Spiral is a 2021 horror film written by Josh Stolberg and Peter Goldfinger and directed by Darren Lynn Bousman. The film is the ninth chapter in the Saw franchise. Chris Rock, Max Minghella, Marisol Nichols, and Samuel L. Jackson feature in the thriller, which depicts police attempts to arrest a Jigsaw-style murderer. Executive producers include the series' creators, James Wan and Leigh Whannell, as well as Rock and series veteran Kevin Greutert.After the release of Jigsaw in 2017, Chris Rock expressed interest in expanding his presence in the horror genre, which led to the beginning of discussions on the production of a new Saw film. The Spierig Brothers, who directed "Jigsaw," considered making another movie but ultimately chose not to do so. Rock is now working on the screenplay, which was written by Stolberg and Goldfinger. The project was publicly revealed in May of 2019. The other members of the cast were brought on board in the month of July, and the last days of production were spent in Toronto.
Spiral, originally set for May 2020, was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and released on May 14, 2021 by Lionsgate. The film garnered mixed reviews from reviewers, who applauded the franchise's new approach but weren't sure whether it properly reinvented it.
Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) has a storyline.
Off-duty Detective Marv Bozwick pursues a criminal into a sewage pipe during a July 4 celebration. Attacked from behind by a pig mask, Bozwick wakes to find himself dangling by his tongue in a subway tunnel. He is offered an option through recorded message: rip out his tongue and survive, or wait until the next train comes, murdering him. Unable to escape the trap, Bozwick is murdered by the train. The following day, Captain Angie Garza sends Detective Zeke Banks an optimistic rookie. Banks and Schenk analyze Bozwick's death, and Banks thinks it's identical to the Jigsaw Killer's.
After failing to respond to Banks's request for assistance some years earlier, Fitch is kidnapped and put in a trap where he must chop his fingers off to prevent electrocution in an overflowing water basin; he also fails to escape and perish. Because of his past association with Fitch, several police assume that Banks is the person responsible. A parcel containing a pig puppet and a portion of Schenk's tattooed flesh subsequently arrives at the station. The police are directed to a butcher shop by a little vial hidden within the box, which Banks and his father, former chief Marcus Banks, used to frequent as a hobby store. Schenk's skinned body and a recording recorder are found when the squad arrives. Abducted by the murderer, Marcus sets out to find him at a warehouse where he is held captive. In the precinct's cold storage, Garza is abducted and forced to cut her spinal chord with a blade in order to prevent hot wax from dripping from a conduit over her face. When Banks finds her dead, she has been killed by the boiling hot wax since she failed to do so.
Banks gets apprehended while following a lead, and he wakes up in the warehouse with his hands shackled to a pipe and a hacksaw close by. He gives some thought to chopping off his arm, but ultimately uses a bobby pin to get out of the situation. The next thing he notices is that his old colleague, Peter Dunleavy, who was sacked and sentenced to jail after Banks disclosed a murder he committed, is shackled in place. In front of him is a big machine designed to smash glass, and it has been altered so that it can swiftly throw shrapnel at him. It is revealed on a tape recorder that Banks has the option of either releasing him from his confinement or abandoning him to his fate. Although Banks makes an effort to rescue Dunleavy, he is unable to get the key in time. When Banks moved to another chamber, he found Schenk there. Schenk was discovered to have faked his own death by using the skinned body of the thief who lured Bozwick into the tunnels. Schenk was also revealed to have been the copycat the whole time. He says that his real surname is Emmerson and that he is the son of Charlie Emmerson, the man whom Dunleavy murdered because Charlie had promised to testify against a corrupt officer. Charlie was shot and killed by Dunleavy. In addition to this, he divulges the fact that Marcus, during the period that he served as chief, purposely shielded corrupt officers in order to rid the streets of crime more effectively in accordance with Article 8.
