Quentin Tarantino Presents : Hostel Part II

Average customer rating:

Worse Than Part 1

Review

Rip roaring and hugely engrossing horror epic

Oh dear.

Once again, Roth uses violence and gore as a substitute for fear, tension and character.

Quentin Tarantino Presents : Hostel Part II - Unseen Edition [2007]
Starring: Jay Hernandez , Luc Merenda , Roger Bart , Lauren German , and Bijou Phillips
Director: Eli Roth
Manufacturer: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B000TQE03S
Release Date: 2007-10-22

Amazon.co.uk Review

The inevitable sequel to one of the decade's most intriguing and well-made horror films, Hostel Part II, as the title implies, picks up pretty much where the last film left off. And it doesn't take too long for the sequel to find the same groove that earned its predecessor so much attention.

The setting is once again an underground club, where people bid for the right to torture residents at the hostel of the title. Hostel Part II, however, lets us see events from the other perspective too, as we meet the wealthy businessmen who are availing themselves of the club's services. It's a logical dynamic for the movie, and it does bring a fresh perspective to a film that does eventually settle down to a cavalcade of gore and shock.

As a director, Eli Roth has clearly improved since last time around, even if this time he too often succumbs to the temptation to show rather than imply, and Hostel Part II as a result feels a little less fresh and more uncomfortable than its predecessor. Yet it's most certainly an unsettling piece of cinema, and one likely to find favour with Roth's increasing fanbase.

A word of warning, though. Hostel Part II isn't shy about pulling its punches, and it very much justifies its 18 certificate. It's also a cut above many of its modern day contemporaries in the genre, even though it fails to measure up to part one. --Jon Foster

Customer Reviews:

Worse Than Part 1.......2008-03-09

...and when I say worse, I don't mean worse in the good way.

Hostel Part II starts pretty much where the first film finished, but this time around we get given a different perspective, from the view of the wealthy business men. It was good to be given this as it stopped the film from getting stale and repetitive.

Sadly Hostel Part II is dangerously lacking in several areas and is let down by a lack of emotion, no characters development, an absent plot, seriously poor acting, poor pacing and a lack of suspense. Now naturally it has some extreme gore, but this only works in films if it's backed-up by something - anything. Gore alone is meaningless and why someone would want to pay to see it is beyond me.

There was one good scene when a man looses a certain part of his body and while it was pretty obvious it was going to happen, it still made me squirm. The sound track throughout is reasonably good, and I liked the undertones of capitalism, and how money makes someone's life meaningless. The ending was far less dramatic than what I imagined it would be and pretty disappointing. Generally I thought that the film is just laziness from Eli Roth who just seems to be trying to make some money.

You can probably guess from the title (Part II) that if you haven't seen part 1 you should before watching this. Plenty of spills but lacking in thrills means that Hostel Part II didn't leave a lasting impression on me. If you're looking for some blood and gore there are plenty on films out there that do it so much better. Just Google the words good horror films.

Review.......2008-03-04

Hostel Part II 18 5 Stars Danielle Clifton 14

Of all of the horror films, Hostel Part II has to be one of the goriest films created. It starts from where hostel 1 left off, a cliff hanger; so really, you need to watch both films to get the idea.
The Three Main characters, Whitney, Beth and Lorna are backpacking art students going across Europe when a model changes the direction of their journey to Slovakia. When in Slovakia they face a nightmare no one would even dream of when they're lured to an old abandoned factory, which, once they were inside, would lead to death.
This film is not for the faint hearted or persons with a weak stomach as this film contains Blood, Coarse Language and Violence.
It's quite a psychological film, it makes you think "gosh what if that really happens" or "what if that happened to me." Even after all the blood, gore and psychological torment this film has to be one of the best films I have ever seen.

