus Macfadyen), a vengeful man unable to cope with the death of his son, and Lynn Denlon (Bahar Soomekh), a depressed doctor, are kidnapped under John Kramer's (Tobin Bell) orders. Lynn is brought before Kramer, now bedridden from cancer, by Amanda Young (Shawnee Smith) and is given a straightforward game: keep Kramer alive for the duration of Jeff's game. Should Kramer die, or should she try to escape, the collar around her neck will fire five shotgun shells at her head. Jeff awakens in the middle of an abandoned meatpacking plant and is informed that he must go through several tests, which will lead him to "the man responsible for the loss of his child."

In his first test, Jeff enters a freezer and finds Danica Scott (Debra Lynne McCabe), who witnessed the car accident that killed his son Dylan but refused to testify in court. She is naked and chained between two poles spraying ice-cold water at random intervals; she eventually convinces Jeff to help her, but freezes solid before he can retrieve the key from behind frozen metal bars. In his second test, Jeff successfully frees Judge Halden (Barry Flatman), who only sentenced Dylan's killer to six months in prison and was thus a target of Jeff's rage, from the bottom of a vat being filled with liquefied pig corpses by incinerating his late son's toys to retrieve a key. In his third test, Jeff finds Timothy Young (Mpho Koaho), his son's killer, strapped to a machine that will twist his limbs and neck one by one until they break. He retrieves a key attached to the trigger of a shotgun but accidentally kills Halden when it discharges, and Timothy's neck is broken before he can unlock the device. With his tests nonetheless complete, Jeff moves on to the final area.

Meanwhile, Lynn and Amanda work together to keep Kramer alive. During an improvised brain surgery intended to relieve pressure on Kramer's brain, he begins hallucinating about another woman and declares his love out loud. Distressed from witnessing this, Amanda leaves the sickroom to continue monitoring Jeff. Flashbacks reveal that Amanda continued cutting herself after Kramer became bedridden, and she recollects becoming Kramer's apprentice and kidnapping Adam Stanheight (Leigh Whannell) prior to the events of the first film. Amanda also finds a letter addressed to her, its contents further distressing her. After the surgery, Lynn and Kramer talk privately; Lynn reveals that her ordeal has given her a new appreciation for her family. Amanda returns with the news that Jeff's tests are complete, but refuses to release Lynn; she reveals that she does not believe Kramer's modus operandi and had designed her tests to be inescapable accordingly, including Troy's and Kerry's. She also reveals that she and Eric Matthews fought after he escaped the bathroom and that she left him for dead. Additionally, she had returned to the bathroom before the events of Saw II and gave Adam a mercy killing through suffocation.

Amanda shoots Lynn in the back just as Jeff arrives in the sickroom; he retaliates by shooting her in the neck. Kramer reveals to the dying Amanda that the test was hers: she was being tested on her will to keep someone alive, not knowing that Jeff and Lynn were married. Amanda dies from her wound and Kramer gives Jeff one last test, where he can choose between killing Kramer or forgiving him; Kramer offers to call an ambulance for Lynn if Jeff forgives him. Jeff takes a circular saw, tells Kramer he forgives him, and slashes Kramer's throat. The door to the room seals itself as a dying Kramer plays a tape recorder, which reveals that Jeff has failed his final test by killing Kramer, who was the only person to know the whereabouts of his daughter, Corbett (Niamh Wilson). In order to find her, Jeff must play another game. The tape ends as Kramer dies, and the shotgun collar activates and kills Lynn simultaneously, leaving Jeff trapped with the three corpses as he screams in agony.

Production
On a budget of $10 million,[3] Saw III began principal photography in Toronto from May 8, 2006 until late June.

According to the director's audio track on the DVD release, almost all the transitions from one place to another (such as from Kerry's trap to Chris' place, and Jigsaw's lair to Jeff's crate) were not made using digital effects. The transitions were shot on the spot. For example, when the camera moves from Troy's crime scene to Kerry being in the bathtub, Dina Meyer had to run, take off all her clothes, and jump into the tub. If you look closely, you can still see the water moving from when she got in.

According to Leigh Whannell, Adam had many more scenes in the original film, one of which was the scene between Adam and Amanda, included on the Saw III DVD bonus features.

