Darren Lynn Bousman directs and wrote Spiral, a 2021 horror thriller. The 9th Saw film. Chris Rock, Max Minghella, Marisol Nichols, and Samuel L. Jackson feature in this thriller about a Jigsaw copycat murderer. James Wan, Leigh Whannell, and Kevin Greutert are executive producers.After the release of Jigsaw in 2017, Chris Rock expressed interest in expanding his portfolio to include other horror films, which sparked rumors about a potential new Saw chapter. The Spierig Brothers, who directed the film Jigsaw, expressed interest in directing another movie but ultimately chose against doing so. In May 2019, the project was given its formal announcement, and at the time, Rock was working on refining a screenplay written by Stolberg and Goldfinger. The other members of the cast didn't sign on until July, and shooting continued in Toronto for the remainder of the month and into August.
Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) was supposed to come out in May 2020, but it was delayed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It finally came out in theaters in the United States on May 14, 2021. Critics had mixed things to say about the movie. They liked the new direction of the franchise, but they weren't sure if it had completely changed the series.
In Spiral, what happens?
Detective Marv Bozwick, who is not on duty, chases a thief down a sewer drain pipe during a Fourth of July parade. Bozwick is attacked from behind by a person wearing a pig mask. When he wakes up, he is hanging by his tongue in an active subway tunnel. A recorded message tells him he can either cut out his tongue and live or wait until the next train comes, which will kill him. Bozwick is killed by the train because he can't get out of the trap in time. The next day, Captain Angie Garza of the police department pairs Detective Zeke Banks with William Schenk, an idealistic rookie. Banks and Schenk look into Bozwick's death, and Banks realizes that the way he died is similar to how the now-dead Jigsaw Killer did things.
Meanwhile, a murder investigator called Fitch is kidnapped and put in a trap where he must pull his fingers off to prevent electrocution in a filling water basin; he too fails to escape and dies. Several years earlier, Fitch had rejected a backup call from Banks, almost killing him. Because of his relationship with Fitch, several police accuse Banks of being the perpetrator. A pig puppet and a piece of Schenk's tattooed flesh are then sent to the station in a package. A little vial inside the box points the cops to a butcher shop, which was formerly a hobby store frequented by Banks and his father, retired chief Marcus Banks. When the squad arrives, they find a recording recorder and Schenk's skinned body. Marcus goes to a warehouse to search out the murderer himself, but he gets kidnapped. Garza is abducted and held captive in the precinct's cold storage, where she must slash her spinal chord with a sword to prevent molten wax from dripping into her face through a pipe. As Banks finds her body, she fails to do so and succumbs to her injuries caused by the scorching hot wax.
Banks is caught while following a lead. When he wakes up in the warehouse, he is handcuffed to a pipe and there is a hacksaw nearby. He thinks about cutting off his arm, but a loose bobby pin helps him get away. He then finds Peter Dunleavy chained in place. Dunleavy was his former partner, but Banks fired him and put him in jail after Banks found out that Dunleavy had killed someone. In front of him is a big machine that crushes glass. It has been changed so that it quickly throws shrapnel at him. A tape recorder tells Banks that he can either set him free or let him die. Banks tries to get the key in time to save Dunleavy, but he can't. Banks then goes to a different room and finds Schenk. It turns out that Schenk faked his own death by using the skinned body of the thief who lured Bozwick into the tunnels. Schenk was the copycat all along. He says that his real last name is Emmerson and that he is the son of Charlie Emmerson, who Dunleavy killed because he was going to testify against a dirty cop. He also says that Marcus, when he was chief, hid corrupt officers on purpose so that Article 8 could be used more effectively to clean the streets of crime.
Emmerson believes Banks may be an ally, so he gives him a last test, which shows Marcus restrained in the air and slowly being drained of blood. Emmerson contacts 9-1-1 and pretends to be a citizen being chased by a gunman, prompting a SWAT unit to be sent to his area. He delivers Banks a handgun and one cartridge, instructing him to either fire a target that would rescue Marcus while allowing Emmerson to go, or to murder Emmerson and let Marcus bleed to death. To rescue his father, Banks fires at the target, loosening his shackles and lowers him to the ground, before fighting Emmerson. The SWAT squad comes shortly after and accidentally sets off a tripwire, yanking Marcus upward again. Marcus' arm gets fitted with a gun, causing the SWAT squad to mistake him for the shooter and murder him. As Emmerson flees, Banks shouts in sorrow.
