Saw III

The "Saw" horror franchise gets its weakest installment as torture mastermind Jigsaw (Tobin Bell) and his new disciple Amanda (Shawnee Smith) kidnap doctor Lynn Denlon (Bahar Soomekh) to perform brain surgery on the dying madman. Even on his deathbed Jigsaw manages to orchestrate a clockwork of horrors for his victims. Jeff (Angus Macfayden) struggles with barbarous tests related to the vengeance he seeks against the man who killed his son in a car accident years earlier. The extreme gore is gratuitous, and character development non-existent in a movie packed with the cookie-cutter visual design of the previous two films. Torturer, victim and audience become one.

Rated R. 107 mins. (C-) (Two Stars)