Emmerson, believing Banks may be an ally, gives him a last test, showing Marcus being drained of blood in the air. Emmerson phones 9-1-1 and pretends he's a civilian being chased by a gunman, so the operator sends a SWAT unit. He gives Banks a handgun with one cartridge and gives him two options: rescue Marcus but let Emmerson escape, or murder Emmerson and let Marcus bleed to death. Banks shoots the target to free his father, dropping him on the ground before fighting Emmerson. Soon later, the SWAT squad comes and accidentally trips a tripwire, forcing Marcus' handcuffs to tug him up again. The movement shows a gun on Marcus' arm, causing the SWAT squad to murder him. Banks wails as Emmerson flees.
Who starred in the film Spiral: From the Book of Saw?
Chris Rock portrays Detective Zeke Banks in the film.
Detective William Schenk/Emerson was played by Max Minghella. Young William was represented by Leonidas Castrounis. Marcus Banks was played by Samuel L. Jackson.
Captain Angie Garza was played by Marisol Nichols.
Detective Marv Bozwick was played by Daniel Petronijevic. Detective Fitch was acted by Richard Zeppieri. Peter Dunleavy was played by Patrick McManus.
Ali Johnson played the role of Officer Jeannie Lewis. Kara Bozwick was played by Zoie Palmer. Sergeant Morgey Silva was played by Dylan Roberts in the film. Detective Drury was acted by K. C. Collins.
Deborah Kraus was played by Edie Inksetter.
Coroner Chada was acted by Nazneen Contractor.
Detective Tim O'Brien was played by Thomas Mitchell.
Benny Wrights was played by Chad Camilleri. Christopher Ramsay was cast in the role of Speez. Frank Licari played Emmerson.
Lisa Banks was played by Genelle Williams.
Gretzky played Pat Jones.
Tobin Bell, who portrayed John Kramer / Jigsaw in all prior Saw films, did not appear in Spiral: From the Book of Saw, making it the first film in the genre to include neither Bell nor the Jigsaw persona onscreen other than in images. Bousman said that the murderer in the film is a Jigsaw clone, not the real Jigsaw, and that he has no plans to replace Bell in the famous role. Bell has indicated interest in reprising his role as Jigsaw if the plot went further into Billy the Puppet's origins.
Chris Rock's participation in Spiral: From the Book of Saw
Chris Rock pitched Spiral to Lionsgate as a chance to revitalize the Saw series and his own career.
Chris Rock met Lionsgate vice chairman Michael Burns at a friend's wedding in Brazil and believed shooting a horror film would be a fresh direction for his career. He wanted to integrate humorous aspects in the picture. Lionsgate was interested in Rock's plan to prolong the series. Lionsgate CEO Joe Drake said Rock's approach was respectful to the material while reinvigorating the brand with his humour, creativity, and enthusiasm for the iconic horror property. By January 2018, reports suggested Lionsgate was planning a ninth Saw picture without the Spierig Brothers. The filmmakers told Screen Rant that their picture sets up sequels. By April 2018, Twisted Pictures was developing a Jigsaw sequel with Josh Stolberg and Peter Goldfinger.
After Jigsaw came out, Stolberg and Goldfinger were talking to series veterans Mark Burg and Oren Koules about making a new Saw movie about only John Kramer/Jigsaw and none of his other apprentices. Burg and Koules called Stolberg and Goldfinger to tell them about Rock's ideas for a new movie, and Rock called them soon after to talk about his idea. Before that, other writers had tried to get Lionsgate interested in their ideas for the next Saw movie, but none of them were successful. Stolberg and Goldfinger, on the other hand, had come up with eight different versions of the movie before Rock came along and combined his idea with theirs. Burg and Koules told the pair to make a pitch for Rock. Stolberg and Goldfinger did this, and both Lionsgate and Rock liked their pitch. This led them to write their first draft, which was approved a week after it was turned in. Rock helped Stolberg and Goldfinger write the story and rewrote parts of it when they needed to.
