Halloween is still more than a month away, but it’s already the scary season in Hollywood. We’ve been treated to plenty of horror movies this September—from the demonic in The Nun II, to the more literate terror of A Haunting in Venice, to the Hindu-themed possession flick It Lives Inside.
And this weekend, moviegoers will be given a new chapter in one of the most notorious horror franchises of all: Saw X.
Saw X, which in franchise chronology takes place just weeks after the original Saw, reportedly brings back the killer John Kramer, who’s in Mexico seeking a cure for his terminal cancer. When he discovers that his would-be saviors are in fact charlatans, he decides to abduct these evildoers and … well, teach them the error of their ways.
It promises to be a very bloody affair. (And if you’re really curious, our review will be posted later this week.) Fans of the franchise would expect—and let’s be honest, demand—nothing less. In 2004, the original Saw helped introduce the term “torture porn” into our vocabulary. The franchise measures blood not by the bucket, but by the vat. Organs spend more time outside the body than inside.
Now, I’ve spoken and written about horror movies before at Plugged In, sometimes even defending them. More than movies in almost any other genre, horror flicks can sometimes give both storytellers and viewers license to consider life’s biggest mysteries: the real battle between good and evil; the question of life after death; the reality and efficacy of God. I know more than one Christian who came to faith, in part, because of a horror film.
But gory films like Saw present a different problem. And while the film’s John Kramer argues that his traps are meant to make his victims reevaluate their lives and enjoy them more, that seems to me a poor reason to subject audiences to the movies’ undeniable sadism. I don’t see the appeal. And yet, they obviously have appeal to some: The Saw franchise has earned nearly $500 million during its nearly 20-year run.
So why do people enjoy movies with outrageous levels of gore?
Part of the answer, according to scientists, is rather simple: People like gory movies because they shock us—but in a safe environment. We are able to deal with something that in real life might scar us deeply. But in the safety of a movie theater, we’re able to process it. Compartmentalize it.
“We get to consume something we see little of in real life, in a controlled and safe environment, where we can test the limits of our emotive response in comfort,” psychologist Dr. Lee Chambers told Salon in 2021. Just as horror movies allow us to experience fear without being put in a fearful situation, gory horror movies give us space to consider the worst tortures we might be subjected to without feeling a thing.
“Both are deeply intertwined with the concept of evil, something that again fascinates many of us but we experience minimally,” Chambers said to Salon. “In an increasingly sanitized and protected life, the chance to experience fear and emotional pain can be appealing and a novelty.”
And that’s the thing, right? Evil is curiously fascinating. We’re drawn to the awful. Sometimes onscreen evil, and even gore, comes with an intended purpose: Mel Gibson’s ultra-bloody The Passion of the Christ is a fine example. Many viewers felt the blood and gore was an important part of the story—to show the pain that Jesus suffered to save us. Some Christians took their young children to the film because they felt its message, and its imagery, was that critical.
But anecdotally, a few watched the film as if it was … Saw. They came not because of the message, but because of the blood. Writing for the site Halloween Year-Round, Dave Pierdomenico said that “The Passion of the Christ rivals Saw and Hostel in terms of its use of intense violence and gore.”
Perhaps some of those who were attracted to The Passion for its gore walked away with a greater understanding of Christ’s sacrifice. Perhaps the gore was the carrot that would draw some closer to God. Certainly that’s within the realm of possibility.
But if we consider the impact of blood and gore itself in the movies—setting aside its intended message–many experts say that impact is troubling.
Several studies have linked on-screen violence with real-world violence. According to data compiled by Gitnux Market Data earlier this month, more than a thousand studies have shown a correlation between violence in media and aggressive behavior. It alleges that violence is a component in about one-third of all movie scenes.
And a blog published by Penn State University tells us that horror movies can sometimes trigger us, forcing us to recall traumatic memories from our own lives. (I can relate. When I first started reviewing movies for Plugged In, I was in a pretty jarring car crash. For the next two years, every time I reviewed a movie with an auto accident on screen, my heart started racing.)
But when it comes to gore, the bigger issue may be desensitization.
Lovers of gory movies may already be less sensitive than most folks. According to BBC’s Science Focus, “Studies have shown that those who enjoy watching gore are more likely to score lower on empathy and higher on a personality trait known as ‘sensation seeking’.” Such people aren’t as stimulated by run-of-the-mill dramas, in other words, so they seek out more stimulation from more graphic forms of entertainment.
But over time, exposure to violent or gory movies inherently desensitizes us to violence and gore in the real world. That’s especially true for children, but it can be true for us, too.
And then there’s this: We can be attracted to gory horror movies because we’re told that we shouldn’t be attracted to gory horror movies.
