Eastern Europe Is A Scary Place

Continuing my weekly adventures to the movie theater, I made a trip to see Hostel: Part II. And believe it or not, I actually thought it was an entertaining little flick. It's most certainly a better film than the first Hostel.

I didn't go in expecting a whole lot, considering that I thought the previous movie was thoroughly mediocre and devoid of substance. But Hostel: Part II, while still unabashedly a gorefest, actually has something resembling - gasp! - a plot. Of course, neither the main plot or the secondary plot are very deep, but hey, it's better than the vacuousness of the first movie. Our primary plot is essentially a remake of the first movie, as a group of Americans - this time, three female art students - end up following a little bad advice and end up at the dreaded Slovakian hostel, where they enter a world of pain. The secondary plot, however, reveals just how the "Elite Hunting" organization works as two wealthy American businessmen cross paths with our three heroines.

Eli Roth's direction is well done, but I have to say that I've never exactly been a fan of Roth as a writer. He seems like the kind of filmmaker that I believe would be a far better director if he didn't insist on writing his own material. But I will admit that I thought Hostel: Part II was most certainly better written than some of Roth's other work. The characters aren't as deep as they could have been, but they've certainly more developed than the cheap one-dimensional characters in Cabin Fever and Hostel. The tone of the movie seems to be aiming towards camp, and I think Roth does a decent job with it. The movie also boasts a tighter pace than Roth's other movies, and if you let yourself get drawn in, it almost feels like the movie is over before you know it. However, my biggest problem with the movie as a whole is that there's no real tension or suspense. I think Roth realised that, since he used that void with dark humor. Very dark humor, and lots of it. Kids kicking around a decapitated head like a soccer ball and doing the "pull your shirt off and run around" celebration after a goal? Sure. A torturer scaring his prey by threatening to stick a buzzsaw in her face, then getting upset when he gets the saw stuck in her hair? Why not?

The cast also does an entertaining job, for the most part. Our three female leads - Lauren German, Bijou Philips, and Heather Matarazzo - are all entertaining despite the hit-or-miss writing of their characters. And I feel like I should note something I've picked up on. I mentioned in my post about Bug last week that I felt Ashley Judd had made a career out of appearing in the same movie over and over. But am I the only one who believes that Heather Matarazzo has made a career out of playing the same character over and over? It seems like ever since she did Welcome to the Dollhouse, she's been stuck playing the mousy, awkward misfit in all of her movies. So either she's found herself being dreadfully typecast, or she just doesn't know how to play any other character. I hope it's the former rather than the latter, personally. And I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the actors that give probably the two best performances in the movie, Richard Burgi and Roger Bart. Going too into detail would give too much away, but I'll say that their performances are fantastically intense, and I'll give them a thumbs-up.

So was Hostel: Part II a good movie? I don't know if I'd go that far. But did I enjoy it? Yeah, I did. So I'm gonna give it three and a half stars, but I'd only recommend it to people who didn't outright despise the first one and those who might have even the slightest amount of interest in seeing it. I hear Eli Roth has the movie version of Cell lined up next, and I'm anxious to see what he does with it. He better not screw it up, because I'll have to raise a stink otherwise.