The main actors in Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) were...
Detective Zeke Banks was played by Chris Rock. Detective William Schenk / Emmerson was played by Max Minghella in the film. Leonidas Castrounis was William. Samuel L. Jackson gave the performance of Marcus Banks in the movie.
Captain Angie Garza was played by Marisol Nichols.
Detective Marv Bozwick was played by Daniel Petronijevic. Richard Zeppieri played the role of Detective Fitch.
Patrick McManus played Dunleavy.
Ali Johnson played the role of Officer Jeannie Lewis in this production.
Palmer played Kara Bozwick. Sergeant Morgey Silva was acted by Dylan Roberts. Detective Drury was played by K. C. Collins.
Detective Deborah Kraus (Edie Inksetter) was played by Edie.
Chada was played by Nazneen Contractor.
Detective Tim O'Brien was played by Thomas Mitchell.
Benny Wrights was played by Chad Camilleri.
Speez was played by Chris Ramsay. As Charlie Emmerson, Frank Licari played the role.
Genelle Williams played Lisa Banks.
In the role of Officer Pat Jones, Trevor Gretzky was outstanding.
Tobin Bell, who had portrayed John Kramer / Jigsaw in all of the previous Saw films, did not return in this installment of the franchise. As a result, Spiral: From the Book of Saw is the first installment in the series that does not physically involve Bell or show the Jigsaw persona onscreen beyond pictures. Bousman indicated that the murderer in the film is not the original Jigsaw but rather a Jigsaw copycat, and he stated that he had no plans to replace Bell in the famous role of Jigsaw. Bell has said that he would be interested in reprising his role as Jigsaw if the narrative delves more into the history of Billy the Puppet.
Chris Rock's Spiral: From the Book of Saw
Chris Rock contacted Lionsgate with his Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) proposal as a chance to revitalize the Saw series as well as his own career.Chris Rock says that Spiral (2021) started when he met Michael Burns, the vice chairman of Lionsgate, by chance at a friend's wedding in Brazil. He thought that doing something in the horror genre would be a new direction for his career, even though he planned to include some comedic elements in the film. Rock talked to LionsGate about extending the franchise, and the company was very interested in the idea. Joe Drake, the CEO of Lionsgate, said that Rock's idea was completely respectful of the material's history while reviving the brand with his wit, creative vision, and love for this classic horror franchise. By January 2018, there were rumors that Lionsgate had started talking about making a ninth Saw movie, but that the Spierig Brothers would not be back. In an interview with Screen Rant, the directors said that their movie set the stage for future sequels. By April 2018, Josh Stolberg and Peter Goldfinger, who wrote Jigsaw, were working with Twisted Pictures to make a sequel.
Following the release of Jigsaw, Stolberg and Goldfinger were pitching a new Saw film to series veterans Mark Burg and Oren Koules, focusing solely on John Kramer / Jigsaw rather than any of his established apprentices, but Burg and Koules called the duo to inform them about Rock's ideas for a new film, with Rock contacting them shortly after to discuss his concept. Other writers had submitted their concepts for the upcoming Saw picture to Lionsgate before Rock came and integrated his with Stolberg and Goldfinger's. Burg and Koules gave the pair the task of creating a pitch for Rock. Stolberg and Goldfinger did just that, and their proposal was accepted by both Lionsgate and Rock, allowing them to compose their first draft, which was greenlit only a week after it was submitted. During the writing process, Rock assisted Stolberg and Goldfinger by reworking the tale as needed.
Rock's character was formerly connected to Danny Glover's David Tapp from the previous film. Stolberg and Goldfinger decided against it since it didn't smell right. In May 2021, Bousman said he's discussed bringing Costas Mandylor back as Mark Hoffman in a future film. Bousman and the crew debated casting Tobin Bell as Jigsaw until the final day of production, but they thought that doing so would make the film seem like the ninth edition of the Saw series rather than a standalone picture. As Jigsaw was killed off in the third picture, Bousman believed that earlier films did a disservice by utilizing flashbacks to bring him into the tale. He didn't want to make that error in Spiral (2021) or disrespect Bell's legendary portrayal. Bousman contemplated having Bell perform a Johnny Cash cover during the concluding scene, but decided it was too gimmicky.
