SPIRAL: FROM THE BOOK OF SAW
HORROR SAGA GETS RIGHT BACK IN THE GAME…
Is the horror-franchise relaunch killer or copycat?
SPIRAL: FROM THE BOOK OF SAW 18
OUT NOW CINEMAS
Too often dismissed as the poster child for ‘torture porn’, there was always more to Saw than senseless sadism. Series spin-off/revival Spiral fully embraces Saw’s widely overlooked strengths, emerging, perhaps surprisingly, as the most political horror movie since Get Out.
Chris Rock plays Det. Zeke Banks, son of Samuel L. Jackson’s former police captain Marcus. When various appendages previously attached to missing cops start arriving on Zeke’s desk, he’s assigned the case alongside rookie William Schenk (Max Minghella). But it becomes clear that Jigsaw, or his latest copycat, is no longer targeting those who take life for granted, but corrupt police officers.
Following mass protests over police brutality, the long-delayed Spiral arrives at a particularly pertinent moment. It may not be as nuanced as Jordan Peele’s modern horror classic, but that Spiral even goes there is commendable.
Beyond the full-throated politics, and a marginally more humorous tone, it’s mostly icky business as usual. Series stalwart Darren Lynn Bousman (Saws II-IV) draws from a familiar but effective bag of tricks. The largely self-contained plot might not boast earlier entries’ labyrinthine intricacy, but it’s satisfyingly twisty, and stocked with suitably horrible death traps. Spiral’s that rarest of reboots – one that will sate series die-hards and a new generation of horror nuts. Jordan Farley