In an early draft, Rock's character was linked to Danny Glover's David Tapp from the previous film. Stolberg and Goldfinger decided against going in this way since it didn't smell right. Bousman said in May 2021 that negotiations had been place regarding perhaps recasting Costas Mandylor as Mark Hoffman in a future film. Tobin Bell's appearance as Jigsaw in the film was heavily debated by Bousman and the crew until the last day of production, but they thought that bringing Bell back would make the film seem like the ninth edition of the Saw series rather than a new picture as it was intended. Because the Jigsaw character was killed off in the third picture, Bousman believed that earlier films did Jigsaw a disservice by bringing him into the tale via flashbacks, and he didn't want to make the same error in Spiral (2021) or disrespect Bell's legendary performance. Bousman explored including Bell in Spiral by having Bell perform a Johnny Cash song during the concluding scene, but discarded the idea because he thought it was too gimmicky.
Tobin Bell was in Spiral.
Tobin Bell didn't play Jigsaw in Spiral (2021), making it the first Saw film without him.
Despite discussions occurring after the first test screening and throughout post-production, Stolberg stated in an interview with Bloody Disgusting that Jigsaw was never included in any draft for the screenplay of Spiral (2021) because they felt that including Jigsaw would change the foundation of the story they were trying to achieve, not to diminish the character but to move the franchise in a new direction. Because of the franchise's timeline, Stolberg and Goldfinger proposed an after-credits sequence in which 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 Killer.
As the film's murderer is a Jigsaw copycat, Billy the Puppet was substituted with Mr. Snuggles so the new killer couldn't be compared to the original. Reusing Bell's voice for Mr. Snuggles could have created questions about the relationship between both killers; an early draft featured Jigsaw's voice only to be revealed a digitally altered version of his voice; the story originally had all the speeches as past recordings of Jigsaw's voice using words in a different order to show that the Spiral Killer had digitally rearranged the words. Filmmakers tried to replicate Bell's lethal voice. Bousman tried several women's, children's, and men's voices before choosing the computer-generated voice. Two days before the sound mix, the final voice was chosen.
Spiral: From the Book of Saw Behind the Scenes
On May 16, 2019, pre-production began. Former series director Darren Lynn Bousman directed and Burg and Koules produced. Rock was a writer and executive producer.James Wan, Leigh Whannell, and Daniel Heffner, the original creators of Saw, have joined Rock as executive producers. As scriptwriters, Stolberg and Goldfinger were confirmed.
Rock mentioned in his statement that he has been a fan of Saw since the first film in 2004. He was ecstatic at the prospect of taking things to a dark and twisted new level.
Rock suggested Bousman direct a Broadway production when he declined to direct Saw IV.
It was claimed by Burg and Koules that Rock's portrayal of Saw was analogous to what Eddie Murphy had done in 48 Hrs. for buddy cop flicks and that it gave the Saw series an entirely new viewpoint According to the director, Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) contains less violence and gore than previous Saw films, expressing the belief that gore and violence were the gimmick for him when he first started working on the films, but that both elements now serve the story, which focuses more on character, tension, and fear.
Stolberg also clarified that the ninth film will exist in the same canon as the previous eight films and would neither be a reboot or a straight sequel to Jigsaw.Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) casting
Detective Zeke Banks, played by Rock. The character was conceived by Rock, Stolberg, and Goldfinger during discussions prior to writing the screenplay, with Rock pondering what he would do if he were the original Saw protagonist Dr. Lawrence Gordon and had to cut off his own foot, until they decided it would be interesting if Rock played a cop who was shunned by his coworkers.
Samuel L. Jackson decided to portray Chief Marcus Banks because he wanted to experience something new, such as the climax sequence in which his character is hung up like a marionette. Despite being a Saw fan, Marisol Nichols preferred to view David Fincher's Seven instead of the other films in preparation for the part. 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 after years of playing on stage.
Max Minghella, a lover of both horror and buddy-cop films, took on the part of William Schenk / The Spiral: From the Book of Saw Killer because he wished to play in a movie with straightforward story-telling like the buddy police of his childhood, such as 48 Hrs., and when he read the script, he believed it was that, coupled with a Saw picture.