Matthew Strohl, an assistant philosophy professor at the University of Montana, told Salon that the transgressive nature of movies such as Saw is an integral part of their attraction. “These are the movies that we aren’t allowed to see as kids, that pearl-clutching commentators tell us are bad and wicked and evil, and that come with warnings for the faint of heart,” Strohl told Salon. “These movies appeal to us in part because they are dangerous and transgressive. Nothing is a surer guarantee that I will go see a movie than outraged controversy or nauseated critics.”
Which means, paradoxically, that I’m a part of the problem, if you can call it that. If Plugged In warns people to stay away from Saw X, some readers will see Saw X because Plugged In told them not to.
We’re funny creatures. We can be drawn to the horrific, attracted by gore. As the Apostle Paul told us in Romans 15, we often do not understand our own actions.
But we can still ask ourselves the right questions. If you’re looking forward to see the latest Saw movie, ask yourself a simple one: Why?
I don’t mean that as a rhetorical question, but an honest one. For us to make true, God-honoring entertainment choices, we first must understand ourselves—our hopes, our fears, our yearnings, our desires, our ugliness.
John Kramer, with his wicked traps, has long encouraged his victims to ponder their lives, to ask important questions for their own improvement. Why have they made the decisions they have? Why have they wasted so much time? How can they can be better people?
We don’t need John Kramer’s help in asking those questions. And perhaps the first question we should ask ourselves is whether movies such as Saw make us better people … or worse.
12 Responses
-The types of cinematic blood and gore I have no problem with are the kinds depicted in “Hacksaw Ridge” or “Saving Private Ryan” because it shows the brutal reality of war and that sometimes soldiers must shed blood for freedom or the scourging and crucifixion of Jesus Christ depicted in “The Passion Of The Christ” because that is what really happened to our Lord and Savior before His Resurrection.
-The issue I’ve retroactively had with The Passion is that there have been a bunch of Christian films that covered a lot of the same subject matter but weren’t nearly so brutal in how they did so. I have a lot of issues with the parents, churches, and youth groups who took young children by the busload to a movie that was itself described as “torture porn” the very same way the Saw films were and for the same reason, to say nothing of how a lot of families had a “no R ratings ever” rule but chose that of all movies to break their rule for. I have no idea how many children were traumatized from that.
“Paul, Apostle of Christ” did a very good job of showcasing martyrdom and the early realities of the Christian church tactfully, while “Silence” and “Hacksaw Ridge” really don’t deserve to share a rating – both are unsuitable for teens, but the latter really should have been restricted to adults only the same way that a movie like “Shame” was, and I’m increasingly convinced that “The Passion” should also have been NC-17, even if not as blatantly as the still-excellent “Hacksaw Ridge” should have been.
The ironic thing about “Hacksaw Ridge” showcasing the ‘brutal reality of war’ (which may well be a necessary tool for, say, Ukrainians to keep their freedom but hasn’t been necessary for Americans in the ~80 years that have passed since that film and “Saving Private Ryan” took place) is that its hero was one who dared to question the basic concept of “killing because you’re told to” and saved countless lives, including attempting to do so for the very Japanese lives who were depicted as his “enemy.”
As with the person below who mentioned 9/11 and its political aftermath, we’re so often told to accept horrific violence because it’s somehow necessary to protect our freedoms (even the “Saw” movies, from my understanding, try to excuse it by saying they’re teaching people a lesson), and the “brutal reality of war” is that tens of millions of people kill each other because a few world leaders see no other way to interact but are very good at using chains of command, and sometimes even convincing a great many people in the church, to justify this in the name of national interests.
-I’m not sure gratuitously gory movies that aim for physical revulsion make people any worse, but they’re not as interesting as movies that make you feel and think. They’re like grossout jokes that stop being funny once you turn 16.
And don’t forget the historical context here. The Saw franchise and similar torture-based movies became popular in the years after 9/11 and during the war on terror, when traumatized Americans were looking for ways to confront violence, pain and sadism in a controlled environment. It was a dark time psychologically, and movies reflect the times.
-That’s a really interesting point since one of the 9/11 defendants was just declared (less than a week ago) too mentally unfit to stand trial because of CIA torture abuses. Plugged In noted in its review of the excellent but almost unwatchably horrific “United 93” that these people are “real human beings as well. That characterization in no way tries to excuse their actions. But it does show them as three-dimensional people, not just clichéd Muslim radicals.”
-Saw X is a bad movie, but since it has had nine predecessors over the years, I think everyone who decides to see it knows what they’re getting into at this point. I am more concerned with an upcoming film called “Cinderella’s Curse”. Everyone associates Cinderella with being wholesome and family-friendly (except for its critics), so I am concerned that a lot of people will watch “Cinderella’s Curse” and be shocked to see that Cinderella is a murderous monster and her fairy godmother is a gruesome zombie.
-As with the Winnie-the-Pooh horror movie that came out shortly after the original book (with a non-Disney version of the character) entered the public domain in the U.S., this is why people should research the content of the movies they watch before they – or their children – watch them, and it’s probably why movies like “Ted” and “Strays” advertise their adult ratings prominently in order to dissuade children from watching. Some of my friends got one big surprise when watching “Oppenheimer.”
