
CAUGHT IN A TRAP Saw IV succumbs to the dreaded ''how I became a serial killer backstory'' gambit
Steve Wilkie
Credits
Release Date: Oct 26, 2007; Rated: R; Length: 95 Minutes; Genre: Horror; With: Costas Mandylor and Tobin Bell
D+
The reports of torture porn's demise may have been greatly exaggerated, but this fourth entry in the mutilate-yourself-or-die series joins what may be the worst genre of the decade: the lamely ''sympathetic'' serial-killer backstory. The man behind Jigsaw, embodied by dour Tobin Bell, is dead, but there are flashbacks to how he became a psycho, and he haunts Saw IV with taped messages. He now imparts so many life lessons via his Rube Goldberg thresher devices that he's starting to turn into the Rod Serling of severed body parts. Now that's torture. D+
Posted Oct 31, 2007
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You Might Also Like
- Movie Commentary Elements of the 'Saw' franchise (Oct 29, 2004) | Clark Collis
- Movie News Pop culture hit and miss (Oct 26, 2007)
- Movie Review Saw V (Oct 24, 2008) | Gregory Kirschling
- Movie News Also playing in October
- Movie Review Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (1993) | Ty Burr
- Movie Review My Boyfriend's Back (1993) | Ty Burr





