Saw X editor’s neighbours called the police when they heard him working on eye trap scene

Gruesome new horror sequel sees the return of John Kramer, the Jigsaw killer

Saw X director Kevin Greutert has revealed that his editor was confronted by police after his neighbours heard him working on the gruesome horror.

The latest entry in the long-running horror franchise was released on Friday (29 September), witnessing the return of original star Tobin Bell, who plays John Kramer, the Jigsaw killer who tests his victims’s desire to live by placing them in terrifying contraptions.

In a new interview with NME, Greutert said that First Assistant Editor Steve Forn was working on a grisly scene involving an “eye vacuum trap” at his office in North Hollywood, Los Angeles, when the police arrived.

“There was a knock at the door,” Greutert said. “We have the doorbell [camera] video of the police walking up, [Forn answering the door] and the police saying, ‘The neighbours [have been] calling and saying someone’s being tortured to death in here.’ And he was like, ‘Actually, I’m just working on a movie… You can come in and see it if you want?’”

“The cops started laughing!” the director, who has helmed three Saw movies, continued. “They said, ‘We want to but, you know, you’re all right.’ It must have been a pretty realistic performance! It’s a pretty funny story…Plus Steve is such a mild-mannered guy. I can only imagine the look on his face when he realized what was happening!”

The events of Saw X are set between the first and second Saw instalments, showcasing a previously unseen chapter in Kramer’s life as he travels to Mexico to receive non-FDA-approved treatment to cure himself of his terminal cancer.

‘Saw X’ (Alexandro Bolaños Escamilla/Lionsgate)

After 75 reviews on aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes, Saw X has a score of 87 per cent. This is 37 per cent higher than the second best-reviewed Saw film, which is the first instalment from 2004.

The James Wan-directed original earned $103.9m (£84.9m) from a budget of just $1m (£817m), spawning eight sequels (and one spin-off, 2021’s Spiral: From the Book of Saw).

In The Independent’s review of Saw X, critic Clarisse Loughrey said: “Ten films in and it’s a routine we’re so intimately familiar with that it’d be hard to call any element of Saw X original but returning director Kevin Greutert knows what’ll satisfy his audience: a few buckets of blood and the gag-inducing sound of crunching bone. Here, they’ll get exactly what they want.”

Saw X is in cinemas now.