You can sleep through the first act, but after that you may never sleep again

Rating: 6/10 (11 October 2005)

(Note: my comments refer to the unfinished version of the movie. I've seen the final cut, and a bit of careful editing has resolved most of my issues.)
I saw this movie at the Toronto Film Festival this year, and I have only a few things to say that you can't get from the other comments and reviews: Drink a Red Bull for the first third of the movie, because it is BORING. All the character build-up stuff, all the development of the so-called plot, all the set-up as the characters travel across Europe to Slovakia... snore. The actors are decent, but the characters are just so two-dimensional and uninteresting that all the life injected into their performances is wasted. Worse yet, you aren't going to this movie to see interesting and deep characters, which makes the first 25 minutes of the movie even more wasteful.
But... when they get to their destination and strange things start occurring... well! Eli Roth is not much of a writer, but as a director and creator of gruesome and terrible things, he shines. The villains are evil, the "heroes" are disturbing, and the climax and denouement, such as it was, left everyone in the theatre shocked, aghast, and cheering.
Overall I give it 4/5 for style, and 2/5 for substance, resulting in my 6 overall score.