A gripping horror-thriller, if you have the stomach for it

Rating: 10/10 (1 August 2016)

A blood-and-guts horror film made by a horror fan for horror fans. That's probably the most fitting description I can come up with for this movie, which I had low expectations for; surprisingly, it turned out to be a very hard-hitting horror-cum-thriller with plenty to recommend it. Eli Roth (who first bloodied himself with CABIN FEVER) works with a low budget but brings style, verve, and atmosphere to his film, which benefits from some excellent Eastern European locations to add to the authenticity (yep, this film is shot in the same places that Van Damme and Seagal now shoot all of their films).
The film starts off in Euro Trip territory as two American jocks, and an insane Icelander (Eythor Gudjonsson playing Oli, who is EXCELLENT and steals all his scenes) go around boozing, doing drugs, and having sex with lots of beautiful women. Indeed, the first half of this film is chock-full of attractive beauties, who are willing to bare all for the camera. Roth builds up the tension with some eerie location shooting; this is a place with run-down streets and buildings and packs of kids going around mugging people. The music is old-fashioned but extremely suspenseful, really adding to the sense of isolated horror. When the torture scenes come in the film's second half, I was pleased to see that they were short and more powerful because of that; Roth shows plenty without giving too much away, and you'll really be wincing when a guy gets his legs drilled. There is one particular sequence (involving an eyeball) that goes way beyond the bounds of good taste into pure gross-out territory, and I could have done without that one but, but everywhere else, the violence has a point and is deeply unsettling.
The acting is pretty strong from the cast, with the exception of the annoying Derek Richardson. Jay Hernandez starts off as a typical jock character but he grows on you throughout the film, and it turns out he's actually a damn fine actor; I hope to see him go far. The rest of the cast are authentic foreigners, and stand-outs include the pair of beautiful girls, the American businessman, the German surgeon (weirdo!) and, of course, Jan Vlasak, as the Dutch businessman, who is extremely psychotic.
The latter third of this film gets really good, turning into your typical revenge-style thriller, with lots of chasing and violent death. Roth pumps up the adrenaline so that you end up cheering the hero on, willing him to escape from the bad guys. Seriously, when I came out of the cinema, I was so pumped up I was ready to beat anyone who looked at me funny it's that kind of film. Roth certainly knows how to please the crowd after making them wince, so when the good guys turn the tables on the bad, the film becomes sheer perfection. All in all it's uneven but strong, realistic, quite disturbing, and unpleasant through-and-through. I recommend it for those with strong enough stomachs