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Dan Owen reviews
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment As premiered on
danowen.blogspot.com
Unseen Edition: 
Dungeon Deluxe Edition:
Blu-Ray:
- Cert:
- Cat.no: CDR 40859
- Running time: 91 minutes
- Year: 2005
- Pressing: 2006
- Region(s): 2, PAL
- Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1
- Languages: English
- Subtitles: English
- Widescreen: 2.35:1
- 16:9-Enhanced: Yes
- Macrovision: Yes
- Disc Format: DVD 9
- Price: £19.99
- Extras:4 Audio commentaries, Hostel Dissected documentary, Kill The Car! Multi-anglemTrailers
Director:
- Eli Roth
Producers:
- Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner
Screenplay:
- Eli Roth
Music:
- Michael Giacchino
Cast:
- Paxton: Jay Hernandez
Josh: Derek Richardson
Oli: Eythor Gudjonsson
Natalya: Barbara Nedeljakova
The Dutch Businessman: Jan Vlasak
Svetlana: Jana Kaderabkova
Kana: Jennifer Lim
Yuki: Keiko Seiko
Alex: Lubomir Bukovy
Vala: Jana Havlickova
The American Client: Rick Hoffman
The German Surgeon: Petr Janis
Three hedonistic backpackers travel to Bratislava andbecome victims of a sinister international trade in human torture…
Writer-director Eli Roth has been quick to proclaim himself horror’ssaving grace — the Wes Craven for the ’00s. Roth’s confidence stems from thesuccess of his low-budget debut Cabin Fever, an effective throwback to’80s shlock. Since then, Roth has been taken under the wing of QuentinTarantino and snubbed post-Fever studio offers to get Hostel off the groundbased on a spec script.
Hostel is apparently based on an unsubstantiated Thai website,discovered by Harry Knowles ofAin’t It Cool News,that offered the chance to torture and kill people for $10,000. Roth supplantsthe idea to Eastern Europe and stretches this thin idea into a workablescript that’s laborious with set-up and snappy with the pay-off.
The movie begins in Amsterdam, where three backpackers, Hispanic Yank Paxton(Hernandez), shy aspiring writer Josh (Richardson) and Icelandic party animalOli (Gudjonsson), are busy frequenting ganja bars and the notorious Red LightDistrict. After getting locked out of their hostel, the trio are advised by aRussian samaritan to head for Bratislava, where all their sexual dreams willcome true.
Arriving in the crumbling Slovakian town (the tourist board must hate Roth),the friends find refuge in a hostel and are taken under the voluptuous wingsof sexy goodtime girls Natalya (Nedeljakova) and Svetlana (Kaderabkova). Itappears all their fantasies are indeed being fulfilled, but they’re unawarethe girls are being paid to deliver them to businessmen who want to tortureand kill for kicks.
Hostel desperately wants to be a gruelling and nightmarish benchmark insadistic horror cinema, but ultimately it fails to achieve these lofty aims.The idea is simple and should spark interest in audiences minds, but theexecution (no pun intended) is too haphazard to be effective…
The build up to the film’s raison d’etre is long, but nevertheless interestingand involving thanks to the lead actors’ chemistry. But after such a slow burnthe film’s torture sequences aren’t particularly worthwhile. As with allhorror, nothing can beat your imagination, so despite a few in-your-faceglimpses at drills in flesh and sliced ankles, it’s all more distasteful thanhorrific.
The first torture is the most successful, as the situation is so bewilderingand performed with relish by victim Richardson and torturor Jan Vlasak as acreepy Dutch Businessman.
By the time the film’s other tortures take place, the movie is beginning tolose its chilly mystique, but manages to work by focusing on survival andrevenge. Roth’s script isn’t very good, particularly in Act III when thenumber of contrivances for Hernandez to exact his escape and revenge is almostcomical. A scene where three villains neatly gather together just asking tobe run over is particularly unlikely, as is Vlasak’s eventual comeuppance.
