Am I so totally out of it? The movie HOSTEL. I really hated it..

Turistas was another similar film. That one was enjoyable as long as they were on the beach with babes. Then it goes downhill, or is it uphill to the evil doctor's lair.

 

The first one had a cameo by the great Japanese director TAKASHI MIIKE! Oddly enough, he's made a couple of movie that were WAY more 'f-ed up' than HOSTEL. However, he's also made musicals, gangster films, and sci-fi, fantasy, and kiddie films.............. truely, the ultimate renaissance film-maker.

 

Low cost gross-out films are big business. The Blair Witch Project made a fortune, and Hostel, Saw et al have created successful franchises. Gore, boobs and a couple of laughs are a potent money-making combination. Makes you wonder whether the folks decrying the corruption of modern Western civilization may be right....... Not really.

 

I was only able to sit through 20 minutes of this flick before I capitulated from boredom and turned on the mute button and did other things. Gore and violence doesn't automatically discount the quality of a movie because there are plenty of excellent horror and bloody action films.

Although Tarantino produced this film, I doubt very much deep in his heart he thought this was a quality product, despite the quoted blurbs. Trying to make a buck. The films and characters he pays homage to in his own scripts and movies are unique and clever, and not in same creative universe as whatever lack of imagination inspired H. Mindless.

Check out Japanese and South Korean horror for entertaining contemporary blood and guts.

 

Is there even any gratuitious nudity to sustain interest over the aimless beginning?

 

I watched it over a friend's house. I was mentally and physically ill for days. Is that supposed to be the point? I guess I don't get it either...

 

I believe that would be the point of a movie like HOSTEL. It is a bit sick that people "love" these movies. For me they are like crazy, fast roller coasters - I don't go on them because they scare me s**tless. In most cases these movies scare me s**tless (yet I was able to watch SAW and HOSTEL).

 

IMDB lists Quentin Tarrantino as the Executive Producer.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0450278/fullcredits

 

Hate to sound like a cranky old man/"things were better in the good old days" guy, but I too, refuse to watch these torture porn movies. I saw the preview for Saw and that was all I needed to see. I've never liked these kinds of movies. The Silence of the Lambs marked a turning point where this sort of thing became acceptable, imho. Still the only movie I've ever walked out of.

 

I haven't seen Hostel, but I recall some of those other movies you mentioned. I remember 20 years ago watching a similar movie called "Mother's Day," which was released around 1980. That movie angered and disgusted me. After watching it, I took the tape our of the vcr, went onto my back porch with a hammer, and smashed it to pieces. It was pure misogynistic crap that didn't even try to explain itself. Has anybody here see that one? It has the famous "draino" scene.

 

"Torture Porn"? Is that like an actual genre of film nowadays?

It's gettting ever harder NOT to be a cranky old curmudgeon when stuff like this is big money now.

 

I haven't seen Hostel. In fact, I've never heard of it. But I loved Cabin Fever.

 

Maybe I'm being hypocritical, but I can admire a film like the original TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE for creating a palpable atmosphere of horror, but consider HOSTEL and its ilk as gore for its own sake, without any real merit. I've heard these films refered to as torture porn, and I don't think it's too far from the truth. Look at the films of Hitchcock or Mario Bava- sometimes less is more.

 

Tarantino and Eli Roth are buddies apparently. Roth did a fake trailer for "Grindhouse", and he also plays a small role in "Death Proof"...

 

I didn't like "Hostel" and agree with the thoughts that it's just too nasty and unpleasant. My review:

http://www.dvdmg.com/hostel.shtml

 

Actually, I like the "fake out" in which the movie seems to be going one way but takes a radical detour. In fact, I thought "Hostel" would've been better if it didn't hint at the horror AT ALL until it happens. There are a few hints of nastiness early, though most of it's just about a couple backpackers.

That's the model straight out of "Psycho" - set up a story that's going one way and make a big turn 1/3rd of the way into the movie...

 

There is some EXCELLENT nudity along the way. Enough to make up for the unpleasantness? Probably not, but at least the nudie scenes are good!

And dammit, I LIKE the aimless beginning in this film's context. It's the rest that sucks!

 

Personally, I like the term gorno better than torture porn.

 

Did you get stuck with a fine from the video store?

 

Roth gives good DVD commentary - his ripping into union practices and how they drive productions abroad on Hostel is classic, and his track on the Bloodsucking Freaks DVD is pure straight-faced satire, featuring as it does his discources on the supposed huge influence the movie had on popular culture.

 

I haven't seen it but after aching myself through those stupid Saw movies I assumed this was more of the same and avoided it. I am a fan of the classic 70's grindhouse style of ultragore like Dead Alive, Cannibal Ferox, Zombie, Re-Animator, Dawn of The Dead, and those films are more amusing and humorous than scary and are usually laced with witty social commentary. The modern splatter films seem to do nothing more than to try to raise the shock bar on each other with no attention paid to writing or tact.

 

Tarantino is a huge fan of exploitation and gross out horror movies. He takes them very seriously.

 

I haven't gotten up the nerve to watch Hostel yet. I enjoy some horror films like Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but there's definitely a line which I don't cross. I was hesitant to watch "Saw" also but recorded it off Showtime and actually enjoyed it. It wasn't a great film but was pretty good and I felt the trailer implied more than the movie actually delivered (which I consider good). I also enjoyed High Tension except for the ending.

Mark

 

A different kind of movie, in my opinion, more of a thriller. I think it was scarier (in its way, I've never found a movie particularly scary, but I appreciate a tense, creepy atmosphere) and less graphically violent, and just a better film in general. I think Herschell Gordon Lewis' films were much more violent than Hostel, and he made those in the '60's. At least, based on stills I've seen, they were more violent, haven't actually watched one.