Saw II wastes no time in delivering on the promise of its tag line, "oh yes... there will be blood," or in living up to the expectations set by its predecessor. The film opens with a scene of horrific torment and suspense in which a new victim of the kidnapper 'Jigsaw' is forced to make a gut-wrenching decision in order to save his life. Again and again throughout the film, the tortured pawns in a game of sadistic justice are sacrificed in unspeakably cruel ways as a result of their mistakes, past and present. The makers of Saw II have improved upon the original by maintaining a consistent level of tension moment to moment, and by casting far more effective actors in the lead roles. Tobin Bell's portrayal of Jigsaw is perfect in its understated presentation of an evil genius, motivated by a compulsion to punish, chastise and either reform or execute those who are seen as unworthy of the lives they've been given. A double-twist ending brings this second chapter of the Saw franchise to a satisfying conclusion, in keeping with the precedent set by the first film, though it's perhaps not quite the jaw-dropping blindside that made Saw I an instant classic. Donnie Wahlberg stars as a secretly corrupt cop who routinely frames various criminals as his own way of insuring justice, now trapped in a game of Jigsaw's creation, racing against time in a cat and mouse game to save his estranged son from death by deadly Serin gas poisoning. Dina Meyer as Detective Kerry and Shawnee Smith as Jigsaw survivor Amanda return from Saw I. The beautiful Emmanuelle Vaugier as Addison joins a cast of potential victims who gruesomely fall prey to their own inability to display calm, logic or humanity in their effort to escape the hellish trap in which they awaken to find themselves.
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