Hostel Part 2

[rerj73]

I am a fan of Eli Roth. I thought Cabin Fever was fun, and I thought Hostel was one of the best horror films in recent years, thanks to clever construction and an intensity that so many films lack. I only say that to illustrate the genuine disappointment I felt with Hostel Part 2.
All the things that made me love the first are notoriously absent.... the slow build, the clever misdirection and the balance of fun and horror. Instead, Roth delivers a film that never seems to find its own voice. The characters are far flatter in this incarnation, and their peril never resonates they way it did in the first film. There is an intriguing storyline involving two new customers to the murder for fun club, but even that thread quickly goes sour. For gore fans, there are definitely some cringeworthy moments, but the effects feel less horrible when the characters are this thin. If you can't see the ending coming... well, you're just not listening.
That being said, I was very disappointed in the turnout for this film. I like to think that we in the horror genre will support its artists and continue to get big-budget horror on the screen. Even if it's crap, and a lot of it most certainly is, it's important that the studios see that there is a large and rabid market for a horror film.

[thecrawlingchaos]

The whole thing with people ganging up on Eli Roth is getting a bit tiresome . But I'm not so sure supporting horror even if it's crap is a good idea. There's some folks who are going to put out sh*tty material that will sell to the horror fanbase and don't care about the quality of their films. And if they are successful they're going to keep doing the same thing, just like 'Day of the Dead 2' -making money off of Romero's name.
Funny thing is, I know people who loathed cabin fever who liked Hostel 2!

[rerj73]

I definitely agree that seeing some crap sequel like Creepshow 3, etc., isn't supporting our cause, but the larger films, such as Grindhouse and Hostel 2, are a different case I think. Now we're seeing those "Horror is Dead" headlines again, which only means that it goes underground until the next breakthrough film comes around like Blair Witch or Sixth Sense. I think that the genre we all love is a perfect example of the adage "voting with our dollars." If you want to see money put behind horror on the studio level, you have to support the genre films that are out there to do something different. I am definitely not advocating seeing I Will Always Know What You Did Last Summer, unless there is a prize for doing so.

[thecrawlingchaos]

I hear ya, the 90s was a pretty tough time for horror. Even though we had 'Dead Alive' and mainstream movies become much darker and more violent and edgy, it was a bad decade.

[schoffman23]

i hated Hostel. i really did. i thought it was nothing more than a bad plot with tits and blood. But honestly, Hostel 2 went beyond that and focused on the killers which made it all the more disturbing. it almost took a completelyldifferent approach. i hate defending Eli Roth cuz ill never forgive him for Cabin Fever, but this sequel was excellent in my opinion

[deadlover]

I agree.
Hostel couldn't take itself seriously, and that really bugged me. It felt like it had a decent enough idea, but it felt like Mr Roth didn't know if he wanted his audience to squirm or chuckle. The effectivness of violence depends so much on what surrounds it and Hostel...
well, it was kind of silly at times.
Part 2 however, was a vast improvement, and the entire time I watched it I just kept thinking, "Why didn't he just do this the first time?"
As far as torture movies go, I don't think that you can do much better than Audition.

[crusher310]

i second deadlover--there are much torture movies than hostel--audition for example but also michael haneke's films that are much subtler form of torture.