Alternate Best Actor 2004: Leigh Whannell in Saw

 Leigh Whannell did not receive an Oscar nomination for portraying Adam in Saw. 

Saw is the film that started it all, although this film is a semi-mystery thriller element with only relatively tame gore compared to what the films would become infamous for. 

Leigh Whannell is the name you more likely know as the writer/director of Upgrade and The Invisible Man remake, who started out as a writer with this film, while James Wan directed this film. Whannell is technically one of the lead actors of the film, as we open with two men finding themselves chained separately in a dank room with various clues speaking to their circumstances. The other being one Dr. Lawrence Gordon (Cary Elwes with his most unconvincing American accent since Hot Shots!). Whannell takes on the role of a few upcoming writers or directors who star in their own films, sometimes this works, and sometimes there’s a reason the individual became better known for his behind the scenes work. With Whannell it is the latter. And honestly it is rare to be able to take on a performance that honestly comes across more High School level than film level at any point. Whannell tries hard, very hard as we open up in his scene of disorientation in the area and fear. The problem is the effort is more noticeable than the emotion. Whannell is effortful in every bit of dialogue he speaks. There is the raging attempt at portraying anxiety of the situation but it comes across as more awkward than effective. His expressions are either the emotion in the most thin terms of it, or very flat. This is most evident when Elwes is speaking, where Whannell could do much more in terms of alluding towards the truths of his character, craft a bit of internal life as he’s listening to this other man, but instead his performance is very flat as he struggles to do nothing. 

As the film unwinds we find out that the two men are in a trap designed by an infamous serial killer who designs puzzles for their victims, victims he chooses as people not appreciating their life enough. The two men find out they’ll need to play his game to escape, as they have a hacksaw that is only good for their legs, and he wants to pit the two men against each other in their predicament. Where the plot thickens is that the men are connected more so than either thought, as Adam is a photographer who took pictures of Dr. Gordon was cheating on his wife, meanwhile Gordon himself was mistaken as possibly the killer by two extremely incompetent police detectives. These two get interconnected as Adam was hired by one of the two idiot detectives to spy on Gordon, giving a more direct reason of hatred. A revelation that isn’t performed particularly well by Whannell, who again tries to play it kind of casual of the man having a bit of an ego about his private detective abilities and a brief superiority over Gordon. Again though it comes across as trying hard, but not as a man posturing, but rather an actor who can’t quite hit the note he’s looking for. 

The two do try to trick the game including a standout, in that it stands out as being extra bad, of Adam pretending to die from poison which pretty much looks like when Bugs Bunny pretends to be dying in a given battle with Elmer Fudd. One could counter my argument to say that Adam is supposed to be a bad actor so Whannell played it properly by being bad, but eh, that might hold more water if the rest of his performance was on point, or even more so if the immediate scene afterwards he does some non-fake (in movie reality) acting as Adam is electrocuted to show the obviousness of the ruse. The electrocuted acting is very similar to say when Homer Simpson is electro shocked, so still very cartoonish. The one bit of credit I can give him is towards the end of the film when all is revealed, his portrayal of his character’s physical pain and eventual complete panic stricken fear is decent. Not great, but at least somewhat believable, however this only stands out because before this point his work is far less than believable. There are worse performances than this one, but this isn’t a particularly good one. Though I’ll note that James Wan doesn’t necessarily seem to get great performances from his actors, as even the more seasoned Elwes sometimes struggle here, though maybe the comically bad “pale losing blood” makeup on him at a certain point didn’t help matters. Whannell could be worse but he’s not good here, and found his place appropriately as a decently talented writer/director.