Hostel Movie Review (Hollywood excrimate alert)

Boston.com ^ | 1/06/05 | Wesley Morris

[teddyballgame]

Folks who live for the pull and snap of live flesh will have their share of sequences to cheer for in "Hostel," the new horror flick about two American backpackers who wind up snared in a wild Slovakian torture ring.

Written and directed by Eli Roth ("Cabin Fever"), the movie tells one of those nightmare-abroad tales, like "An American Werewolf in London" or "Eurotrip." Jocky and horny Paxton (Jay Hernandez) and bookish and virginal Josh (Derek Richardson) show up in Amsterdam and promptly hit the bong and cruise the nightclubs. They befriend an Icelander named Oli (Eythor Gudjonsson), insult the locals, get in fights, find hookers, and carry on with boorish joie de vivre.

[TheBigB]

Sure, it sounds like it. I know I have no interest in seeing it myself.

Of course, we won't be able to determine if it "stands the test of time" for a few years to come, will we? ;)

[StayAt HomeMother]

This review seems to reveal as much about its author as it does about the movie.

The subtitle of this review is “Horror flick 'Hostel' is not horrifying enough.”

The author states that early in the movie “Intolerant and bullying, Paxton causes most of the trouble, and the movie indulges his chauvinism and casual homophobia.” The review ends, “The trouble is that in Paxton we have a hero we don't like. … Part of you is rooting for this cocky American to lose more than a finger.”

[Recon Dad]

After seeing the previews for this film I would hope it would become a staple with our interrogators. At the beginning of an interrogation show this to whom you're interrogating and tell them if you don't cooperate we're sending you to the "Hostel" for further questioning.

I'd be singing like a baby!

[socal_parrot]

I will not go see this movie, having to see the torture scenes in the commercials is gross enough.

[Zechariah11]

A quick wit!

[popdonnelly]

"America has been clamoring for movies about "wild Slovakian torture rings"."

Another example of how the popular culture continues to sink. I've never understood the attraction of weird, sadistic and violent movies.

I'm sure we'll never see a movie about a wild Muslim torture ring.

[JamesP81]

I do remember, but somehow I can take war movies, "monster", movies, ect, but have never tolerated slasher films.

I don't get scared, just sick.

I think it's because those movies appeal to a depraved mind. The violence in Hostel or Kill Bill is its own end, and such movies darken the mind with despair, revulsion, anger, and fear. Movies like Saving Private Ryan, The Passion, We Were Soldiers, etc, these movies are horrifying in their violence but it's for a reason: those movies depict people who endure such awful things willingly, so others don't have to. It sets a completely different tone and sends a totally different message.

Kill Bill sends the message that you should take revenge and that violence and killing is cool or fun. The message Tom Hanks sent with Saving Private Ryan was essentially this: Greater love has no man than this, that a man gives up his life for his friends. These are the very words of Jesus Christ. It's completely different from these depraved movies.

[orionblamblam]

[HairOfTheDog]

Whatever happened to wholesome, family pictures? It seems the movie industry keeps going further and further into the gutter.

Good films are still being made. I bring you Narnia, Lord of the Rings, even Harry Potter and many of the Disney films.

Horror films aren't new. Both ends of the spectrum have always, and will always, exist.

How full is the glass?

[JZelle]

"I read somewhere that people were fainting at this screening."


People faint for different reasons, I fainted while watching "Herbie, Fully Loaded" ;)

[who knows what evil?]

I think it's because those movies appeal to a depraved mind.

...and there are plenty of them out there. Weep for America.

[subterfuge]

And Hollywood continues to navel-gaze and ask why people are not paying to see their offerings

Good point, but I think hollywierd is gazing just a little lower.

[Ro_Thunder]

Frankly, I don't think the ads on TV for it are very good, and really do show too much. I have a 4 year old, and when she looks at me and asks if that's a puddle of blood that man slipped in - it's gotten to be too much. I want to saw I saw this on either Disney, or Nick, or ABC Family, something like that - it's about the only channels we watch together as a family.

[Borges]

When Hammer Studios released their takes on Dracula and Frankenstein in the mid to late 1950s (the ones with christopher Lee) they advertised them with the same 'Just try not to faint!' tag line. Those films were regarded as quite graphic at the time.

[L98Fiero]

"Kill Bill sends the message that you should take revenge and that violence and killing is cool or fun."

I didn't get that at all. I didn't really get any message.

"Kill Bill" was just Japanese anime put to live action. C'mon, who really believes that when someone's arm is cut off with a sword, blood sprays out like a garden hose with the nozzle opened half-way. That's what Kill Bill was. Cleanly chopped off limbs with very obvious fake blood spraying like a loose fire hose. Mony Python's Holy Grail, anyone?

[processing please hold]

Does it have shades of a snuff film?

[ansel12]

As the warrior pool in America shrinks, the interest in violent fantasy diversions seems to increase.

[processing please hold]

"The Exorcist"

I left the walk-in with my little girl during that movie(who's a grown woman now) It freaked me out. Haven't watched it all.

[napscoordinator]

I agree. This one won't be a hit. I know that we make predictions here and sometimes were wrong, but I really believe this will not get the attention of some like Brokeback Mountain, Geisha, etc. to help the bottom line.