Media Credit: Photo courtesy of movieweb.com and Lionsgate That's what the television commercials said for Eli Roth's latest gore-fest Hostel: Part II. That doesn't mean that all the decapitation and castration will force you to leave your seat or cover your face.
It just means Eli Roth really likes what he does and this summer's bloodiest movie proves it. The film begins with Jay Hernandez's character from the last film hiding in Europe, but he is quickly done away with in a largely unimportant first five minutes of the film. In Part: II the audience is told the story from both sides.
It follows three girls much like the three guys from the last film who are in Europe and having possibly too good of a time. A good chunk of the story is also told from the perspective of the people who are a part of this organization that abducts and kills tourists beginning with a very unexpected, very entertaining auction montage. It is in telling the story of two American businessmen played by Richard Burgi and Roger Bart (one overzealous, one skeptical respectively) who enter into this pact or brotherhood where the film really shines.
Some of the most powerful scenes are just conversations between them and completely sans gore. But that's not to say that the entire film is sans gore and that's not to say that the gore doesn't work because it does. Eli Roth is great at it.
He's taken his cues from classic torture flicks like Texas Chainsaw Massacre and it is his love for the genre that makes him pretty good at what he does. The "It's only a movie" line is taken directly from old grindhouse gore fests where Roth sowed his wild oats. He's seen the worst of the worst when it comes to killings and blood and he has a way of rationalizing some of the most sickening scenes I've ever seen on film and for that, he is an excellent horror director.
The writing is where he has problems. The choices the characters make based on their motivations and what happens to them in the movie doesn't make that much sense. Only one of the girls in the film are likeable and the ending is a little anti-climactic, but be honest folks, in Hostel: Part II people are looking for gallons of blood and armfuls of boobs, not engaging character arcs and plot twists.
Is that an excuse for sophomoric writing and uninteresting characters? No. But this film shows promise for the future.
Eli Roth is a pretty good horror director. He has a feel for where the genre is going and he is going to take it there. He won't do it alone though.
All of Roth's movies have been written by him and directed by him. Next up he has an adaptation of Stephen King's Cell, an amazing new take on zombies. I can't wait to see what Roth can do when he has one of America's best storytellers hand him one of the best zombie narratives since the original Dawn of the Dead.
With really powerful story in his hands Roth might have the chops to pull off a Romero-style masterpiece. Hostel: Part II is entertaining, but not great. Roth's next film, however, will blow people away and break new ground for horror and breathe life into a dying, stale genre.
Media Credit: Photo courtesy of movieweb.
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