“Saw” helps prove that the much talked about horror movie revival isn’t really happening. A horror movie doesn’t function if you can’t build some tension, show some gore and have characters that we can actually root for. “Saw” take a good premise and waters it down with bad acting, overly arty direction and super-silly plot twists. The movie centers on two fellas trapped in a nasty bathroom and trying to escape from Jigsaw, a killer who has little moral lessons he wants his victims to learn. We start in that bathroom and find out about Jigsaw through a series of flashbacks. And just how exactly are we supposed to be scared of something that has already happened? These flashbacks help kill any tension that the director trys to build. Then there are the actors. Cary Elwes and Leigh Whannell (vanity casting if there ever was such a case … he wrote the screenplay) are so bad that you really could care less what happens to them. I was actually rooting for Cary Elwes to buy it before the end just so we wouldn’t have to endure any more of his “emotional” outbursts (see above photo for an example). Danny Glover does his typical “good cop” routine. Haven’t we seen that in about a thousand movies already? Grrrrrr. If you want a good serial killer/morality play just watch “Seven” again. It’s a great example of how a movie’s tone and mood can creep you out without showing you lots of violence just for violence sake.