-These are interesting perspectives. I try to avoid gory horror dramas. I am an R.N., so I have seen some awful wounds in real life, but it is different when it is in a movie because you can do nothing to help and it often seems to be for shock value.
I think my favorite horror stories are the Doctor Who episodes “Don’t Blink” and “Midnight” which have no gore at all.
Thank you for sharing your perspective. By doing so, you are counteracting the myth that “everybody else sees these movies but me”, and helping others to find similar friends. That will be more effective in discouraging people from watching violent movies than telling them that “media violence makes you more aggressive” and “media violence desensitizes you”. I don’t think those two statements work because most people don’t believe them, and for those that do, it makes media violence more appealing, because a lot of people wish they were more aggressive and/or not as easily rattled, and they see watching violent movies or playing violent games as gateways to becoming who they want to become.
We can also lower the demand for media violence by telling kids and parents that kids who get lower grades in school are more likely to be attracted to violent video games:
https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/do_bad_grades_violent_video_games_violent_kids
That’s because academic tasks such as reading, writing, math and science stimulate the left hemisphere of the brain, whereas television, movies, and a lot of video games stimulate the right hemisphere.
https://www.amle.org/educating-students-to-be-critical-of-violent-media/#:~:text=Since%20the%201990s%2C%20psychologists%20and,on%20behavior%20and%20academic%20performance.
Here’s another article on media violence and academic performance:
https://www.amle.org/educating-students-to-be-critical-of-violent-media/#:~:text=Since%20the%201990s%2C%20psychologists%20and,on%20behavior%20and%20academic%20performance.
And if schools publicized a list of all their students who make the honor roll every quarter instead of sweeping that information under the rug, that would not only counteract the myth that “everyone else is doing it”, it would also enable kids to avoid situations with negative peer pressure in the first place by picking smarter friends.
Thank you again for sharing this. Have a great day.
-I think we need to first be concerned about excessive violence being committed in our foreign and domestic policy (e.g., war crimes) before we worry about fictional depictions of it negatively influencing our children (we already have too many voices, including sometimes in the church, calling for more violence we don’t need or abetting it in the name of “they did what they had to do”).
-Those two articles are interesting. I wonder about other factors though, like, if the kids had just given up on their grades and did video games because of this, or if they were already violent and chose these games, or if their parents didn’t have time to work with them on schoolwork so the kids used video games more.
I have played games with not-so-realistic violence, such as Spider-man games and Horizon Zero Dawn as an adult. And when I was a kid played Super Smash Bros., Prince Caspian, and a plastic army man shooter game. For me, it doesn’t seem to make me more violent but I am a girl. I don’t actually own a game system, though, I’ve just used friends’ systems, so I haven’t spent as much time on it as a typical gamer.
One thing that was weird was when I borrowed a VR headset. When I remember the game, it feels like I was there in-person in my memories! Fortunately, you only fight dragons in that game, not humans, but it made the game much more personal. Also, they’d built it so you couldn’t fall down the cliffs, but you could accidentally walk on thin air and look down! I was barefoot so I could feel the solid floor, but it still felt bizarre. It is reasonable to think that violent video games might be internalized easier by some players, like in that story in the link about the guy who went target shooting immediately after playing a video game. He didn’t realize how it would affect him.
But it can also happen with books. When I was a teenager and first read The Lord of the Rings, I almost felt it was real and compared everything to LotR. And escapism can also happen if you go on a thrill ride at an amusement park. These things can also distract from grades too, but are generally fairly healthy.
-Thank you for your perspective, and for your invaluable work. My perspective on “shock media” is that if the person doesn’t find it shocking, or if the person merely finds it distasteful (“that’s not scary, that’s just gross!” ~ Angelica from Rugrats, a line I quote frequently), or if the material is overused (contrast “Baldur’s Gate III” developers Larian Studios’ infrequent and thus startling use of environmental gore in their previous game “Divinity: Original Sin II”) then it rapidly loses its gimmick appeal.
-I saw the first installment of the “Saw” franchise many years ago, and none of the sequels until now. I wouldn’t call myself a gore-hound, but I do enjoy good horror flicks, and “Saw X” has been getting rather good reviews. And seeing how the new “Exorcist” movie has been getting really horrid reviews, I decided to blow my Friday movie allowance on “Saw X.” You write, “Perhaps the first question we should ask ourselves is whether movies such as Saw make us better people … or worse.” My respose is: NEITHER. Horror movies aren’t supposed to make us better or worse. They are nothing more than a vicarious thrill. I’m one of the kindest, most caring people you’d ever meet, and horror and death in real life is bad enough. But movies like “Saw X” aren’t real life. That’s why the mechanism used against the baddies make us cringe and giggle at the same time