The Hostel trilogy is a series of horror films originated by Eli Roth, released between 2005 and 2011. While Roth wrote, directed and co-produced the first and second films (both notably "presented" by Quentin Tarantino), the third was made without Roth's involvement, being directed by Scott Spiegel and released Direct to Video.
The series centers around Elite Hunting, a secret society of torture clubs, which use Eastern European hostels (basically cheap dorm-style hotels for tourists) and local women to capture victims for the wealthy to kill and torture at their leisure. Each film features similarly unwitting American protagonists who wind up in the clutches of the society while embarking on hedonistic journeys; while the first and second use college students backpacking through Europe, the third centers around a bachelor party in Las Vegas.
Hostel was Roth's first project following the success of his debut film Cabin Fever, and was assisted in no small part by the aforementioned Tarantino, a big fan of the film, who pushed Roth to create an original story as he was receiving various directorial offers on horror remakes. All three films utilize the same style, containing Roth's pre-established likings for prominent splatter elements and the occasional Black Comedy, this time presented through the world of extreme torture. In fact, it was the first film that was among the flock that directly inspired the coining of the term "Torture Porn". While the term's actual applicability to this series is a mildly contentious subject, all three films are definitely not to be watched while eating a bowl of spaghetti.
Not surprisingly, the films saw heavy censorship in various countries as well as fierce criticism from the Czech Republic and Slovakia for their portrayal in the film.note For the record, it should be noted that real-life hostels are emphatically not torture-chambers of any description. While they once had a reputation for being rather disreputable (in that they were largely unpoliced and prone to incidents of theft), recent efforts and gentrification have succeeded in revitalizing the modern hostel as a safe, secure, and family-oriented location.
Provides examples of:
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Tropes across the series
- Affably Evil: Some of Elite Hunting's clients, like the Dutch Businessman, can be quite pleasant people...unless you're one of the people they've paid to kill, of course.
- Ax-Crazy: The majority of the Elite Hunting clientele, none more triumphant than the American Businessman in the first film and eventually Stuart in the sequel.
- The Bad Guy Wins: Played straight in all three films. A few villains were killed but the organization in general continues and those running it continue to be millionaires from it. Did we mention the "heroine" of the second movie joins the organization at the end of the movie?
- Big Bad: Sasha Rassimov, the leader of the Elite Hunting.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: A primary focus of the series, in many shapes and sizes.
- Creepy Child: The Bubblegum Gang, who appear in the first and second films.
- Deadly Road Trip: Elite Hunting targets backpacking tourists, and the first and second films revolve around groups of them.
- Depraved Bisexual: Mrs. Bathory and possibly the Dutch Businessman. Since he has a daughter, he might have a wife as well, and he makes some creepy advances to Josh.
- Developing Doomed Characters: Go ahead, admit it. Ten minutes into the movie, you were crossing your fingers in hopes that they would all just die already.
- Fanservice:
- It's exploitation by way of the Honey Trap and other methods is the driving force of Elite Hunting. Natalya and Svetlana are even introduced halfway through changing as the boys arrive in their room.
- The spa scene has toplessness from Svetlana and Natalya, as well as a bunch of Fanservice Extras (some of whom are full frontal). The three boys are all in nothing but towels, and Oli shows his ass.
- For the Evulz: This is basically the sole motivation of the Elite Hunting's customers.
- Gorn: It's Eli Roth, what did you expect? However, the Mrs. Bathory scene in Part II brings the "porn" part of gorn to a whole new level.
- Groin Attack:
- In the first film, as Paxton is being taken to his room, he sees a few other people being tortured. One of them appeared to be suspended helplessly, with the man's genitals being twisted off. With a rather sickening crunch.
- In the second film, Beth to Stuart. With garden shears. With no discretion shot. Even the hardened killers working there recoil. Then she feeds his genitals to a guard dog."Let him bleed to death."
- Hell Hotel: Well, yeah.
- Hoist by His Own Petard:
- Paxton's would-be killer in the first movie is killed by his own chainsaw and gun.
- Stuart in Part II. Goes from client to game.
- In Part III, the host of the Vegas death show Wheel of Misfortune releases Scott from the torture chair just before Carter was about to kill him. This causes a ripple effect resulting in him blowing the operation and him getting killed at the hands of Carter later.
- Honey Trap: Natalya, Svetlana and Valla. Axelle to an extent in that she flirts with Beth.
- It Only Works Once: Paxton manages to escape the facility in the first film by exploiting their poor security. In the sequel, these flaws have since been rectified.
- Jerkass: Paxton (at first) and Oli in the first movie, and Whitney in the second.
- Karma Houdini: Almost everyone involved in Elite Hunting, notable examples being Sasha, Valla (the desk girl), Mrs. Bathory, the Cannibal, and the masked woman in leather.
