With Saw mania taking over the world, a third instalment was a foregone conclusion. With an increased budget once more of $10 million, Saw III brought in a whopping $164.9 million at the box office, cementing its legacy and a lengthy future.
Here, we’re delving into exactly what made the third film in the series - directed by Darren Lynn Bousman from a screenplay by Leigh Whannell - so successful, from all of the maniacal traps featured to the twists and turns along the way…
How do we start things in Saw 3?
As has now become tradition, we kick off the film with a gut-churning moment. This time, it features Detective Eric Matthews (Donnie Wahlberg) from the second movie, as we are brought straight back to where we left him; on the floor of the original dilapidated bathroom with his foot chained to the wall.
Though he at first looks to the hacksaw and we think he’s going to chop his foot off, just as Doctor Lawrence Gordon (Cary Elwes) did in the first film, he instead takes the heavy lid of the toilet tank and smashes his foot, breaking it completely so he can squeeze it through the shackle around his ankle.
Six months later…
After fading to black, we’re brought into the present day where Lieutenant Daniel Rigg (Lyriq Bent), along with detectives Allison Kerry (Dina Meyer) and Mark Hoffman (Costas Mandylor), have discovered another victim of the Jigsaw Killer. When they realise that the trap was inescapable however, due to the door being welded shut even if the victim had been able to escape the chained hooks inserted into their body, they come to the conclusion that someone other than John Kramer (Tobin Bell) must be working either on his behalf, or as a copycat.
Now at this point as viewers, we know that Amanda Young (Shawnee Smith) has become an acolyte of Jigsaw, thanks to the events of the second movie. It’s something only Detective Matthews knows, but with him still being very much on the missing list, we’re left wondering if he ever made it out of the bathroom after smashing his foot out of the chains that bound him.
Following the new body and discover, Detective Kerry herself is abducted, placed into a trap and told that she must retrieve a key from a jug of acid so that she can release herself from a contraption that would tear her ribcage apart. Though we’re happy to see her successfully remove the lock within the allotted time period, that relief soon turns to anguish as we see that her test has also been manipulated so that she would never be able to escape.
It’s at this point that Amanda appears, watching the mechanics in motion as Detective Kerry is murdered. She has taken on much of Jigsaw’s mission, but has decided that she should decide herself whether or not the victim has the choice of saving themselves or, if they are resigned to their fatal fate no matter how they progress through their test.
Now the game’s truly begin
Shortly after this scene, we see Amanda abduct a surgeon, called Doctor Lynn Denlon (Bahar Soomekh). Taking her to the meatpacking factory which has become her hideout along with Jigsaw, she is wheeled into a room where we find John completely bedridden due to his ongoing battle with terminal cancer.
With hardly any time left to live, Lynn is told that she must do everything in power to keep John alive until his latest subject has passed a series of tests and come to the conclusion of his own game. A bomb necklace is placed around Lynn’s neck, which she is told is linked to John’s heart rate monitor. If he dies, so will she.
Elsewhere within the same plant, a test subject called Jeff (Angus Macfadyen) awakes inside a crate, breaking himself out after listening to a tape recording which tells the audience that he has become utterly obsessed with the accidental killing of his son, in a car accident. Consistent in his need for vengeance against those he deems responsible, Jigsaw explains that he must now learn to let go and forgive the people he wants to get his hands on.
Jigsaw also promises that if he goes through with a series of his tests, he will be led directly to the drunk driver who was ultimately responsible for the loss of his child.
In Jeff’s first room -a freezer - he is confronted by a completely naked woman hanging on a chain. We learn that she is Danica Scott (Debra Lynne McCabe); the only witness to his son’s death that refused to testify on the stand, resulting in the light sentence that the drunk driver was eventually served.
At regular intervals, cold water is blasted onto Danica’s body, which quickly turns to ice due to the freezing temperature of the room. Jeff is able to save her by retrieving a key behind icy iron bars, but in his hesitancy, he leaves it too late before eventually forgiving her and grabbing it. Danica is frozen solid and Jeff progresses to his next room.
There, he finds Judge Halden (Barry Flatman) who presided over the case of the drunk driver. Having given him such a short sentence, Jeff feels that he is someone who should be punished for allowing the perpetrator to, in his mind, get away with his crimes.