Rip roaring and hugely engrossing horror epic.......2008-02-26

The decision to follow up the original 'Hostel' film with a more extreme sequel has paid dividends. Back in the director's seat is Wes Craven, fresh from his spell acting on broadway and delivering all the necessary thrills and shrills.
The film picks up where the first left on, in a rundown village in Columbia. Unsuspecting tourists are lured into the mysterious 'Habibi Hotel', drugged and then taken to a nearby farm where they are subjected to a series of inhumane acts. Many people squirmed at the cinema, but I found the scenes rather sumptuous and pleasurable. My favourite bit is where Jane (Angelina Jolie) is made to ride a dead horse around a field, before being sprayed with slurry and forced to morris dance for one of the business associates.
The gore was not nearly strong enough for my liking and I would have liked to have seen the producers tackle some really hardcore scenes. I went to the cinema with a checklist of things that I wanted to see happen, but was rather disappointed to see none of them were realised onscreen. I have forwarded to the writers of the film my suggestions that they recruit actors who actually willing to be maimed or possibly killed for real when they make 'Hostel 3'. This would make the film far more authentic and I am sure many aspiring actors would happily sacrifice an arm or a limb for a part in an exciting movie franchise; I know I would.
The music is richly absorbing, provided by American country singer Garth Brooks and contrasts nicely to the onscreen violence.
I heartily recommend this movie.

Oh dear........2008-02-11

Torture porn ? No, just torture to watch it.

Its funny, but I always thought Eli Roth was utterly full of s**t since I listened to his god-awful commentary on the Troma DVD of Bloodsucking Freaks. Now hes managed to go on and prove it.

Having seemingly built up a reputation purely on the grounds of being buddies with some guy called Tarantino, Mr. Roth hopes to shock, scare and disgust us with this mangy jigsaw of exploitation and 70s splatter imagery and ideas, all stolen (though he might say lovingly referenced) from more worthy pictures (and thats not saying a lot). But like a lousy jigsaw with pieces missing, the finished picture just isnt worth seeing. Nor is it worth even waiting for the laughably cheap climax, which is like something out of Burial Ground or Zombie Holocaust.

It has all been done before, back in the 1970s, and so much better. At least those old grindhouse movies delivered the goods, and without any smarmy, post-modern irony to get in the way of the guts and blood. They also knew what their audiences wanted and gave it to them, right in the face, without ducking for cover at the last moment - twenty minutes of any old Italian Cannibal movie would kick the pants off this pathetic effort for pure bloody-minded viciousness. No kids, torture porn is nothing new, and was going strong long before you, and even I, were born. I mean, throwing the severed penis to the dog&WTF? That was cheesy even in Bare Behind Bars, nearly 30 years ago. Get a grip.

Trust me, the few minutes of phony snuff footage at the end of Emanuelle in America are 1,000 times more shocking than this turgid, amateurish mess that is completely lacking in suspense, pace, interest or panache. Anybody who actually enjoyed this film clearly hasnt seen very many films in their life, or else is of well below average intelligence, and probably loves Marilyn Manson. I mean, where do we start? Atrocious script. Flashy but dull, and utterly predictable direction. Interiors and lighting that look like any other modern dark horror movie of the last 10 years&Texas Chainsaw, Saw, etc., etc., except they had competent directors behind the camera. Plotholes you could drive a juggernaut through. And&no, I really cant be bothered listing any more reasons why I loathed this film so much its already taken up over an hour and a half of my evening.

God help us if this is the future of horror. Bring back Ilsa. Now theres a lady knew what torture porn was really about.

Once again, Roth uses violence and gore as a substitute for fear, tension and character........2008-01-28

As with the first Hostel (2005), the central concept here is a familiar one, with the stranger in a strange-land motif having been used in a number of great, similarly-minded horror films of the last thirty-years, most notably in John Landis's classic black comedy, An American Werewolf in London (1981) and again, more recently, in films such as Wolf Creek (2005) and Them (2006), The concept is one that lends itself to ideas of paranoia, unease, uncertainty and helplessness, as we realise that there is no one to turn to and no one to trust. With this in mind, the fact that Hostel Part II (2006) seems almost entirely devoid of tension is a real testament to the ineptitude of director Eli Roth and his bizarre quest to put violence and sadism above even the most basic levels of character, narrative, horror and style.

