Eli Roth is back!

Rating: 10/10 (26 March 2006)

Despite whatever criticism Cabin Fever received I personally thought that it was a decent horror film with suitable amounts of gore and a general unpleasant atmosphere hanging in the air. It was one of the best horror films i have seen, this is saying something as I generally find them boring, clichéd and NOT scary. I'm not saying cabin fever was particularly "scary" as such but rather that it creates a very unsettling atmosphere and builds on it to create a panic stricken "adventure" in the middle of nowhere.
Now hostel is quite a different beast. While starting, to me at least, in quite a similar fashion to cabin fever with a bunch of loudmouthed stoner friends and frat-pack humour, it divulges into a far more perplexing film. It is hard to say much about the film without spoiling it but i'll try my best.
First note that this is not as the posters claim " the most vicious brutal bloody film ever" or whatever, because that implies that it is some kind of all out gore fest. NO that is not Hostel. In fact i felt that the use of violence was quite reserved.....OK well there is quite a lot of blood here and there but the films success is rather on the disturbing nature of what the film transgresses to. From the trailer you should have gathered the focal point of the film, a place where people are allowed to torture other people. The torture scenes are quite disturbing, as one must consider why the hell anyone would actually pay to do this. The way the place is shot is very unsettling, with stark use of light and grimy, deshevled surroundings. Although, this place is not actually introduced right at the start, Roth instead builds up his characters so the film is not quite what one might expect.
Overall, a strange film but a successful one it is quite uncompromising however and Definitely not for the weak hearted or easily offended.