Hostel

Ratings : * Avoidable ** Average *** Good **** Must Watch

In Amsterdam, backpackers Paxton (Jay Hernandez), Josh (Derek Richardson) and Icelandic Óli (Eyþór Guðjónsson) meet Alexei (Lubomir Bukovy), a Russian man who tells them about a Slovak hostel filled with American-loving, promiscuous women. The backpackers board a train to Slovakia, where they meet a Dutch businessman (Jan Vlasák) long enough to be unnerved by his bizarre behavior. Upon arriving in the small village, the backpackers check into the local hostel and find themselves sharing a room with Natalya (Barbara Nedeljáková) and Svetlana (Jana Kadeřábková), two attractive, single women who entice the backpackers to a spa and a disco before sleeping with them.

The next morning, Óli is missing. A young Japanese backpacker named Kana (Jennifer Lim) also reports that her friend Yuki (Keiko Seiko) has disappeared. A MMS photo sent from Yuki's phone shows Yuki and Óli beneath a smokestack of an abandoned factory, the word Sayonara written beneath it. Paxton and Josh decide to leave Bratislava with Kana the following day. Later that night, while partying with Natalya and Svetlana, Paxton and Josh succumb to the effects of alcohol. Josh stumbles back to the hostel while Paxton passes out in the disco's storage room. Hours later, Josh wakes up handcuffed to a chair in a dungeon-like room surrounded by power tools and weapons. The Dutch businessman enters in a leather apron and gloves and begins torturing Josh, explaining his unfulfilled dreams of being a surgeon. Despite Josh's pleas for his release, the businessman continues to torture him before finally murdering him.

Across town, Paxton awakens and returns to the hostel to find both Josh and Kana missing. In his room are a different pair of beautiful women inviting him to a spa, eerily similar to Natalya's and Svetlana's offer from before. When the local police chief (Miroslav Táborský) proves unhelpful, Paxton locates Natalya and Svetlana and demands to be taken to his friends. They drive to a factory on the outskirts of the town where inside, Paxton is ambushed by thugs who drag him past cells filled with other backpackers being tortured by various clients. Paxton is taken to his own cell and restrained to a chair, joined minutes later by a German client (Petr Janiš) who as he begins torturing Paxton, inadvertently saws off Paxton's handcuffs along with his index and middle finger before slipping on the blood from Paxton's injury onto the floor. Paxton breaks free, shoots the client with a nearby gun and conceals himself in the client's outfit before escaping to the upper levels of the factory, where outside he can see police officers conspiring with the factory men. Paxton dresses himself in the clothes of the previous client when he discovers a business card for Elite Hunting, now revealed as a secret, worldwide, murder-for-profi t organization. An American businessman (Rick Hoffman) arrives and believing Paxton to be another client, discusses his intended victim and asks Paxton whether to kill her quickly or slowly. Paxton advises administering a quick death, but the American businessman disagrees and decides to resort to torturing, leaving behind a no longer needed firearm before exiting. Paxton steals the firearm and escapes to the courtyard when he hears a woman scream. Unable to ignore it, he returns to the factory and kills the American, now in the middle of burning Kana's face with a blowtorch.

Paxton and Kana flee the factory in a stolen car and drive to the railway station, now filled with waiting policemen and factory guards. Kana, who notices the disfigured reflection of her missing eye, is unable to live with her hideous scars and throws herself into the path of an incoming train, distracting the guards and allowing Paxton to escape aboard another train. Once aboard, Paxton hears the familiar voice of Josh's torturer, the Dutch businessman. As the train stops in Vienna, Austria, Paxton follows him to a public restroom and throws the Elite Hunting's card under his stall. When the Dutch businessman reaches down to pick it up, Paxton grabs some of his fingers from the outside and cuts them off. He then breaks in the stall and nearly drowns the Dutch businessman in the toilet bowl before slitting his throat, killing him. Paxton then leaves to board another train out of Austria.

My Rating : **

Genre : Horror/Thriller

Director : Eli Roth

Cast : Jay Hernandez, Derek Richardson