Funny you should ask...Eli Roth's blog post for us yesterday was about working with the MPAA on the rating for "Hostel: Part II".
http://www.mtvmoviesblog.com/2007/05...pect-the-mpaa/

Personally, I won't be seeing it, but I don't like any horror films. When I was six-years-old my karate instructor held a sleepover and proceeded to show everyone the goriest, sickest movie shit I've ever seen, scarring me for life. I can't even watch Freddy Krueger without having crazy Nam-like flashbacks.

And we've got a jumping off point for Happiness Vol. 2.

hmm... (oh nevermind)

guess I'll bypass the theatrical cut and just wait for the unrated DVD - like I did with the remake of 'The Hills Have Eyes'

No judging! It was an earlier, more innocent time.

I was chiding you... I was a kid in the 70's - I agree, sleepovers where the norm

No, I'll just pleasure myself right there in the theater. Why else would you pay $7.00 for a jumbo tub of extra butter popcorn.

Anyway, I am there first week.

Just finished watching it. Much more bleak,shallow,and darker than the orginal. The only "Good time" I had with it was with Deodato's cameo (Unlike Miike's cameo in the last movie, we get to see Deodato's methods as a paying customer!)

I'm also surprised at the rating slip too. The first killing (Or, the first killing that happens in the middle of the movie) really pushed the envelope and would have guaranteed an NC-17 rating back in the day.

don't want to read the spoliers but i can't wait for this to hit theaters. i love eli roth's movies and his style and sense humor. i doubt part 2 can top part 1 in the character development area, but it's rare a horror movie these days focuses on that aspect anyway. part 1 did it well though.

So it sucks even more than the 1st one?

In Hills defense,the R version is pretty brutal and violent as hell

I just caught the R version on HBO last weekend to see what that version was like again after seeing the unrated dvd. Since I only saw it once in theaters and thus couldn't exactly remember how all the gory bits were edited. And I must say, the majority of the cuts were rather small and hardly made a difference in some cases.

Only a couple moments were much more graphic and longer than the R version. But overall, there was mostly split second shots cut from the R version here and there. So the R version still packed a big wallop and was not 'destroyed' at all in my opinion.


Hostel was a fun theatrical experiance and I hope part 2 will be even better. So I'll be there on opening night most likely and can't wait!

It sounds like more was cut than the original film. But then again I remember it sounding like "Hills" was being butchured by the MPAA with the 'large cuts' required. And hardly anything 'big' was cut drastically.

Either way,I'll be there to support the film in theaters and hope for the best!

Well, the secret was that if you had too much red blood in your movie, you would get an X/NC-17 (i.e., Taxi Driver saturating the blood in the shoot-out or Evil Dead 2 being forced to use green or black blood) but, as I pointed out in my previous post, Hostel 2's first "big" kill now proves that theory wrong. So there's no doubt that a new MPAA is in town.

I'm honestly not expecting lengthy moments of excised footage for the eventual "unrated" cut.

Don't make me start calling you "Pee Wee".

The version floating around online (which apparently in many versions has a watermark on it saying "S. Mooridian", giving away the name of the person who had the copy that was put online, heh, he's screwed) is an unfinished version of the film. I'm not going to watch it, but I have read that there is a scene in an elevator where green screen can be seen and there are images shown on cell phones that are incomplete CGI. So there's a very good chance that that is the director's cut.

I saw some clips.. There's some really bad superimposing on the workprint as well.

I like Eli Roth but I wish he would go back to a Cabin Fever type of horror movie. There are too many of these torture type movies out now.

I didn't find the first one scary at all, just negative, stupid, and sad. Pass.

I didn't ask why people enjoy horror movies. This type of movie is often not about the "scare" so much as depicting human suffering. I'm intrigued (and to be honest, a little disturbed) by the notion that people find this type of entertainment fulfilling.

The second film is really a huge step back from the first. Sure, we get more explanation on the whole organization and we see the torturers in this one but it lacks the fun carefree wild side of the first film.

Not worth the time, really.

Well it is scary knowing there are people in the world who get off on torturing and killing helpless victims. Imagine if you were in the victims situation and that is scary stuff! How would you react,how would you survive(if possible)? And many other questions that are chilling to contemplate.

So in that way, Hostel was very effective for myself and delivered one hell of a roller coaster ride. It's not about 'getting off' on viewing the torture and death,and more about 'what if'. Putting yourself in the victims scenario and imagining what you would do in a similar situation. And hoping they make it out alive. But the odds are against them, which makes it gripping and horrifying. This is why the torture scenes when done right are effective. if it was just endless wall to wall torture from beginning to end, with no build up at all. It wouldn't be as effective.

This is where I give Roth props for the original film by not over doing the torture and gore aspect. Though that is what people expected,and why many hated the film. Since it 'copped out' and didn't go far enough. But I was pulled into the charecters world from the beginning,as things slowly got more ominous until the first full blown torture scene. Which then had my knees shaking uncontrollably and my teeth chattering with nervous tension. A great reaction for a horror film to give me, since I rarely have such reactions today!


And there is a vastly smaller amount of 'torture' films than people think. Aside from the SAW films, and Hostel. It's practically zero. Hills Have Eyes is not 'torture porn' and whatever stupid name people want to give brutal horror. It's just a simple brutal horror film with uncompromising violence. While only Saw and Hostel have actual torture scenes/set pieces solely involving torture.

So for all the brutal violent R rated horror films being released(not many btw). There is 10 times as many PG-13 or 'subtle' R rated horror films being released.

But I think it's standard reaction like when slasher films came into vogue. People were pondering "Why would anyone like this trash? It's garbarge for would be serial killers" and other exaggerated claims. But really, most of the morally offended crowd. Just don't like a down and dirty visceral more 'realistic(in some cases) portrayal of violence. And would prefer hte offscreen death or bloodless onscreen death where someone clutches their chest when shot and falls to the ground. This way they know it is all make believe and not 'real' and can feel safe and secure.

But once that rug gets pulled out from under them and they have to dare to see just what real deaf/destruction may look like. It upsets them and they'd rather ban and censor the material. So they can feel safe and secure in their little clean world view.

I only saw the unrated DVD of Hostel and thought it was entertaining to a degree, but felt really nasty and evil for being entertained by it. I have no idea what was left out of the theatrical version, but am curious (SPOILER, even though it is for one that most of us have already seen) if the scene of the girl having her eyeball cut with a gush of puss and stuff following was in that print. That almost made me lose it and turn off the DVD.

The unrated DVD only had about 25 seconds of footage reinserted, mostly involving the guy getting his leg chopped off due to the chainsaw. The eyeball cut with a gush of puss? In the theatrical version uncut and uncensored.

The eyeball scene is actually a few seconds longer in the unrated version! It cuts away quicker in the R version as the 'puss' starts to flow out. But in the unrated version, it lingers on it for a few seconds longer.

It's all so minor that you wouldn't even notice it if nobody told you that you were watching the unrated version.

Yep, the MPAA edits today are kids stuff compared to the massive edits from just a few years ago(1994 in this case). Marvel at the MPAA edits to all the gore and violence in Psycho Cop 2! note-this clip obviously contains spoilers. So don't view if you don't want it ruined for you. And note-not all deaths are shown in this clip,but a good amount of them are. + it contains a brief glimpse of a nipple and adult language. So beware if you're at work or something like that.

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