Review of Hostel (2011) by Jacob B — 09 Jun 2018

Honestly, this film receives much more hate than deserved. On thing that I hear most when people criticize this film is that it takes far to long to get to the actual plot. While this is somewhat accurate, I feel that all of the filler was Roth's way of building suspense; if all of the gore occurred within the first 20 minutes, it would have no substance.

Another thing that I typically hear that is used against this movie is that the characters are all unlikable. While I disliked all of the characters at the start, I feel that Josh was never too awful and Paxton went under many changes over the course of the movie.

For instance, he went from being a homophobic jerk to becoming heroic, which is shown when he travels back into the factory to help someone escape. Suspense is also something that is present throughout the movie.

At a certain point, a glimpse of the factory is shown, but very little detail of what occurs inside is revealed. This is a brilliant use of dramatic irony because the audience knows that the characters will face their demise in there later on, so they are constantly anxious as the heroes continue to party, unknowing of what awaits them.

Long story short, the first Hostel movie masterfully uses dramatic irony to provide suspense which is hard to find in most modern horror films.