Roth’s ability as a writer is definitely in question, but his directorialskills are much better. For the most part Roth knows how to build tension andhow often to show graphic shots. Hostel works best when events are left tothe imagination, best exemplified by decapitated head sitting on a table andsome mutilations done off-camera.
Eventually, Roth gives in and shows a burned-out eyeball and chain sawdismemberment, but for the most part the balance between seen and unseen isgood. Of course, those actually hoping for an orgy of no-holds-barred violencewill be disappointed.
The subtext to the film isn’t too bad: the fact three horny college kids spendtheir vacation treating women as sex objects, only to become objectifiedthemselves as meat to be slaughtered, isn’t too shabby. But Hostel doesn’tdo anything within its genre to become anything more than a gory oddity. Thebest thing about the film is its ugly premise, but while Roth occassionallyhits the right note and delivers some chills, it’s all a bit underwhelming,disappointing and very contrived.
Only three sequences are worth your time: the first torture scene because ofits performances and directorial skill, a moment when Herndandez pleads forhis life in a German torturor’s native tongue and a brash US businessmandebating how best to kill his victim.
The rest? Entertaining but forgettable nonsense that struggles to achieve theshock-horror verve of Japanese director Takashi Miike (who even cameos), butprovides enough tits, blood and violence to please horror fans for theshort-term. Also nice to spot the injokes: Pulp Fiction on TV as homage toproducer Tarantino, while a sex scene takes place to the song “How Do” fromThe Wicker Man, Room 237 from The Shining appears, and the search fororange-jacketed Oli reminds of a similar pursuit for Don’t Look Now‘sred-coated ghost…
Eli Roth may think he’s the saviour of horror cinema, but he’s not on theevidence of this. The fact he’s already stuck filming an unnecessary sequelseems to prove this…
This Unseen Edition contains 27 seconds of extra “eye goo” which is disappointingfor those expecting a more gruelling DVD experience than in the theatre, butthere you go.
The 2.35:1 widescreen image is very good, with crisp exterior daylight scenesand smooth blacks.
The Dolby Digital 5.1 mix is effective, particularly when people or vehiclesmake noises from the rear speakers. There’s plenty of opportunity foratmospheric screams, rattling and water dripping, and it all helps to placeyou in the film’s nihilistic mindspace. English and French subtitles.
The extras are as follows:
- Commentary Track 1: Director Eli Roth is joined by executive producer Quentin Tarantino, BozaYakin and Scott Spiegel. Great fun, as you’d expect with movie-junkieTarantino’s involvement.
- Commentary Track 2: Eli Roth is joined by actors Barbara Nedeljakova and Eyethor Gudjonsson,editor George Folsey Jr and web critic Harry Knowles. This is a patchworktrack, with commentators dropping in for short intervals, sometimes via phone.Roth does well interviewing his colleagues.
- Commentary Track 3: Roth is joined by producer Chris Briggs and documentarian brother GabrielRoth. A more relaxed commentary that focuses on production. Good stuff.
- Commentary Track 4: Roth’s own commentary that gives advice to aspiring filmmakers, anecdotes,pre-production inspirations and other goodness. Despite being the fouthyack-track, it’s amazing to find Roth still has things to talk about!
- Hostel Dissected Documentary: An excellent feature split into three parts, recounting the making of thefilm in Prague — full of special effects, interviews and a cheeky vibethroughout.
- Kill The Car! Multi-Angle: A strange extra that allows you to watch a gang of Czech kids destroy a car,from three alternative angles. Okay, but pointless.
Rounding out the disc are theatrical trailers for When A Stranger Calls,Silent Hill, The Cave, Underworld: Evolution, The Exorcism Of Emily Rose,Boogeyman, The Fog and Ring Around The Rosie.
A great disc for filmmakers interested in horror, primarily via theentertaining commentary tracks and the documentary. For everyone else, a soliddisc that should provide some additional entertainment. Most importantly, thevideo and audio transfer is excellent. Recommended.
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.