The judge is chained to the bottom of a large pig vat, which slowly begins to fill with liquified pig guts thanks to the bodies of multiple pig corpses being dropped through a gigantic grinder. Jeff is told that he must burn the childhood toys he kept of his son’s to retrieve the key for the judge, as it has been sewn inside one of them. Only by letting go of these items will he be able to save his life.
Though it takes some back-and-forth, he eventually presses the button, retrieving the key for Judge Halden and saving his life. The pair move through to the next room together, but their partnership is soon to be brought to an abrupt end.
It’s in this room that the drunk driver responsible for Jeff’s son’s death is being held. We learn that he is Timothy Young (Mpho Koaho), a bright young student with a great future ahead of him, who made one stupid and very silly mistake.
Timothy is strapped into a device that will twist each of his limbs one by one, before twisting his neck and killing him slowly, unless Jeff reaches into a box containing the key to release him, taking a shot from a shotgun in doing so.
Despite his thirst for vengeance, after seeing a number of Timothy’s limbs snap, Jeff retrieves the key and manages to move out of the line of fire. Judge Halden isn’t so lucky, walking in front of the box and being shot in the head, instantly meeting his maker.
Jeff rushes to deactivate the trap, but he is too late. He cries as he says that he has forgiven the youngster, but Timothy’s neck snaps, leaving Jeff distraught.
Back in John’s makeshift hospital suite, Doctor Denlon is doing everything she can to make sure both she and the Jigsaw Killer stay alive. Performing an improvised brain surgery to alleviate the pressure of the tumour on John’s brain against the skull, she uses a power drill and a buzz saw. It’s a successful operation, but in a hallucination due to the surgery, John professes his love for another woman…
Amanda’s downfall
Seeing this, Amanda is left distraught. She has been treated pretty badly by John in this movie, being told to leave the room so that Lynn can do what needs to be done to keep him alive. When she sees John admitting he is in love, she wrongly assumes that he is professing his love for Doctor Denlon.
Amanda returns to cutting herself to deal with the emotional pain, leading to the triggering of flashbacks which we see play out on the screen. They show us just how she became Jigsaw’s apprentice, helping to set up the series of tests and overarching game we saw in the second movie. What we also see however, is her thirst for blood. She returns to the bathroom from the first film, ending Adam Stanheight’s (Leigh Whannell) life rather than allowing him to die as Jigsaw had intended.
We also see her engaged in a confrontation with Detective Matthews following his escape from the bathroom; one in which he beats her with a metal pole. She eventually gains the upper hand however, leaving him for dead.
In the present day, Amanda is told to remove the collar from Doctor Denlon’s neck by John. She has fulfilled her part of his mission and passed her test and so, she must be allowed to go free. Those are Jigsaw's rules. Amanda however, admits that she has begun playing by her own rules, before launching into a tirade about how John has consistently let her down.
John warns Amanda that her own life is dependant on Lynn staying alive, but she refuses to listen, shooting her in the back just as Jeff reaches the room. It is at this point that the reveal of Jeff and Lynn being husband and wife takes place. Seeing his partner attacked by Amanda, Jeff uses the gun he has been given access to on his way to the room to shoot Amanda who falls to the floor.
Before she succumbs to her wounds, John tells her that whilst he has been testing Jeff, she too has been the subject of one of his most intricate tests to-date. He has known all along that her traps were inescapable and so, he needed her to play her own game one final time. He seems genuinely emotional that she has failed, but tells her that “it’s okay”, before she dies.
The final twist
After Amanda’s death, Jeff turns the gun on John and tries to shoot him dead. Due to her wounds, Lynn is unable to tell him that doing so would also kill her. Fortunately, a lack of bullets means that Jigsaw is still breathing… for now.
John says that he can save Lynn’s life and call an ambulance to their location, but it will take Jeff’s forgiveness for the pain he has inflicted. Otherwise, he offers him an open invitation to kill him.
Though Jeff tells John he is forgiven, he quickly changes his mind, picking up the buzz saw and slashing John’s neck. Blood drains from John as the door to the room automatically slams shut and John pulls out a final tape recording. He hits play and, in that classic cassette voice, explains how he has failed his final test.
Not only will his wife now die due to the bomb collar placed around her neck, but Jeff will never be able to locate his daughter, who John had kidnapped and kept in a secret location. In order to find her, he must play one more game.
John dies, before Lynn’s head is destroyed by the bombs and… we fade to black.
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