How come Tobin Bell wasn't in Spiral (2021)?
Tobin Bell did not play Jigsaw again in Spiral, making it the first Saw movie in which Bell did not appear.
Stolberg stated in an interview with Bloody Disgusting that Jigsaw was never included in any draft of the screenplay for Spiral: From the Book of Saw, despite discussions taking place even after the first test screening and throughout post-production. They felt that including Jigsaw would alter the foundation of the story they were trying to achieve, not intending to diminish the character but wanting to place the franchise in a new direction. Due to the timeline of the franchise, Stolberg and Goldfinger proposed at one point to have an after-credits sequence where John Kramer met a young Schenk after the murder of the latter's father and bonded with him, maybe giving him the puppet he later uses as the Spiral Ki.
It was decided to replace Billy the Puppet with a new puppet in the form of Mr. Snuggles because Bousman felt that if the original Jigsaw was replaced, the original puppet should go and be replaced with a new one so that the new killer cannot be compared. As a Jigsaw copycat, the film's killer differs from the original. The production feared that reusing Bell's voice for Mr. Snuggles could have created questions about the relationship between both killers; an early draft actually featured Jigsaw's voice, only to then be revealed a digitally altered version of his voice; and the story originally had all the speeches as actually being past recordings of Jigsaw's voice using words in a different order to show that the Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) Killer had digitally rearranged the words. When they couldn't come up with a replacement for Bell's voice, the filmmakers had a hard time locating one. Several other female, kid, and male voices were auditioned before Bousman finally settled on the computer-simulated voice. Final selection of voice was made two days before sound mix was completed.
The making of Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) from behind the scenes
The film began pre-production on May 16, 2019. Darren Lynn Bousman, a former series director, will direct the picture, with Burg and Koules serving as producers. Rock served as executive producer and wrote the narrative treatment.James Wan and Leigh Whannell, as well as Daniel Heffner, the original Saw creators, have joined Rock as executive producers. Scriptwriters Stolberg and Goldfinger have been confirmed.
Rock revealed that he has been a fan of Saw since the first film in 2004 while making the news. He was ecstatic at the prospect of taking it to a whole new level of intensity and twistedness.
After Saw IV, Bousman passed down the opportunity to direct a Broadway production in New York City because Rock demanded that he direct the film himself.
Burg and Koules said that the way Rock handled Saw was similar to what Eddie Murphy did in 48 Hrs. with buddy cop movies. This gave the Saw series a completely new look. Also, Bousman said that Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) had less violence and gore than the other films in the series. He said that gore and violence were his "gimmick" when he first started working on the Saw movies, but that they now serve the story, which is more about the characters, tension, and fear.
Stolberg also said that the ninth movie would fit in with the other eight and would not be a reboot or a direct sequel to Jigsaw.Spiral's casting options
Rock played Detective Zeke Banks. As Rock pondered what he would do if he were the original Saw protagonist Dr. Lawrence Gordon and was forced to chop off his own foot, Stolberg and Goldfinger agreed that it would be fascinating if Rock portrayed a policeman who had been outcast by his colleagues.
Samuel L. Jackson decided to portray Chief Marcus Banks because he wanted to do something new, such as the climax sequence in which his character is hung up like a marionette. Marisol Nichols was cast as Captain Angie Garza, a character that was initially scripted for a male actress but was finally given to Nichols, who, while being a Saw fan, preferred to watch David Fincher's Seven instead of the prior films in preparation for the role. Patrick McManus auditioned for the part of Detective Marv Bozwick, but was called back to portray Peter Dunleavy, while Dan Petronijevic was cast as Bozwick, in an effort to pursue an acting career on film and television following years playing on stage.
Max Minghella is a fan of both horror movies and buddy-cop movies. He took on the role of William Schenk / The Spiral: From the Book of Saw Killer because he yearned of starring in a movie with simple story-telling like the buddy cops of his youth such as 48 Hrs., and when he read the script, he felt that it was that along with a Saw film. Max Minghella is a fan of both buddy-cop movies and horror movies.
