Hostel: Part III (2011)
Starring: Thomas Kretschmann, Kip Pardue, Brian Hallisay
Writer: Michael D. Weiss
Director: Scott Spiegel
The Story:
Some dude that looks like an 8-bit version of Neil Patrick Harris is gonna take his soon to be married buddy on a golfing trip. No wait, that's just what the fiance is supposed to think. They actually be goin' to Vegas with two other friends to get fucked and fucked up! Meanwhile, Elite Hunting Club has broadened its horizons and set up shop in Sin City. Here, the entrepreneurs of death can watch the carnage in close-up fashion. They can all use their little handy laptops to place bets on how the hapless victims are gonna die. So, horny dudes goin' to Vegas. Elite Hunting Club already in Vegas. I think you know where this is going...
The Rant:
I liked the first two Hostel films. I actually enjoyed the second film more so than the first. When news of a new direct-to-DVD sequel surfaced without Eli Roth at the helm, I'm sure a lot of fans turned their heads in the “don't give a fuck” direction. Not me. I was pretty damn stoked to see that Scott Spiegel had been announced as director. Maybe not a household name to some, but I'm sure a lot of horror fans know who he is. This dude has been around for quite a while. He introduced Tarantino to Lawrence Bender, and this in turn helped get Reservoir Dogs made. He's besties for the restie with Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell. He's in like Flynn with the Coen Brothers. Spiegel has also played bit parts in a shit-ton of likely favorite films for a bunch of you. This is all cool, but it's not really why I dig the guy. I dig him for writing Evil Dead 2, writing and directing the fucking fantastic grocery store bloodbath Intruder, and the much wrongfully hated (in my eyes) From Dusk Till Dawn 2. I dig the stories of these films, but his eye for camera placement is fucking genius. He could make a piece of shit at least look cool. That's kinda what the deal with Hostel III is; it's a pretty turd.
I thought I was in for a great ride judging from the opening sequence, which ends up displaying what I felt was a cool twist on what had been introduced in the first two films. It all begins with a swift zooming out sequence of a ceiling light, and the camera passes between the first two fingers of a character's hand before a room key is slapped into their palm. Later on when this person enters their hotel room, there's an interesting view of said character being shown through the handle of a clothes iron as it sits on the ironing table. This is all Spiegel style shit. I was giddy. Even the way the title sequence appears on screen was great. Unfortunately, while the film itself looks pretty stellar, the key Spiegel-cool camera angles are too few and far between to save the story. I can't blame him, though; from what I understand he came in after the script had been completed, and just added a few touches. I'm not entirely certain, but I doubt his contributions are what made the story the predictable piece of shit that it is.
It wasn't more than twenty minutes into Hostel III before I started calling out ways that I thought things were going to play out, and I was correct on all the stuff that should have been more cloudy so early on. It's pretty bad when my dumb ass can quickly figure something out, especially while inebriated. I usually sit back and enjoy the ride while my girlfriend plays Nostradamus. However, despite predictability, the kills and the methods behind the madness were keeping me entertained. I tend to enjoy some pretty transparent shit sometimes. I dug the way the gambling on kills were displayed, and I further liked some new implements introduced to the way shit pans out. Still, overall it wasn't enough, somehow. And goddamn the ending... the outcome is so obvious that it's almost fucking insulting.
I'm not gonna be looking for great acting in a film like this, but I'd at least like a good lead character. When you don't get that, it sucks, because you have to cling onto a secondary character whom has a good probability of fucking dying. There's no real depth to anyone here, and what is given to the bulk of the characters is annoying as shit personalities. It's not that you won't care if the victims die or not; you'll more than likely be disappointed that they didn't die sooner. Two actors that stand out are Thomas Kretschmann (Peter Jackson's King Kong) as Flemming and John Hensley (Teeth) as Justin. They seemed to give a shit. There's quite a few hot ladies in the film, hot dudes too, but this IS a Hostel film, so duh. Actually, there seems to be quite a bit less sexy stuff this time around, so if you are one that felt the first two films showed too much of that shit, this may be something you can appreciate. Personally, I think a little bit of banging could have made it more fun.
SFX is definitely a strong point here, but with Robert Kurtzman's Creature Corps on the grue, I am not surprised. I'll leave this section spoiler free, but it does get a bit nasty in a few of the scenes. Maybe not as much as it should have, but it all looks pretty good. And I don't know what it is, but sometimes CGI in Direct-to-DVD films looks more or just as believable as what we get in summer blockbusters. I'm not saying the computer shit here is flawless, but it doesn't look awful.
So, if you feel the desperate need to check this out, then by all means do so. Like I said, it looks good, but overall I was disappointed. Maybe if Scott Spiegel had directed and written the WHOLE story instead of helped work on a few revisions, this may have been a pretty damn good horror film. Intruder and From Dusk Till Dawn 2 certainly were, as far as I'm concerned. The worst thing I see out of all this is that we are sure to endure at least a few more sequels down the road, and I doubt they'll get any better.