If Roth's mentor Quentin Tarantino was once considered to be the Bob Dylan of the radical, post-80's film generation, then Roth himself is probably comparable to Limp Bizkit; with his particular style mixing crude attempts at frat-boy humour, wanton aggression, vicious violence, and knowing nods towards sexism, misogyny and perhaps even xenophobia! Like Tarantino he's clearly seen a lot of films and borrows, references and pastiches with the best of them, but unlike Tarantino, you get the sense that Roth doesn't really love films, but rather, is in awe of the violence that they present to him. His first film, Cabin Fever (2003) attempted to revive the splatter film genre with a combination of Romero's zombie horror and Raimi's kids in the cabin theatrics, with knowing references to films such as Sleepaway Camp, Dawn of the Dead, The Crazies, Deliverance, Sothern Comfort, Evil Dead and The Last House on the Left. Sadly, for all the clever references, buckets of gore and sporadic bursts of T&A, the film was completely devoid of all sense of character or empathy; giving us a film that failed to create any kind of emotional resonance with the audience or anything that made an impression after the final credits had rolled.

Roth rectified these problems somewhat with the first Hostel; which overcame the complete lack of anything approaching real character and his shallow attempts to pay lip service to more talented filmmakers, such as Tarantino and Takashi Miike (who's work Roth seems to completely misinterpret on almost every level) by at least having an interesting concept, an air of dramatic mystery and some truly imaginative death sequences. As a result, I had high hopes for this sequel, which Roth promised would up the ante in terms of on screen tension and reveal a little more into the background of the first film's terrifying universe. Sadly, this has proven to be untrue.

What we get with Hostel Part II is a complete retread of the first film, only this time, instead of three horny guys we get three horny girls. This is juxtaposed with an interweaving plot strand about two successful businessmen preparing for a weekend of "death sports", who each equip themselves for this inevitable bout of carnage in entirely different ways. For me, this was the much more interesting element of the film, making points about male aggression and the concept of violence and repression; though far too often I felt that this idea took a backseat to the less interesting scenes of the three girls wandering around Eastern Europe, getting drunk, looking for men and generally discussing nothing of particular interest, and at length! The violence this time around has nothing to do with being inventive and, instead, has resigned itself to being gratuitous for the sake of it, with naked teenage girls strung up and disembowelled, eyes gouged out, heads cut off, and at one point, a graphic castration scene. None of it means anything because the characters don't mean anything, so, whereas a more skilled filmmaker could have given us great characters and still created true horror by showing hardly anything in the way of violence at all, Roth panders to the needs of desensitised children by showing everything in lurid, close up detail.

It's impossible to feel anything for these characters because they are badly written, badly acted and underdeveloped. As a result, their deaths are meaningless and their suffering used only as a means of titillating the blood lust of teenage boys. Now, I have nothing against violence in cinema, but the old adage that a little goes a long way is certainly true. For me, the most memorable scenes of violence are the ones that hold the most dramatic weight; the ones that feel real and very much believable, where we can feel for the characters in that situation and apply our own various psychological fears and anxieties alongside it.

There is plenty here that audiences will find disgusting, maybe even offensive, but there is nothing that will scare you or remain with you when you make your next trip out into town or down a darkened, gloomy alley. Like the first Hostel, this sequel lacks character, tension, thrills and scares, leaving only the excessive violence and attempts to shock. However, unlike the first film, it doesn't have the vaguely original story and that great chase sequence during the last twenty-minutes to make it anything other than a vicious novelty. If you're looking for mindless entertainment for a post-pub Friday night with the gang, then Hostel Part II might just give you a few decent squirms; but really, anyone looking for a truly great horror/suspense thriller would be better off looking elsewhere. On the whole, some fine DVD extras, but a very disappointing film.

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