I have been putting off to go and see the movie as I heard it was pretty grim, people have been sick in the movie house, others have walked out, unable to face watching it...
But, last night FG insisted we go. I thought, okay, let's do this thing. It's Orange Wednesday, even if the movie sucked ass, it would be about a fiver or so down the drain = not too bad.
Along with other grown ups - the movie had a strict 18 rating - we waited in the dark, giggling and wondering what we have let ourselves in for.
The movie starts like any other roadtrip movie - American kids in Amsterdam with their mate Oli from Iceland doing drugs, doing girls...then they get locked out of their hostel and another dodgy chap lets them into his room. He tells them of this uber cool place in Slovakia where its just girls, girls, girls...
Of course, the boys go off to Slovakia and they have a good time. I am getting a bit bored now as nothing untoward has happened. No inkling of blood or gore...or anything. A good few cinematic "in jokes" as they have Tarantino music in the background and some of his movies playing on random TV's in the background as the boys go through their adventures.
Eventually!!!! After you have seen about fifty girls get their boobies out, things start going wrong. Oli disappears. No one knows where he is. He sends a text to his mates though - I am going home - it says. I want to go home too, I think to myself, but stay as I love the area they are shooting the movie in. Fantastic village. Then the gaumless friend disappears and the cool one, Pax, is left on his own...
And then, that is where the trouble begins. He gets shown the "art" show by one of the girls they have hooked up with, who turns out to be in on the plot - touritsts get killed for sport. Depending on your nationality, you are worth either $25,000 or less. Being American, poor Pax gets dragged off to be chopped up by a maniac. The maniac is German and has paid a lot of money to kill Pax. But Pax begs in German (how odd, someone can speak a European language!!) and the man feels guilty...so he calls a guard and the guard shuts Pax up by sticking this S&M ballstrap thing in his mouth...Pax starts throwing up when the German cuts off his fingers with an electric saw. Grim, but doable. The German starts worrying that Pax is going to choke on vomit and die on him...so he removes Pax's ballstrap thing from his mouth...turns away to get his electric saw and lo! he slips on the vomit and the saw cuts him in half as it lands on him.
Pax makes his escape...or does he?
The last part of the movie is the best part - the gory part. And, I can put my hand up and say this as I have been indoctrinated by FG in the world of gory slasher movies, it wasn't so bad, at all. In fact, it had a fantastic ending and the entire cinema audience were crowing and laughing and doing high-fives in the end.
So, clocking in at 94 minutes, Hostel is an interesting cultural experience with a bit of blood and gore thrown in at the end to shake everyone out of their complacency. I did enjoy it and no doubt it will be one of the dvd's FG will own.
BUT the coolest part of it all, was watching the gory bits and knowing that Greg Nicotero did the special effects. He harks back to Frightfest and he is genuinely a fantastically funny and cool guy - we met him a few times and he is so enthusiastic about his work, that it gives us a silly sense of pride as everyone went "eeeeeew" at some parts, knowing how Greg and his team probably spent days working out the goriest way of doing that scene.
Good fun - not as bad as some that I have seen, with a lower R rating.
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