I saw Saw 3

Live or die, make your choice.

I always think that you can enjoy a movie more with friends than on your own. So when six of us piled into the cinema to watch the 3rd installment of one of the most profitable horror stories ever, I knew I was onto a winner. My only concern was that we were the only people in the theatre, apart from one guy on his own, which gave us all the creeps. Was he making notes??

When the original "Saw" movie was released, it was a breath of fresh air. No gimmicks, no horror cliche's and certainly not a happy end in sight. "Saw 2" was slightly more formulaic, a group of thoroughly dislikeable people trapped in a house with slim chance of survival.

"Saw 3" is more thoughtful, with a couple of nasty surprises thrown in as well as the customary gruesome traps. It's just as bloodthirsty as it's predecessors, but this time the bar is set as "excruciating pain". To give too much of the plot away would be criminal. Suffice to say that two people are put through separate versions of hell in the hope that they come out of the ordeal with at least some of their limbs intact.

Shawnee Smith is particularly psychotic as Jigaw's unbalanced apprentice and Scottish actor Angus Macfadyen is excellent as the main "contestant" who is offerred the chance to claim his life back.

On any number of occasions, the grotesque torture sequences had us all squirming in our seats, hands partially in front of our faces, with the occasional outbursts of "noooooo!!". We had read that some cinema-goers had fainted during previous screenings of this film, and we could understand why particularly when one unfortunate "contestant" was put on the rack. And there were plenty of twists along the way to keep us on our toes.

It's horrific, it's disgusting, it's downright wrong. But its brilliant.