When a horror film says that it is primarily based on a accurate story, we ought to generally take it with a grain of salt. They may possibly have roots in reality, or be inspired by genuine events or folks, but hardly ever are they in fact primarily based on accurate accounts. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre famously claims to be primarily based on a accurate story, but is genuinely just loosely inspired by the crimes of genuine-life serial killer Ed Gein. Still, it is often scary to see the foreboding “based on a true story” tagline in a horror film, simply because a lot of occasions the story is so completely messed up that we do not want to even believe about the genuine folks behind it. So the concept of something in the Saw franchise becoming even remotely rooted in reality is, to place it basically, horrifying. But writers Leigh Whannell and James Wan revealed that the initially film in the franchise has a lot of genuine-globe inspiration, and shared the accurate stories that formed the gorey franchise.

Saw

Two strangers awaken in a area with no recollection of how they got there, and quickly find out they are pawns in a deadly game perpetrated by a notorious serial killer.

Release Date

October 1, 2004

Runtime

100

The ‘Saw’ Traps Are Rooted in Medieval History

With how gruesome the Saw traps are, you may believe that they’re just the sick solution of the creator’s imagination. After all, there’s no way we’d genuinely do this to an individual in genuine life, appropriate? Well, as it turns out, the traps, which have turn into the draw of the Saw films, are primarily based on medieval torture techniques, so they’re pretty considerably genuine. Saw X director Kevin Greuter spoke about this in an interview with SFX Magazine.

“Every year when I’ve been told we’re doing another shoot I’m like, ‘How do we do it?’ Because a lot of it starts with the script, but sometimes the traps and cells are very shorthand. In the script, sometimes they are just as they appear, but usually, there are a lot of long meetings between assorted people – the writers, the production designer, the actors – where you just sit and hash through it.” Greuter explained. “I have lots of books on medieval torture machines and other dark stuff, and from time to time we just pore by way of it and shoot tips off each and every other. Some of the traps have evolved pretty a lot from how they began. And then you have to believe about how to in fact pull it off. I was pretty nervous about some of the issues that we did nervous on a security level and nervous considering it was just going to appear ridiculous.”

With how twisted some of the traps can get, it is chilling to believe that any of them have been as soon as applied for genuine, and not just designed for a horror film. But that is not exactly where the genuine-globe inspiration ends, as Whannell and Wan shared some of the much more individual stories that inspired the basis of each the film’s plot, and the character of John Kramer (Tobin Bell) himself.

Leigh Whannell Created the Character of Jigsaw From His Own Experience

In a 2010 interview with AV Club, Saw writers Leigh Whannell and James Wan looked back on their careers, which, of course, integrated some speak about Saw. When discussing how they came up with the premise of the film, Whannell mentioned that Wan had come up with a starting and an finish to the film, and it was Whannell’s job to bridge the gaps in between them. He revealed that, at the time of generating the film, he was experiencing migraines every single day. It got to the point that he began obtaining tests accomplished, like an MRI, which led to the creation of the titular villain, John Kramer/Jigsaw.

“I had an MRI, and it was such a weird experience to be just sitting there in the waiting area of a neurology ward, being nervous about getting an MRI. And that really was the impetus for the Jigsaw character. I started to think, “What if you were given the news that you had a tumor and you were going to die soon? How would you react to that?” So I began to consider this character who had been offered a time limit, who’d been told that he had a year, two years to reside, genuinely, and that his situation would gradually kill him. Then I sort of attached that to the concept of somebody who place folks in a literal version of that. Instead of a physician telling you, “You have a year to live, make the best of it,” this guy would place folks in a circumstance and say, “You have 10 minutes to live. How are you going to spend those 10 minutes? Are you going to get out of it?” I believed that would be a excellent way to capture the concept of why somebody would stick two folks in this area and give them a time limit to get out.”

Whannell continued on to say that he thinks the sequels tainted the initially film simply because of how considerably the audiences latched onto the traps, and that the franchise has now gained the reputation of just becoming about the traps and the gore, when that wasn’t the original message he and Wan attempted to convey. “Jigsaw and his message was sort of a small part of the first film that got extrapolated on. And I think people just respond to it because they love hypotheticals.” Whannell mentioned. But as soon as once again, there’s much more to the lore of Saw, and this is when it begins to get genuinely creepy.

One of Jigsaw’s Apprentices Is Based on a Real Crime

In the initially Saw film, we discover out that Zep Hindle (Michael Emerson) is operating with Jigsaw on his crimes — although not of his personal free of charge will. Flashbacks reveal that he was an orderly at the similar hospital that John Kramer was a patient in. During Kramer’s frequent stays to maintain up with his situation, Zep became pretty fond of the man, and even interrupted Dr. Lawrence Gordon (Cary Elwes) when he kept referring to Kramer as “the patient” alternatively of by his name. Months later, Zep is kidnapped by Kramer, injected with a slow-acting poison, and offered a tape with clear directions. The directions say that Zep is to kidnap Dr. Gordon’s wife and daughter, and hold them hostage whilst Dr. Gordon himself is place by way of 1 of Jigsaw’s twisted games. However, if Dr. Gordon fails, Zep is essential to kill his wife and daughter. It’s a twisted reveal, which only serves to up the stakes, and as it turns out, it was primarily based on a accurate news story James Wan heard when he was in college.

In a featurette on the Saw II DVD, Wan and Whannell inform of a accurate story about a man who breaks into people’s homes and tickles the feet of their young children. “It was the creepiest thing I’d ever heard, I was so frightened,” Wan exclaimed. “I remember after hearing that story, I slept for the next two, three nights with a hammer by my bedside.” The pair continued on to share how the rest of the story played out, explaining that, when the man was caught, he didn’t say considerably, and he just seemed like a pretty quiet and reclusive man. But when the police questioned him, he mentioned that he didn’t do it alone, and was in fact forced to break into people’s residences. He mentioned that he had received a jigsaw piece that told him to carry out the crimes. Naturally, this became the basis of the Zep character, and the jigsaw aspect lent itself nicely to the accurate antagonist of the film, John Kramer, AKA Jigsaw.

So, whilst Jigsaw himself may possibly not be a genuine guy kidnapping folks and placing them in torture devices, Saw is not totally fictional. It’s constructed upon pretty genuine stories and history, that only add to the eerie brutality, the franchise is recognized for — sort of like a puzzle all on its personal, with all of these small pieces of reality coming with each other to produce 1 masterfully scary tale. It just goes to show how brilliant the minds of James Wan and Leigh Whannell are, and how brilliant a film Saw is. Yes, it may possibly have turn into overshadowed by the gore in the later films, but the initially film is a phenomenal, slow-burn descent into utter terror, and has rightfully earned its acclaim inside the horror genre.

Saw is accessible to rent on Amazon in the U.S.

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