Saw Three for those of you who do not know is the third film in a blood saturated trilogy. If you haven't seen the other two- especially the first one, then I would hazard that the film won't make all that much sense in it's conclusion for you, though parts of it can be watched without any preknowledge of the movies.

Now before I start on the movie proper, I just want to get started on one thing that really bugs me about this trilogy, and that is John (the serial killer.) He vehemnantly denies being a murderer, indeed claims to hate murderers, and claims he does not kill his victims, he just tests their dedication to the life. Could someone tell this man that from where I come from, that is murdering? The definition of murder includes setting up dangerous situations.

As in the other Saw movies the protagonists are set a task, which unless they complete it will result in a painful and disfiguring death. In this film however there are two protagonists, one a female doctor called Lynne, and the other a man named Jeff. Jeff wakes up in a box, and through a series of flashbacks we find out that some time ago his son was killed in a drinkdriving accident, and that the killer got a sentence of six months. After this, Jeff becomes utterly consumed by vengeance, acting out daydream after daydream of killing his sons murderer. He lives for nothing else, ignoring his young daughter completely. Jigsaw sets him a task. He must complete five tasks to get to the man who killed his son. Each stage will bring him closer, but he must also learn how to forgive, and finally at the end to give the ultimate forgiveness.

Here we struggle rather more. The first Saw thing, worked for me because it developed two characters- that of Adam and Lawrence, and to a lesser extent the policeman David Tapp, and made you actually care about whether they lived or died. Saw 2 fell apart for me, because it failed to forge any emotional chains whatsoever. Saw 3 falls somewhere inbetween.

Exactly what we have come to expect from these movies. Death, blood, torture, extremely painful ways of dying. You have to credit to the writers, they must have really sick minds to dream this stuff up. The face mask Amanda wears in Saw 1, and the barbed wire that rips one man apart, seem like child's play, compared to those featured in this movie. Ironically a lot of the blood, and icky moments actually come from those where Lynn is forced to operate on Jigsaw- using a power tool. There are tortures drawn from medivael tortures, taking the principle of the rack, nitrogen oxide, rotting pigs, chains through the bodies and plenty of others. Definitly a twisted genius is at work here.

I enjoy violent films. I watch them with the greatest of ease, I don't flinch as people wrench themselves free of horrible deaths, or dislocate arms. But I have to admit there were a couple of moments in Saw 3 where I felt very inclined to cover my eyes, and say 'for Gods sake this is sick.' And indeed it is. This is human nature at its worst, its most degraded and nauseating. This is us watching actors pretend to torture and mutilate each other, peering with voyeruristic tendancies into the sick depraved minds of pyschopaths. So why did I give it 4 stars, you might ask? Because it kept me watching didn't it? It kept my dad watching, who gave up half way through Saw 2, even though it was less brutal than this, and its kept my brother watching three times, even though he knows the twist now. It's slick, smooth and those very qualities disguise what a bitter pill it is to swallow. The acting is about standard, though I was impressed with Shawnee Smith as Amanda, since she gave the 2D character an emotional range which I was not expecting. This is rated 18 and it deserves every year of that rating, in fact it should be increased if that was possible. People with sensitive constitutions should not even try to watch this film actually.