What was it like filming Spiral?
Production on the feature film got underway on July 8, 2019, in Toronto, Ontario, with cinematographer Jordan Oram behind the camera. The working title of the film at the time was The Organ Donor. It was announced that Rock, Jackson, Minghella, and Nichols would all be appearing in the movie. They believe that Samuel L. Jackson and Chris Rock, along with Max Minghella and Marisol Nichols, will make this film completely special in the Saw canon, and they couldn't wait to unleash this unexpected and sinister new story on fans of this franchise. Joe Drake, the CEO of Lionsgate, stated that they think Samuel L. Jackson and Chris Rock, along with Max Minghella and Marisol Nichols, will make this film. This was the next level of Saw when it was turned up to eleven. Rock had contributed rewrites while on site and had entirely reworked the sequence in which his character is first introduced. According to Bousman, a sequence in the movie that included a trap had to be excised because it was deemed to be too violent.
Filming was officially completed on August 28, 2019. Dev Singh edited the final cut during post-production.
How did Spiral (2021) get its name?
The working title for the film was The Organ Donor until the name Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) and the Canadian distributor Mongrel Media were leaked to the press on January 22, 2020. On February 5, 2020, the first teaser poster and trailer revealed Spiral (2021) as the film's title.
In cinemas and on the internet, Spiral's debut
In the United States, the film Spiral: From the Book of Saw was going to be released on October 23, 2020, and Lionsgate Films was going to be in charge of its distribution. It was pushed ahead to May 15, 2020 in July 2019, from its original date of July 2019. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the release date of the film has been pushed back to May 21, 2021. This date will now take the place that John Wick: Chapter 4 was supposed to occupy. It was eventually moved forward to a week earlier, to be released on May 14, 2021, just as movie theaters started to reopen.
Spiral (2021) will premiere exclusively on Starz in the United States on October 8, 2021, according to Lionsgate's announcement on May 25, 2021. Via June 1, 2021, Spiral (2021) was launched in copyright on PVOD.
Spiral (2021)'s rating?
According to Darren Lynn Bousman, the picture was granted an NC-17 classification by the Motion Picture Association 11 times before ultimately receiving a R rating after editing enough sequences.
Did Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) bring in a lot of money at the box office?
Spiral has earned $23.2 million in the United States and copyright, and $17.3 million in other regions as of March 3, 2022, for a global total of $40.6 million.
Spiral: From the Book of Saw was released with Those Who Wish Me Dead, Profile, and Finding You in the United States and copyright, with an estimated opening weekend total of $10–15 million from 2,811 theaters. The picture generated $3.7 million on its opening day (including $750,000 from Thursday night screenings), bringing the total to $9 million, which was lower than expected. It went on to earn $8.8 million in its first weekend, making it the franchise's lowest opening weekend. The respondents were 56% male and 75% under the age of 35, with a favorable answer being more common on the East Coast of the United States. The next weekend, it stayed in first position, plummeting 48 percent to $4.6 million.
Spiral (2021)'s reviews:
Film reviewers commended Spiral: From the Book of Saw's efforts to shake up the series template, but claimed it ultimately falls short of providing Saw with the significant push it needs to restore relevancy.
On the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, 37 percent of 221 reviewers gave the film a good review, with a 5.1/10 average rating. Spiral (2021) proposes a fascinating new approach for the Saw series, even if the gruesome whole is less than its pieces, according to the site's critical consensus.
Based on 33 reviewers, Metacritic awarded the film a score of 40 out of 100, indicating mixed or mediocre reviews.
CinemaScore surveyed audiences and found that they gave the movie an average grade of B- on a scale that went from A+ to F. PostTrak found that 63 percent of audience members gave it a good review, with 43 percent stating they would absolutely recommend it to others.
According to one reviewer, "the film takes an unexpected twist or two," but "given that it's a thriller about police immorality, it handles that subject in a very untopical, even garishly generic fashion."
Another film reviewer said the writing caught the grizzled-cop-movie tone and created some memorable characters, but the plot was repetitive, the mystery was annoyingly obvious, and the inventive deaths were less imaginative than before. Spiral: From the Book of Saw chose respectability above entertainment value, but it didn't quite accomplish either.
