Saw IV (2007)

All Critics (81) | Top Critics (18) | Fresh (14) | Rotten (65) | DVD (16)

The reports of torture porn's demise may have been greatly exaggerated, but this fourth entry in the mutilate-yourself-or-die series joins what may be the worst genre of the decade: the lamely ''sympathetic'' serial-killer backstory.

October 31, 2007 Full Review

Owen Gleiberman

Entertainment Weekly

Top Critic

This death trap may be rusty, but as long as it keeps generating fresh blood, it's unlikely to slam shut anytime soon.

October 29, 2007 Full Review

Elizabeth Weitzman

New York Daily News

Top Critic

Just as Jigsaw tests his victims, the franchise's own test will be whether such suspension can be maintained, or if matters lapse into a torture chamber of self-parody.

October 29, 2007 Full Review

Robert Koehler

Variety

Top Critic

An incomprehensible cacophony of screams, shock cuts, dour pseudo-philosophizing, heavy metal mutilation and low-rent TV-standard performances.

October 29, 2007 Full Review

Geoff Pevere

Toronto Star

Top Critic

The Syriana of slasher films, so complicated and circuitous that your only hope of understanding everything is to eat lots of fish the night before and then watch each of the previous films, in order, right before you enter the theater.

October 29, 2007 Full Review

Peter Hartlaub

San Francisco Chronicle

Top Critic

It's somewhat better put together than Saw II or III, though there isn't a scare in it.

October 29, 2007 Full Review | Comment (1)

Roger Moore

Orlando Sentinel

Top Critic

The first thing you see in Saw IV is Jigsaw's balls. A sign of things to come? Most definitely.

November 3, 2012 Full Review

Ali Gray

TheShiznit.co.uk

There's the obligatory twist at the end, which hardly makes up for the excruciating boredom viewers are forced to endure. But, hey, if you're paying for torture, expect to suffer.

July 7, 2010 Full Review

Steve Newton

Georgia Straight

We now find ourselves in the downward slope of the Saw series as Saw IV stretches credibility to the breaking point.

October 31, 2009 Full Review | Comment (1)

Wesley Lovell

Cinema Sight

Jigsaw is an interesting character with an interesting worldview and an interesting way of carrying out his will. It's too bad the movies themselves aren't worthy of him.

October 18, 2008 Full Review

Rob Gonsalves

eFilmCritic.com

This gruesomely efficient horror sequel shows noticeable wear and tear.

July 23, 2008 Full Review

Tim Grierson

Screendaily

I do wish that these movies were well made, because I actually think the premises are quite clever, but unless a veteran who is more confident in his abilities takes over, we are left with what could have been...

July 22, 2008 Full Review

Austin Kennedy

Sin Magazine

Poor Jigsaw. The architect of the most deadly traps ever committed to celluloid has endured inoperable cancer, a debilitating car crash and even the premature death of his son, but nothing as painful or degrading as 'Saw IV.'

April 10, 2008

Rossiter Drake

San Francisco Examiner

There is nothing spectacular included here, but fans of the Saw franchise should easily be satisfied by what is offered on this DVD.

February 27, 2008 Full Review

Felix Gonzalez Jr.

DVD Review

... any serious consideration of the killer's fascination with violence is superseded by the director's (and the returning viewers') own sadistic pleasures.

February 27, 2008 Full Review

Felix Gonzalez Jr.

DVD Review

Director Darren Lynn Bousman, helming his third sequel in a row, has plenty of gratuitous style to enhance the gratuitous violence and sadistic torture devices...

January 22, 2008 Full Review

Sean Axmaker

MSN.com

[It has a] not only an entertaining yak-track, it's also quite informative. I have seen all the Saw movies, each of them at least two or three times, and I learned quite a lot from the verbal puzzle-piecing.

January 19, 2008 Full Review

Staci Layne Wilson

Horror.com

• 1. Tracy: What you can't do, is save everyone.
  – Submitted by Rob B (20 months ago)
• 1. Cecil: I don't have a fucking soul.
  – Submitted by Rob B (20 months ago)
• 1. Agent Strahm: Girl loves boy, Boy loves girl. Boy gets girl pregnant, Girl loses baby... boy turns into a serial killer. Jill, I'm not buying it.
  – Submitted by Rob B (20 months ago)
• 1. Jigsaw/John: You don't want to do that.
  2. Cecil: The fuck's your problem?
  3. Jigsaw/John: You're my problem... and you're becoming everybody else's too.
  – Submitted by Rob B (20 months ago)
• 1. Art: I recommend that you stay alive until the fucking... clock counts down.
  – Submitted by Rob B (20 months ago)
• 1. Agent Perez: Who's he?
  2. Hoffman: Lieutenant Rigg, the SWAT commander.
  3. Agent Strahm: What's his problem?
  4. Hoffman: Everyone around him keeps dying.
  – Submitted by Rob B (20 months ago)

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