SAW (2004). The strength of a joke lies in its delivery; so does that of a one-joke movie. Highly praised by the oxygen-deprived audiences at Sundance, Saw begins with a diabolical set-up. Two strangers (Leigh Whannell and Cary Elwes) wake up in a disgusting lavatory chained to pipes. Between them is a gruesome corpse, and scattered about are assorted clues and other items. If they piece -- or unpiece, as the situation calls for (among the available objects are a pair of hacksaws) -- things together in time, they just might escape the doom orchestrated for them by an unknown and apparently omnipotent tormentor. Sounds like a metaphor for life, but first-time director James Wan instead makes it into what looks like a student filmmaker's cocky, sloppy homage to Seven, itself an overrated exercise in pretentious pulp. Maybe if the acting were less hysterical (even Danny Glover as a driven and perhaps demented detective is embarrassing), the characters and their fates might arouse emotions other than repugnance and indifference. Saw's punch line is clever, unexpected, and irrelevant; the joke is on anyone who still cares. (100m)

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