Many film reviews praised Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) as a really terrifying, albeit unevenly paced, detective thriller, while criticizing its writing for failing to depict the potential tensions between its major characters' father-son relationship.
Some film reviewers praised the performances and Spiral (2021)'s simple yet captivating idea, but they also remarked on the unknown killer's voice, which he claimed sounded like Kermit the Frog, and noted that the screams and gore aren't for the movie's intended demographic. They are, in fact, the attraction.
A film reviewer awarded the film one star out of five and criticized its finale, noting that he believed it was hurried and half-assed and clumsily written and worst of all, becoming progressively uninteresting.. He concluded his evaluation by declaring that the game was over.
In his one-and-a-half-star review, another film critic criticized the movie's tone and Darren Lynn Bousman's direction, which he said disappointed him after he praised the cast. He called the movie "impossible to follow" because it lacked tension, story, and plot development.
However, another film reviewer enjoyed the opening sequence and concluded that the film's concept is either dishonest or fear-mongering. For all of its wit and wisdom, this picture does not quite measure up to what it claims to be.
Spiral: From the Book of Saw: From the Book of Saw is likely to offend both Saw devotees and mainstream moviegoers, according to one film reviewer. It's a poor rip-off of the show, failing to match even the most basic aesthetic and narrative standards. It's also a bad movie in general, as it tries to tell a socially relevant story but fails miserably. Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) is barely a Saw film, he said, delivering only briefly on the visceral thrill of mutilation and none of the series' other tenets. It's also the most artless, tactless version of what it actually is: a snubbed pilot episode for a rote cop drama.
Decker Shado talked about how he felt about Spiral. Spiral, the newest film in the Saw series, comes from the Book of Saw and the imagination of Chris Rock. After a whole Summer of Saw, you should probably know the routine by now: a murderer is on the loose, testing his victims with mechanical contraptions that are as inventive as they are scary. At least, that's the idea. A number of these traps left a lot to be desired... and the technique, as well as the purpose, is incorrect. His video explains it much better.
Another film reviewer said that it isn't precisely a waste of a premise. The franchise, on the other hand, does not need reinvention. Spiral gets some fresh blood with Rock's participation, but after a promising start, it merely becomes a really good Saw movie with some larger stars than usual—one whose jaundiced lighting and procedural narrative more closely resemble David Fincher's Se7en than anything else. Consider the game a failure if the goal was to determine whether a new approach on a long-running property could withstand being cut and diced by the sequel machine.
A film critic gave the movie a bad review, saying that "Spiral: From the Book of Saw stumbles through its central mystery without grace, style, or even much thought." Even the death traps are strangely boring. He said that the movie had potential and that the most frustrating thing about Spiral (2021) is that there is a better, smarter movie hiding under all this nonsense. There are too many fast cuts and scenes that get faster and faster. It's annoying that bad dialogue is shouted at full volume. In the end, Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) is a movie about corrupt and even murderous cops who are suddenly held accountable. This kind of material has the potential to be both subversive for a Hollywood movie and timely, but Spiral seems to care so little about any of this that it's almost frustrating. Its only goal is to kill many people, which it does.
Will Spiral: From the Book of Saw be followed by a sequel?
In April of 2021, it was announced that a sequel movie to Saw named Saw X was officially in the works at Twisted Pictures. On the other hand, Bousman noted that the announcement was made too soon, something both he and the film's producers found surprising. He said that simply because they created Spiral (2021) does not imply that the Saw series would no longer be produced in the future. There is still a possibility that Saw IX will be made, despite the fact that Spiral has already been released. This is not the ninth installment in the Saw movie series. There is a good chance that Saw IX will come out after Jigsaw. I believe that they are waiting to see how Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) performs and how people react before deciding what the next step will be. In December of that year, according to Josh Stolberg, the writing of the screenplay was completed.
A Spiral TV series?
In an April 2021 interview with Deadline Hollywood, Lionsgate Television chairman Kevin Beggs said that Lionsgate TV is in early negotiations to produce a television series based on Spiral: From the Book of Saw, with Mark Burg and Oren Koules' Twisted Television productions.