Lionsgate entertainment company recently dropped a trailer for the ninth installment of the phenomenally successful horror franchise ‘Saw’. A ‘Twisted’ Pictures production, the latest Saw spinoff titled ‘Spiral’, is a rehashed version of the original ‘Saw’ film, which depicted a vigilante killer (Jigsaw) – with a ‘Twisted’ sense of justice.
The trailer follows a veteran cop played by Samuel L. Jackson and his detective son Chris Rock investigating bizarre serial killings possibly by a copycat Jigsaw killer because of the uncanny resemblance to the earlier Jigsaw murders. If the trailer honestly epitomizes the actual film, then the film is seemingly tilting more towards the psychological-horror territory rather than grisly-horror genre. This could prove to be a wise decision by the makers owing to the already overused gore-horror tropes in their preceding ‘Saw’ films.
‘Spiral: From the Book of Saw’ is being helmed by the franchise veteran Darren Lynn Bousman, who had earlier directed the second, third and fourth installments of ‘Saw’. Although written by Josh Stolberg and Pete Goldfinger (who had previously written ‘Jigsaw’), the script is originally based on an idea by comic actor Chris Rock, who took a fancy to reinvent the ‘Saw’ franchise.
It would be interesting to see humorist Chris Rock, incidentally an Eddie Murphy discovery, going the ‘Sacha Baron Cohen’ way, by transcending from comedy to the totally different genre viz. psychological horror.
The first ‘Saw’ film was directed by horror maestro James Wan, who later gave us the modern horror classic ‘The Conjuring’. The film was about two strangers finding themselves trapped inside a room with a dead body lying between them and are forced to pay a huge price for their freedom.
The 2004 film, which was made on a paltry budget of $1.2 million grossed over $100 million worldwide, was followed by seven successive sequels/spinoffs. Although the lucrative franchise was a reliable cash-cow for Lionsgate entertainment company, nevertheless the sequels were not able to replicate the critical success of James Wan’s ‘Saw’.
Originally planned for an October 23, 2020 release, ‘Spiral: From the Book of Saw’’ will now get a theatrical release on May 14, 2021.
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