According to executive producer Daniel J. Heffner, the film was toned down seven times to obtain the "R" rating. According to director Darren Lynn Bousman, the MPAA ratings board was less concerned with the film's graphic violence because television shows like CSI have expanded the scope of what is acceptable viewing with their graphic depictions of crime scenes and autopsies. Bousman says the MPAA is more concerned with emotional torture that disturbs the audience.

Promotion
A scene from Saw III was planned to be shown when the action/thriller film Crank opened in theaters on September 1. However, the MPAA did not allow it, due to the scene's large amount of graphic violence. For similar reasons, an early teaser trailer for the film was removed from the official Saw III site. The next trailer released featured flashbacks of Jigsaw attaching the "reverse bear trap" to Amanda and applying his makeup for posing as the corpse in the bathroom from Saw. The ads played up Saw's yearly release dates with the tagline, "If it's Halloween, it must be 'Saw'"

About 1,000 special posters were made and sold for $20 each in support of Saw III. The posters were made with a small amount of Tobin Bell's blood (mixed with the printing ink). One such poster was also signed by the entire cast and crew of the film, and was auctioned off. All the proceeds from the auctioned poster were donated to the Red Cross.

At Spike TV's Scream Awards on October 10, 2006, Tobin Bell and Shawnee Smith appeared on stage with director Darren Lynn Bousman. Smith pinned Bousman to a chair, saying "Payback's a bitch," while Bell staged sawing off the top of Bousman's head. Smith then found a blood-saturated piece of film on his brain. This led to a "World Premiere" trailer featuring the plight of Troy in the body chains trap.

In a promotional video featured on MySpace (with similar versions made for YouTube and Break.com), Billy, Jigsaw's puppet, addresses the viewer in the same fashion as in the videos in the film. He states, "Hello. Are you watching me on MySpace? Good. I'd like to play a game with you. Up until now you've...just sat there as a voyeur, watching other people in their videos without care about who that person is. Well, what do voyeurs see when they look into the mirror? Let's find out. Right now you are being watched. If you forget for one second that you're being watched, you will lose. Your only way out is to understand these numbers: 1, 0, 2, 7, 0, 6. Find the meaning and you will live. Just remember; knowledge changes everything." The numbers represent the film's release date, October 27, 2006.

The original cut of the film ran for slightly over two hours, and several scenes have been confirmed to have been cut out, including a scene which depicted an extended scene of Kerry and Rigg examining Troy's trap, where Kerry reveals to Rigg she has had nightmares about Eric, and she blames herself for what happened to him.

There was also reference in an interview with Bousman of a scene that was not shown, Jigsaw questioning if he was correct in his goal. The audio commentary also notes that Leigh Whannell's character of Adam had more screen time, including a scene in which he passes by Amanda at the entrance of his apartment that was also included on the DVD.

Critical
The film received generally mixed to negative reviews. Rotten Tomatoes.com gave the film a 25% rating, qualifying it as "Rotten", whereas Metacritic gives Saw III a 48 rating, indicating mixed or average reviews, but still earning the series' best score up to date.

At screenings in the United Kingdom, five people were reported to have fainted at separate cinemas with three at one cinema, resulting in ambulances needing to be called.

Box Office
Playing in 3,167 theaters Saw III grossed a total of $33,610,391 on its opening weekend. With a production budget of $9.98 million, the film was already considered a box office success. Saw III ended up grossing $80,238,724 domestically and $150,907,724 worldwide. As of May 2008, the film has made $164,874,275, making Saw III the most successful film in the series worldwide as of 2010.

Home Media Releases
The DVD was released on January 23, 2007 in two versions with the same bonus features. Also confirmed are two exclusive featurettes to the Blu-ray Disc release of Saw III, which includes a feature on the writing of Saw III, and an "Amanda: Evolution of a Killer" featurette. These featurettes were also included on an exclusive 2-disc edition, sold at Target stores in the US and Future Shop stores in Canada. They contain the Unrated Widescreen Edition on Disc 1.

Unrated Edition
The unrated DVD, released on January 23, 2007, features a 113-minute cut of the film that includes more gore. On the commentary track, Bousman notes that this is not his original, two-hour-plus cut of the film, and that is why he released the Director's Cut in October 2007. This edition was also released on Blu-ray.

Director's Cut
A 121 minute long Director's Cut of Saw III was released on October 23, 2007 to coincide with the theatrical release of Saw IV on October 26. Saw III made $47,099,279 in DVD sales.