'Spiral' movie review: 'Saw' reboot rapidly devolves into silliness thehindu.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from thehindu.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Spiral: From the Book of Saw is out now in cinemas and its ending sets up a new Saw movie that could be Spiral 2. Here's how Spiral's ending sets up a sequel.
View Comments
When word came out that Chris Rock was starring in “Spiral,” a spinoff of the “Saw” movies, he seemed like an odd choice.
Having seen “Spiral” he’s still an odd choice, but by far the best one in a lazy movie of misfires. It was reportedly Rock’s idea to reboot the franchise with him in it, which explains why he is also an executive producer of the film, subtitled “from the Book of Saw” like it was some lost artifact of torture-porn legend or something.
It’s not. It’s just a dumb horror movie with a smart lead actor who gets off to a funny start riffing on why “Forrest Gump” couldn’t be made today while on an undercover assignment and works inexorably toward him screaming and facing the Impossible Choices that define the “Saw” films.
Spiral: From the Book of Saw (R18, 93mins) Directed by Darren Lynn Bousman I wished this could have been this decade’s
Seven. I hoped it might emulate 2018’s resurrection of
Halloween. I prayed it would at least be more palatable than Ridley Scott’s
Hannibal.
Spiral is the disappointing
Saw-homage we should have seen coming a mile off. Strip away the high profile acting trio of Chris Rock (who also apparently gave the “turd-gid” script a polish), Samuel L. Jackson and Max Minghella, and it’s the same thin gruel of extreme vigilantism laced with grim torture-porn scenes where there’s only ever one outcome. At least here, we learn a little more about our troubled “hero” and the deadly devices are used sparingly, but, at its dark heart, this is still just another ploddingly predictable instalment (No. 9, if you’re still counting) of a series that’s devolved from a smart, inventive opener to a succession of geek shows.
The Times is committed to reviewing theatrical film releases during the
COVID-19 pandemic. Because moviegoing carries risks during this time, we remind readers to follow health and safety guidelines as
outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and
local health officials.
Following the Black Lives Matter protests of summer 2020, Chris Rock’s frank 2018 riff “A Few Bad Apples” provided a measure of viral catharsis. “Bad apple? That’s a lovely name for ‘murderer,’” he quips about deadly cops. “Some jobs can’t have bad apples.”
If you listen closely, above the blood-curdling screams resounding off concrete torture rooms in “Spiral: From the Book of Saw,” one can imagine the truths behind Rock’s well-aimed punchlines hanging like an orchard above the gruesome cacophony. An attempt to revive the graphic thrills of the moribund franchise that gave horrific meaning to the phrase “Do you wanna play a game?” by delivering a socially cons