It's So Much Worse Than It's Trying To Be.

Rating: 1/10 (8 February 2012)

I don't want to spend too much of my time or energy on this review because this terrible movie doesn't deserve even the 24 words I've already typed. Slasher films historically were low budget, inconsequential forgettable nonsense that Hollywood depended upon to bring in just enough teenage cash to cover their costs and maybe help finance another more creative, worthy endeavor. But Hostel actually aspires to something more. It actually has lofty ideals, and it sincerely strives to be profound. It wants to be taken seriously. And that's the sickest, most depraved aspect of a film that has no moral or ethical qualms about plunging to the lowest depths of depravity in its quest to shock the most unshockable, desensitized, deadened generation of film goers ever. Director Eli Roth has exquisitely exploited the most modern technological cinematic methods in crafting his damaged, deranged Frankenstein of a film. It barely lives in any human sense. It lurches and lumbers like a lobotomized linebacker, slowly and deliberately strangling the life out any sentient being in its path. By the last half hour I felt so ashamed and so disgusted to be in the same species as the wretched creature that contrived this horrendous mistake. It's just so deeply, sadly, desperately sick. Just like the deeply, desperately sick society that would ever consider this mess to be anything else but a complete tragic abortion.
So maybe Hostel is deep and profound in that regard, the way it reflects just how hopelessly corrupt is our culture and how it's all coming to a horrible, grisly end so much faster than anyone cares to imagine. The feeling of helpless despair I have for our poor, crippled world I also feel for the makers and fans of this poor, crippled film.