But in a conference speech yesterday, Michael Burns, the Vice-Chairman of Lion's Gate dispelled any fantasies we may have had that the torture quotient in our multiplexes would be lowered any time soon, saying Saw is here to stay, and while they are at it, that Lion's Gate has no intention of abandoning it's campaign to destroy entertainment. Burns told the , there will be a Saw 7 and that the Tyler Perry machine will continue assaulting comedy until the end of time.

The Hollywood Reporter quotes Burns speaking slyly of Saw's status:

Despite a disappointing performance by Saw VI, which Burns attributed to getting "buzz-sawed" at the boxoffice by Paranormal Activity, he said it was full steam ahead on the seventh installment, which will be in 3D.

"As long as we make money on it we'll keep doing this," he said, pointing out that such franchises tend to have a long shelf life across different platforms. Dirty Dancing, he pointed out, still sells 2,000 DVDs a day for the company, and that's after 20 years.

We have to hand it to Lions Gate, the unholy alliance of torture porn and the most-useless, money-extorting innovation of the past decade — 3D — might just be the giant leap forward we've been waiting for to crush audience's desire for creativity and life once and for all, after which, there would be nothing to stand in the way of a thousand reign of Saw films.

Burns also vowed that Tyler Perry's crusade to erase the last vestiges of comedy from the cinema would continue until the last comic standing, referring to Perry as a machine and taunting the assembled media savants with the threat of new Madea insallments.

Burns however, cleared up confusion about Perry's legal status, confirming he still enjoys the full freedom due an American citizen. "He's not an indentured servant," Burns explained, confirming that Perry enjoys the freedom to pursue non-Lion projects.

• Across showbiz, executives are being shuttled to emergency power retreats. With the collapse of the Saw franchise, studio chieftains are ordering the rule book shredded, the box torn up and thrown into the dumpster while development teams embark on vision quests to imagineer an industry not based on Saw sequels. First order of business: order up some Paranormal Activity sequels. While Saw raked in a mere $14 million this weekend, the still expanding Paranormal stole the top slot from the venerable horror stalwart, earning $22 million and bringing its total to $62.5 million, putting it safely in that rarefied Blair Witch category of no-budget movies that went on to make amounts impressive even by Hollywood standards. [Box Office Mojo]

• Elsewhere in the weekend results, the alternately heralded and reviled Where the Wild Things Are dropped off "an alarming 56 percent" from last weekend's grosses. [Box Office Mojo]

• Sunday Night Football retains its slot as the most expensive real estate currently on television according to an Ad Age survey of ad rates "with a 30-second ad commanding an average of $339,700," American Idol, which is off the air until January regularly tops Football however, with an ad rate between $360,000 and $490,000 for 30 seconds of its airtime. Scripted shows can still bring in big bucks however, with Grey's Anatomy charging $240,462. On the other end of the spectrum, The Jay Leno show is the cheapest real estate to be had, with "an average cost between $48,803 and $65,678." [Ad Age]

• Bravo has ordered another spin-off of its Top Chef hit. Just Desserts, will feature a battle of the pastry chefs. "Their Achilles heel is usually the desserts" said Bravo's VP of the Top Chef flagship competitors. Variety notes however that TC:JD enters a crowded television dessert category, already packed with Ace of Cakes, Cake Boss and Ultimate Cake-Off to name a few. [Variety]

• Completing the Discovery's transition from quaint host of nature shows to extreme programmer, the network has announced plans to turn two of its shows, Deadliest Catch and Man vs. Wild into video games. [Hollywood Reporter]

• Micheal Eisner isn't giving up on his straight-to-web production dreams. The former Disney boss signed a deal Canadian Rogers Communications to fund up to 30 new internet series. [Variety]

• The Wrap reports on the flight not just of production, but of post-production houses overseas. [The Wrap]

• In a pairing sure to launch a thousand Stuff covers, January Jones and Diana Kruger have announced they will team up to make a thriller Unknown White Male for Dark Castle films [Variety]

1. Saw IV - $32.11 million
For a third consecutive Halloween weekend, Lions Gate's strategy of supplying teenage ticket-buyers with a fresh installment of the Saw franchise at the precise moment when their hunger to be delivered an unimaginative, gore-drenched horror sequel is at its natural peak has paid off, bringing the studio yet another easy, late-October box office win.

While LG's inevitable success with this fourth chapter already has them promising that Saw V will hit theaters a year from now, we fear they're thinking way too small. They should be testing their devoted audience's seemingly insatiable appetite for their product by announcing that they'll simultaneously release three new sequels next Halloween, unveiling an early mock-up of the one-sheet depicting villain Jigsaw trying to force-feed a trio of his blood-splattered, edged torture implements into the gaping maw of a victim chained to a theater seat.

