Posted in: Interview, Lionsgate, Movies | Tagged: interview, lionsgate, saw x
Saw X producers Mark Burg and Oren Koules have revealed how they go about listening to the fans, and it includes lurking on all of your Reddit threads.
The people behind Saw X have been pretty open about this movie being made for the fans. Often, that is a giant red flag because fans don’t usually know what they want. However, it sounds like the team behind Saw X is doing things a little differently. They are more than ten movies into a franchise that no one thought would last this long or have a fanbase this rabid. There have been plenty of other films that have tried to replicate what Saw has and failed. While attending the junket for Saw X, we got the chance to ask longtime producers Mark Burg and Oren Koules why they think Saw has succeeded where others have failed.
“I think we spend an inordinate amount of time working on the scripts and coming up with a story that we think our audience, and any audience, will want to find out what happens in the beginning and stick around for 90 minutes, two hours to find out how it ends and what happens,” Burg explained.
The Saw Producers Are Lurking On Reddit
Koules, however, had a different thought to the whole thing. He believed that it was because so many team members have stayed the same since the franchise’s beginning to Saw X, and the other is that they listen to the fanbase, making them far braver than most people.
“I also think there are two other reasons,” Koules explained. One is it’s [director] Kevin Greutert, [executive producer] Dan Heffner, us, [digital compositor: Switch VFX] Jason Kozsurek, who have been here since the first day of shooting, so it’s the consistency of the same team. And Charlie Clouser does our music. So we’ve had the same people that have done the movies for 20 years. The other thing is, I know this sounds super corny, but we actually respect our fans and try to look at it from their point of view. And we listen to them. We read Reddit, we’ve done studies, NRG has done things, and so we listen. So we’re like, Hey, if everyone hates X (not the movie) a person, we’re probably not going to keep using the same person and things like that. But we literally read all the Reddit threads.
You read that right; if you’re posting on the fan Reddit threads for Saw, the producers and other team members might be lurking and reading your posts. It was from that information that they were able to figure out precisely what the audience and what the audience wanted was John Kramer and Amanda Young, specifically. That meant going back in the timeline despite this film being called Saw X.
“This story in particular, the audience wanted Tobin Bell [as John Kramer], and they wanted Shawnee Smith [as Amanda Young], and they wanted Tobin Bell carrying the story,” Burg explained. “We came up with an idea that Tobin Bell’s probably in this movie more in sight than he’s been in the last five movies combined. He drives this story, and he’s so good. Thinking of making a Saw movie without him just won’t happen.”
“He was magnetic on screen,” I tell them, and you can see how much they both agree with that sentiment. “So we open the movie with him as John Kramer,” Koules continued. “Most people see him in most of the movies as Jigsaw. So, seeing him as a human trying to extend his life, no different than any of us would do. His doctor tells him how long he has to live, and he’s trying to do an experimental process to try to extend his life. All of us would try it.”
Be on the lookout for more of our interviews with Saw X producers Mark Burg and Oren Koules coming soon.
Saw X: Summary, Cast List, Release Date
John Kramer (Tobin Bell) is back. The most chilling installment of the SAW franchise yet explores the untold chapter of Jigsaw’s personal game. Set between the events of SAW I and II, a sick and desperate John travels to Mexico for a risky and experimental medical procedure in hopes of a miracle cure for his cancer – only to discover the entire operation is a scam to defraud the most vulnerable. Armed with a newfound purpose, John returns to his work, turning the tables on the con artists in his signature visceral way through a series of ingenious and terrifying traps.
Saw X, directed by Kevin Greutert, stars Tobin Bell, Shawnee Smith, Synnøve Macody Lund, Steven Brand, Renata Vaca, Michael Beach, Octavio Hinojosa, Paulette Hernández, and Joshua Okamoto. It will be released on September 29th.
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