Complete, and total, and absolute drivel

Rating: 1/10 (16 November 2006)

Idea inspired by the grim horror of Texas Chainsaw Massacre fails miserably in every sense to even vaguely emulate that classic.
I'd heard a little about this movie - such as the extremely squeamish gore levels and pain contained therein, and always enjoying dramatic and edgy cinema, decided to give it a spin.
I have never regretted watching a movie more in my life; this is up there with those luminary shambles such as Resident Evil, Cabin Fever and Darkness Falls. If I'd known this was from the hand of Eli Roth, the same man responsible for the dire and truly pitiful afforementioned Cabin Fever, there is no way I'd have committed myself to wasting 2 hours on it.
Hostel is set out in the Eastern Bloc of Europe, namely the small nation of Slovakia, after initially being set in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
A group of 3 friends are enjoying the hedonistic pleasures of the flesh offered by the seedy districts of Holland's capital, before a chance encounter with an apparent pimp sets them on course to travelling east where a hostel hosting the most beautiful and sexually precocious women is apparently situated.
Unfortunately for them, it is also the location for a torture chamber, and they have no idea of what visceral depravity and horror awaits.
As one can clearly tell, this is inspired by the style of Texas Chainsaw Massacre - a 'group' of conspirators try to lure unsuspecting victims into a dungeon in which vicious and unspeakable hells lurk, carried out out by psychotic lynchmen.
Regrettably it shares only that similarity with TCM and nothing else; a truly appalling, shallow, and thoroughly disjointed plot which commits the cardinal sin of being fundamentally boring completely undermines this movie's chances of being half decent. There is simply no point here; once the first sequence of torture is over, you find yourself wondering why the hell you're watching this drivel. I was very close to quitting entirely, but it switched elsewhere, deluding me into thinking there might actually be a moral or purpose concealed within.
But there simply wasn't. This mess was a monumental hash - implausible, pointless, bereft of originality and poorly conceived. Plus if you only watch the first 30 or so minutes, you'd think it was practically soft porn.
The one saving grace is that the acting was actually OK, and nowhere near as pitiful as Cabin Fever's, for example.
Eli Roth clearly cannot do horror, and I plead with him to refrain from trying again.