What was it like filming Spiral?
The principal filming of The Organ Donor started on July 8, 2019, in Toronto, Ontario, with Jordan Oram acting as the cinematographer. It was announced that Rock, Jackson, Minghella, and Nichols would star in the film. Joe Drake, the chief executive officer of Lionsgate, stated that Samuel L. Jackson and Chris Rock, along with Max Minghella and Marisol Nichols, would make this film completely unique in the Saw canon, and that they could not wait to share this unexpected and sinister new story with fans of the franchise. This was the next level of Saw at maximum power. Rock had offered rewrites on site and entirely rewritten his character's introductory sequence. According to Bousman, a sequence with a trap had to be removed from the film because it was too violent.
Filming officially ended on August 28, 2019. Dev Singh finished the editing during post-production.
How did you go about marketing Spiral?
The film was formerly known as the working title The Organ Donor; however, on January 22, 2020, the name Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) was leaked to the press, along with the news that Mongrel Media will be the Canadian distributor. The title of the movie was revealed to be Spiral: From the Book of Saw with the publication of the film's first teaser poster and trailer on February 5, 2020.
In cinemas and on the internet, Spiral's debut
Spiral was initially intended to be released on October 23, 2020, and was distributed by Lionsgate Films in the US. It was pushed back to May 15, 2020, in July of this year. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the film's release date has been pushed back to May 21, 2021, replacing John Wick: Chapter 4 on the schedule. As cinemas started to reopen, it was rescheduled for a week early on May 14, 2021.
On May 25, 2021, Lionsgate announced that starting October 8, 2021, Spiral (2021) will only be available to stream on Starz in the United States. Spiral: From the Book of Saw came out on Canada's PVOD service on June 1, 2021.
What was the rating for Spiral (2021)?
The Motion Picture Association gave the picture an NC-17 classification 11 times before ultimately deleting enough parts to achieve a R rating, according to Darren Lynn Bousman.
What was the box office gross for Spiral (2021)?
Spiral: From the Book of Saw has grossed $40.6 million globally as of March 3, 2022, including $23.2 million in the United States and Canada and $17.3 million in other markets.
Spiral (2021) opened with Those Who Wish Me Dead, Profile, and Finding You in 2,811 theaters in the United States and Canada, and was expected to make $10–15 million in its first weekend. The picture generated $3.7 million on its opening day (including $750,000 from Thursday night screenings), bringing its 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 percent male and 75 percent under the age of 35, with a favorable answer being more common in the US East Coast. The next weekend, it stayed in top position with a 48 percent dip to $4.6 million.
What did people who review movies say about Spiral: From the Book of Saw?
Critics commended Spiral (2021)'s efforts to change the franchise template, but thought it didn't give Saw the jolt it needed 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. The site's critical consensus was Spiral (2021) reveals an exciting new approach for the Saw series, even if the gruesome whole is somewhat less than its pieces.
Based on 33 reviewers, Metacritic gave the film a score of 40 out of 100, indicating mixed or mediocre reviews.
Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the movie an average grade of B- on a scale from A+ to F, and PostTrak said that 63 percent of people who saw it liked it and 43 percent would definitely recommend it.
A film reviewer said that the picture takes an unexpected twist or two but given that it's a thriller connected to the problem of police immorality, the film handles that theme in a bizarrely offtopic, almost garishly generic fashion.A separate reviewer said the writing caught the grizzled-cop-movie tone and created some memorable characters, but the plot was repetitive, the mystery was annoyingly foreseeable, and the inventive deaths were less imaginative than before. Spiral (2021) traded entertainment value for respectability, but failed to accomplish either goal.
Many film reviews praised Spiral as a really terrifying, albeit unevenly paced, detective thriller, while also criticizing its writing for failing to communicate the possible tensions between its major characters' father-and-son relationship.