2. Dan in Real Life - $12.081 million
Not even Hollywood's Second Most Likable Star (first place, of course, belongs to disarmingly cherubic killer spy Matt Damon) stood a chance against Saw, although Disney did do decent business giving parents a place to kill a couple of hours while their kids were busy being further desensitized to graphic violence on the other side of the multiplex.

3. 30 Days of Night - $6.7 million
Credit Sony for being smart enough to get their vampire movie into theaters a week before Lions Gate's buzzsaw tore through theaters, allowing Josh Hartnett his fleeting moment at the top of the box office.

4. The Game Plan - $6.257 million

5. Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married? - $5.74 million
After seeing the ads for Will Smith's I Am Legend that seemed to appear during every commercial break this weekend, the management team for Hollywood's stealth superstar is actively developing Tyler Perry's Why Am I The Last Man on Earth?, a lighthearted, family-friendly look at how humanity's sole survivor comes to grips with discovering that his millions of his once incredibly loyal, church-going fans have been turned into homicidal zombies by a mysterious virus.

• Weekend Box Office October 26-28, 2007 [Box Office Mojo]

1. Saw III—$34.3 million
Using the paradigm-redefining, so-far-out-of-the-box-that-the-box-seems-to-have-never-existed strategy of releasing a horror movie at a time when males under 25 years old are most likely to soak themselves in fake blood and seek out similarly gore-drenched entertainments, Lionsgate and the Saw team have dominated a second consecutive Halloween weekend. The studio is optimistic that they can maintain their streak through the October 26, 2012 opening of the ninth installment of the franchise, a project temporarily (and, in our opinion, rather cynically) identified in their development department as Saw IX: These Idiots May Never Stop Giving Us Their Money.

2. The Departed—$9.84 million
With over $91 million in tickets sold in just four weeks of release, The Departed is almost guaranteed to pass The Aviator as the highest grossing film of Martin Scorsese's career, a clear message from the public that they'd rather watch him direct Leonardo DiCaprio as a conflicted undercover cop than as a womanzing billionaire who urinates into milk bottles.

3. The Prestige—$9.626 million
Notoriously dedicated actor Christian Bale is having some trouble leaving behind his ultra-competitive character from The Prestige; he's quietly pledged to confidants that he will put his acting career on hold, spending the next five years of his life concocting elaborate disguises which will enable him to fool Hugh Jackman's security personnel long enough to disrupt every performance in his hated rival's musical theater career.

4. Flags of Our Fathers—$6.35 million
It's been noted that Clint Eastwood's last two movies, Mystic River and Million Dollar Baby, opened weakly but had enough staying power to hang around until awards season success helped push the films into profitability; this glimmer of hope is what will keep Paramount executives from drinking themselves to death upon seeing Flags of Our Fathers' box office numbers each weekend between now and when this year's Oscar nominations are announced.

12. Catch a Fire—$2.012 million
We often don't give moviegoers enough credit for being informed consumers; clearly, they saw through last week's misguided wildfire tie-in campaign and avoided Catch a Fire because of its deceptive contextual advertising practices.

• October 27-29, 2006 Studio Estimates [Box Office Mojo]

Gregg Hoffman, producer of the recent hit film "Saw II," died early Sunday at Hollywood Presbyterian Hospital, where he had been admitted overnight after complaining of neck pain, his business partners said. He was 42.

Hoffman died of natural causes, according to a news release issued Monday from Lions Gate Entertainment, which distributed Hoffman's recent films. An autopsy is pending. [...]

"He never put himself in front of anybody," said Oren Koules, one of Hoffman's partners at Twisted Pictures. "He never did anything for the ego — everything he did was for the betterment of the movie."

Added partner Mark Burg: "He was one of this town's good guys."

• Gregg Hoffman, 42; Producer of Horror Films 'Saw,' 'Saw II' [LAT]
• Previously: “Saw” Producers Temper Success With Humility [Defamer]

Today, "Saw" has grossed more than $102 million worldwide, and its sequel, "Saw II," has pulled in $75 million at the box office in less than three weeks. And because they retained the rights to the franchise, Twisted Pictures founders Mark Burg, Oren Koules and Gregg Hoffman have become very rich. Just ask them.

"The best deal we made wasn't financing the movie, it was not selling the movie," Koules said last week as he sprawled in a sagging leather chair at the production and management company's offices in Hollywood. "We make more money than anyone you'll ever interview."

The producer then paused thoughtfully, struck a match, and lit a stack of hundred dollar bills on fire before continuing, "I used to wipe myself with these, but found them too scratchy. And who's gonna see me do it, you know? The platinum bathroom attendant robot doesn't care what I do. But hundreds do smell really nice when they burn. What were we talking about? Oh, I was just going to tell you how every movie we ever make will gross at least fifteen billion dollars. It's a lock. Write that down."

• Taking Risk on 'Saw' Gives Firm's Executives a Big Cut [LAT]