Adam (Leigh Whannell) wakes up in a dank room across from Dr. Lawrence Gordon (Cary Elwes) and the body of a guy who has blown his own brains out. Not a happy place, obviously, and it gets worse when both men realize that they've been chained and pitted against one another by an unseen but apparently omniscient maniac who's screwing with their psyches as payment for past sins. Director James Wan, who concocted this grimy distraction with screenwriter Whannell, has seen Seven and any number of other arty existential-psycho-cat-and-mouse thrillers, so he's provided Saw with a little flash, a little blood, and a lot of ways to distract you from the fact that it doesn't make a whole hell of a lot of sense. Wan and Whannell (who's not the most accomplished actor, either) pile on the plot twists, which after some initially novel ideas become increasingly juvenile. Elwes works hard but looks embarrassed, and the estimable Danny Glover suffers as the obsessed detective on the case. The denouement will probably surprise you, but it won't get you back the previous 98 minutes.--Steve Wiecking

This is where it all began! Adam and Dr. Gordon wake up in a dirty, filthy bathroom with a dead body in the middle. They hear a tape that tells Dr. Gordon to kill Adam by 6:00 a.m., or his wife and daughter will die. Throughout the time in the room, we see flashbacks of Jigsaw's other games, and why Adam and Gordon are in the room. If you love horror, and twists, you'll love SAW!!!

"Saw" is a badly acted movie with spotty writing and odd direction. The characters aren't believable and the twist at the end is even more unbelievable. Nothing rings true, unless you like gore for gore's sake.

This is not a horror movie in my opinion. It's simply a horror.

I just finished watching Saw and thought it was a great movie. maybe I need to watch it a second time, but my question is are we to assume Dr. Gordon was killed by saw and Adam never rescued?

Well, for starters I can say it is one of the best franchises ever, not only because the "killer" has a real good motive for "killing" people, and it isn't like most of the genres were the killer is "just insane" and does it just for "fun"...also, no matter how well you think you have figured out the genre you will have a lot of surprises in all the movies of SAW, for me its simply one of the best movies ever and if you have a chance to see the other ones you wont get disappointed, but I have to say that they are more of the "gore genre" than the scary genre... never the less still a great movie franchise. I highly recommend them.

It is not exactly true that James Wan et Leigh Whannell have written Saw. They should have mention that they "borrowed" a lot from The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971) written by James Whiton et William Goldstein. You will find less blood in the Phibes movies, but a lot more humour (with Robert "the avengers" Fuest as the director, and Vincent Price as the sadistic killer).
Fans of Saw, if you want to know the real origin of this story, watch "The Abominable Dr. Phibes" (1971) and Dr. Phibes Rises Again! (1972).