Some film reviewers paid praise to the performance and Spiral's plain yet captivating idea, but also provided notes to the voice of the unknown murderer, who he thought sounded like Kermit the Frog, and stated that for this movie's genuine audience, the screams and the gore aren't something to be endured. They're truly the appeal.
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.
Another film critic, in his one-and-a-half-star review, criticized the film's tone and Darren Lynn Bousman's directing, which he claimed disappointed him despite his respect for the performers, and called it illegible for its lack of tension, narrative, and plot advancement.
A different film critic liked the opening scene, but thought it was the only good part of the movie. To sum it up, he or she wrote that the movie's premise is at best dishonest and at worst designed to make people afraid. Like one of Jigsaw's easy puzzles, this movie is not as smart as it thinks it is.
One film reviewer awarded the picture a 3 out of 10 rating, claiming that Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) is sequel that aspires to woo Saw enthusiasts and mainstream viewers equally, Spiral: From the Book of Saw: From the Book of Saw is likely to offend them both. It's a false replica of the series, failing to match its most basic aesthetic and narrative standards. It's also a terrible picture in general, which attempts to portray a socially important narrative that it can't seem to grasp. He also attacked the picture for its lack of connection to the Saw franchise, noting that Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) is barely a Saw film, delivering only momentarily on the visceral pleasure of mutilation, and on none of the series' other premises. It's also the most artless, tactless form of what it plays like instead: a rejected pilot episode for a monotonous police procedural.
Spiral: From the Book of Saw, as seen by Decker Shado. From the Book of Saw and the mind of Chris Rock comes Spiral: From the Book of Saw, the latest movie in the Saw series, which came out late in 2021. After a whole SUMMER OF SAW, you should know the drill by now: a killer is on the loose who doesn't directly kill his victims but instead tests them with clever and disturbing machines. Or at least, that's the idea. A lot of these traps leave a lot to be desired, and their methods and goals are also a little off. It is explained much better in his YouTube video.
Another film critic said that it wasn't exactly a waste of an idea. But the franchise doesn't need to be changed up either. Rock's involvement in Spiral (2021) gives it some fresh blood, but after a promising start, the movie just turns out to be a pretty good Saw movie with some bigger names than usual—one whose dreary lighting and procedural storyline remind me most of David Fincher's Se7en. If the point of the game was to see if a new take on a long-running franchise could stand up to the sequel machine, then the game is over.
Spiral fumbles through its fundamental riddle without elegance, flair, or even much thinking, according to a film reviewer who gave it a bad review. Even the death traps lack imagination. He recognized the picture's promise, claiming that the most aggravating aspect of Spiral: From the Book of Saw is that a better, wiser film lies behind all the foolishness. There are just too many rapid cuts and sequences when the tempo ramps up. It's irritating to hear poor speech blasted at full volume. Spiral (2021) is ultimately a picture about corrupt, even deadly officers having a reckoning, and that kind of material has the potential to be both subversive and current for a Hollywood film, yet it's been noted that Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) is almost infuriating in how little it appears to care about any of it. It merely want to lose a great deal of blood, which it does.
Is Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2021) going to have a sequel?
In April 2021, a sequel film, dubbed Saw X, was announced to be in production with Twisted Pictures. However, Bousman noted that it was a premature statement that astonished him and the film's producers. He added that simply because they produced Spiral: From the Book of Saw, it doesn't mean that the Saw series ceases to exist. Just because Spiral: From the Book of Saw is here, it doesn't mean there won't be a Saw IX. This is not the ninth film in the Saw series. There easily may be a Saw IX that succeeds Jigsaw. I suppose they're waiting to see how Spiral goes and how viewers react to decide what happens next. Josh Stolberg said the script was done in December of that same year.
Will there be a television series based on Spiral?
Kevin Beggs, chairman of Lionsgate Television, made the announcement in an interview with Deadline Hollywood in April 2021 that the company is in early talks to develop a television series based on Spiral (2021), in conjunction with Mark Burg and Oren Koules' Twisted Television productions. Deadline Hollywood was the publication that conducted the interview.