Appalling for the wrong reasons.

Rating: 2/10 (27 December 2006)

HOSTEL begins surprisingly enough along the lines of EUROTRIP, as a crass rite-of-passage sex comedy about a trio of young Western backpackers chasing after exotic thrills in the seductive form of a bevy of loose and kinky European women. The film takes a sudden turn for the sinister as they head east in the direction of Slovakia. While on the train they share a carriage with a slimy Dutch doctor who sets the scene for the horrors to come by messily eating raw mushrooms. Upon arrival they find themselves the victims of an unsrcupulous honey trap. Next thing they know, these silly lads are strapped up in an underground torture complex at the mercy of some leftover Josef Mengele types(If only Eastern Europe was really this exciting).
I didn't have a big problem with the uneven structure of the film. From the opening few minutes it was clear that I was watching unadulterated trash - not always such a bad thing. I had more of a problem with the drably hedonistic and totally transparent characters, the strange lack of involvement I felt towards the nasty events, and the somewhat retarded attitudes of Eli Roth towards women, foreign countries and just about anything you can't learn about from watching splatter movies.
The unpleasantly childish fratboy mentality of the writer/director spreads to most levels of the film. There's a puerile self-regard in the characters' motivations, their attitudes towards women and gays, and in the revenge scenario that later develops. Especially offensive is the vile treatment of Asian women in the film. I get the idea that Roth was weaned on Japanese films like GUINEA PIG and the more extreme works of Takashi Miike (who has a cameo in HOSTEL). Seeing how awfully Japanese women are treated in their native cinema, he had to try a ham-fisted imitation in his own film. I also have a disturbing suspicion that the film might have had more problems with American audiences and censors had it shown a beautiful blonde American girl having her eye burned out with a torch. "People won't mind so much if it's only a Japanese...We beat them in the war after all" I hope I'm wrong about that.
Eventually the ridiculously contrived plot sees the uninteresting 'hero' of the film escaping and taking bloody revenge on the various people who set him up and tried to murder him. But there's no gruesomely thrilling catharsis of the kind experienced while watching I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE, for example. The honey trap women are lined up for easy disposal like ducks in a barrel, the mushroom chewing doctor is wiped out with the blandest kind of gloating sadism. We're meant to cheer the hero on but we never gave a stuff about him in the first place.
In sum... there are horror movies that chill your spine or provoke your mind... there are those that legitimately shock and appall you. HOSTEL merely annoys and offends. If I had to say something positive I would note that the women are beautiful and I don't have problem with simple eye candy. A setting in the gorgeous continent of Europe can't hurt either. Eli Roth is capable of creating an atmosphere of sickness and menace, but I'm left with the impression that he's a myopic individual with all kinds of dubious outlooks, even more so than his patron, Quentin Tarantino, who can at least create characters that we care about.
If you want a gruesomely enjoyable thrill-ride, I recommend WOLF CREEK, HIGH TENSION or NONHOSONNO. If you want to be appalled and brutalised, see THE UNTOLD STORY, MEN BEHIND THE SUN or SALO. I'd only recommend HOSTEL to the most undemanding splatter fans.