Saw 2 – Vancouver Premiere

Carol and I just got home from seeing the premiere of Saw 2. This one boasted a bigger budget ($4 million as opposed to $1.2 million last time) and as a result producers could afford a few more people to kill off and a bit more gore. That pretty much says it all, because that’s what we got. If you liked Saw and expect the same creatively creepy writing and directing you’ll be disappointed. We were.

No, it wasn’t only the guy in front of us who Carol said smelled of beer and cigarettes. I thought he smelled more like something buried with a bad batch of kimchi (if you can imagine something smelling worse than good kimchi). The movie kind of stank too. Sure there was tons of gore and scenes that had us squirming and even a bit of “what’s going to happen next?”, all great qualities of a horror film, but there were many other parts of the film that had me thinking about the DVD’s I’d just bought and wondering what Moosh was up to. You’ve got to keep me on edge. Don’t let me get bored. By the end of the flick I felt my intelligence had been insulted and a hack saw dragged across the wound. It was one of those endings. You’ll know what I mean when you see it yourself. UGH!

Dear studios and producers, people are not that stupid, please let us leave the theatre with our dignity. The test audience full of grandmothers, drunks and figure skaters on an outing doesn’t understand horror.

The fact that a relative unknown in the directing chair named Darren Lynn Bousman who’s credit’s include Honey Wagon Attendant on the X-Files helmed this limping rehash of a fun little horror movie should have been the first thing to tip me off, but no… We had to see it. I’m glad I didn’t pay.

I know everyone has to get their start somewhere, but Honey Wagon Attendant? I guess he’s used to dealing with pieces of shit, becayse he just made one. This particular piece of shit will garner him the coveted box office top this Halloween weekend so my hat’s off to him. The next time I’m holding my breath and squeezing one out on set in one of those awful honey wagons I’ll think of him. I have a horrendous honey wagon story that I’ll tell sometime, but not now.

One last thing, the Saw 2 website wouldn’t let me into the unrated version as it was too GD stupid to read a Canadian postal code. I, the person with much darker things in my head (that I’m trying to get written down) had to play in the kiddie pool. Up yours Saw 2, but congrats on taking the weekend.

My Saw 2 experience rates a 5 and a half stars out of ten. It’s a pass, but barely.