SPIRAL: FROM THE BOOK OF SAW (2021)

'ello, guvna. After cranking these fuckers out one installment per year between 2004 and 2010, the makers of the Saw franchise took a break before returning with the fresh, silly and exciting JIGSAW in 2017. Unfortunately, something stinky this way comes and shit all over the bed because this next Saw installment isn’t very good.  Which is disappointing, cause the posters looked promising in a True Detective, season 1 kind of way.

Anyway, the story, set in an unnamed metropolitan area that looks a lot like Toronto, is about a homicide detective, Chris Rock, who is on the trail of a Jigsaw copycat.  Meow.  Rock's style of investigation appears to be yelling a lot, letting people borrow his phone and scrunching up his face like he just walked into the fart cloud of somebody who eats a lot of plant-based meat covered in Tiger Sauce.  Stuff happens and I found myself straight-up not giving a shit.  Slow pace, overly complicated story, ugly photography, uninspired acting, boring kills, unscary killer and worst off: SPIRAL didn't feel like it had any kind of real connection to the actual Saw Universe.  The whole thing felt like a poorly written fan fiction.

And speaking of poorly written fan fiction...

Jigsaw "Grrr."-d to himself as his latest intended victim escaped from yet another game!  This is the fifth trap this guy has escaped from.  And then, once he's free, he just stands there talking about boxes of chocolate.  I should have never kidnapped this guy.  Looking into the dingy B&W video monitor, Jigsaw presses the speaker button to communicate with his victim.  "Why did you solve that puzzle so quickly, Gump?"  "You told me to, Jigsaw!"  Jigsaw lets go of the button and slams his head down onto his desk.

Part 1 - Saw (2004)
Part 2 - Saw II (2005)
Part 3 - Saw III (2006)
Part 4 - Saw IV (2007)
Part 5 - Saw V (2008)
Part 6 - Saw VI (2009)
Part 7 - Saw 3D (2010)
Part 8 - Jigsaw (2017)
Part 10 - Saw X (2023)

HEAVEN CAN WAIT (1978)

Los Angeles, California 1978. Due to a Heavenly boner, professional football player Warren Beatty’s soul is mistakenly removed from his body nearly 50 years before he is supposed to die. By the time the blunder is discovered Beatty’s body has been cremated. A representative from Heaven, James Mason, tells Beatty that his soul can be placed into the body of somebody that is about to die. Mason and Beatty, now invisible, journey back to Los Angeles where a wealthy industrialist has been drugged and left to drown in his bathtub by his cheating wife, Dyan Cannon, and his evil secretary Charles Grodin. So, while the millionaires soul leaves the body (to be tortured forever in the fiery pits of Hell, I assume), Beatty’s soul slithers in (via the butt?) and takes over. Anybody with an I.Q. over 17 would naturally get rid of the people who literally just murdered the former resident of this body, but nope, not Beatty. Instead, he befriends Grodin and spends his time reading business reports while the dastardly duo continue trying to kill him!

The older (and more attractive) I get, the more I find myself absolutely fascinated with 1970's Cinema.  I don't know exactly what it is, but there's just something so unique about the films of that era.  For example, HEAVEN CANNOT WAIT is not particularly good.  In fact, the story is dumb, the direction is average and it's not even an attractive movie to look at (example: Heaven is just an empty soundstage filled with fog), but yet...it was nominated for nine Academy Awards, including Best Picture!  It even won for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration.  Which doesn't even make sense, cause it was hard for me to even take screenshots for this review due to the fact that the entire film was so drab looking.  There were zero visually standout moments.  (And don't even get me started on the fact HEAVEN CAN WAIT beat out Woody Allen's gorgeous INTERIORS in that category.)

Anyway, even though HEAVEN CAN WAIT is not a great movie and the story is just a series of plot holes and it probably didn't deserve even one Oscar nomination let alone nine...I still enjoyed it.  Warren Beatty is charming, the comedy is so unfunny that it's kinda amusing, impressive cast, completely illogical romance story.  Worth checking out, but it could definitely be remade into something better.