- Kids Are Cruel: The Bubblegum Gang, the group of kids in the village that mug people for money or candy. They have no problem with violence, playing soccer with a decapitated head in one fairly humorous scene at the end of the second installment of the series.
- The Killer Becomes the Killed: The Dutch Businessman, Stuart, Carter, and various other clients.
- Masquerade: The titular hostel and its workers.
- The Mole:
- Axelle in the second movie.
- Carter in the third movie.
- Nebulous Evil Organisation: The Elite Hunting club.
- Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Happens in all three movies.
- In the original, Paxton would have been as good as dead if not for his torturer cutting off his handcuffs by mistake, then slipping and dropping his chainsaw onto himself.
- In the sequel, Stuart frees Beth from her chair to try to rape her, allowing Beth to gain the upper hand and eventually escape.
- The biggest one happens in the third, where Fleming orders Scott to be freed just as Carter prepares to torture him in order to make the session more exciting, only for Scott to escape the room.
- Punch-Clock Villain: Some employees at Elite Hunting, like some guards and the cleaning crew, don't seem particularly sadistic and treat their job as simple everyday routine.
- Revenge: Dished out in spades, when possible.
- The Syndicate: The Elite Hunting club.
- They Look Just Like Everyone Else!: The most scary part of the Elite Hunting group is that most of the torturers are perfectly normal people, who have a life and loved ones. Especially made clear during the auction scene in the second film, where some of the bidders are shown.
- Too Dumb to Live: If the first and third films are anything to go off of, it's as if Elite Hunting specifically targets men who think exclusively with their dicks, allowing women to goad them into increasingly sketchy settings. ** The women in the second film are notable aversions of this, but it doesn't help.
- Stuart stands out in the second film, calling Beth a "cunt" while she's negotiating her way out and holding his penis with garden shears.
- Took a Level in Badass: By the third act, both Paxton and Scott are hardened into action heroes that make great escapes, killing anyone in their way.
- Torture Porn: Along with the Saw franchise, this series is one of the more notable examples of the genre's modern definition.
- Town with a Dark Secret: The local "enterprise" employs quite a few people, including a police officer.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: In-universe. Even though viewers know the fate of Oli, Paxton and Josh are left in the dark on whether he actually "went home" or not. The same applies to Lorna in the sequel.
- In the II part , we don't know the whereabouts of Beth.
- In the III part the bald guy that accompanies Kendra disappears suddenly
- Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Both the first and third films feature men throwing up from inebriation or shock.
Tropes in the original film
- Agony of the Feet: Josh, in one of the film's most memorable moments, has both Achilles tendons slit by the Dutch Businessman.
- Ain't Too Proud to Beg: The Dutch Businessman's last words to Paxton are a plea for mercy right before his throat's slit.
- Ambiguously Bi: It's implied that Josh is confused about his sexuality, judging by his reaction to the Dutch Businessman putting a hand on his thigh and their later conversation. He did however have a long-term girlfriend he's just split up with, and there are times where he seems genuinely into Natalya.
- Artistic License – Geography: The Amsterdam featured in the film's opening doesn't much resemble the actual Amsterdam, due to those scenes being filmed in the Czech Republic. And the less said about the film's portrayal of Slovakia, the better.
- Bilingual Bonus: Many of the scenes include dialogue spoken in untranslated foreign languages—most notably, a speech delivered by the main character towards his torturer in German.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Natalya, Svetlana and Vala the receptionist all put on a front of being nice and friendly, but are part of a Honey Trap to lure the tourists in.
- Black-and-Gray Morality: The three protagonists in the first movie are homophobic and impulsive sex addicts who become targets of deranged sadists who pay thousands of dollars solely to torture victims to death. It's obvious what the lesser of the two evils is here.
- Black Dude Dies First: Inverted! Josh and Oli, the two white characters, are the ones who die. The Latino Paxton survives the film.
- The Can Kicked Him: Paxton kills the Dutch Businessman in a stall of the train station's bathroom.
- The Cameo: Takashi Miike, whose film Audition was a primary influence for Roth in structuring the film, is seen leaving the Elite Hunting club's slaughterhouse and offering a word of caution to Paxton."Be careful. You could spend all your money...in there."
- Camping a Crapper: Paxton ambushes and kills the Dutch Businessman in a bathroom stall.
- Chainsaw Good: Amusingly subverted. Paxton's torturer Johann attempts to use one on him, at one point having its active blade running dangerously close to his face, but he ends up slipping on the ball gag he gave Paxton and sawing off his own leg.
- Chekhov's Skill: Ultimately subverted. Paxton is implied to speak German earlier in the film. He shows he can later on to a German Elite Hunting club member, but it doesn't help him any.
- Creator Cameo: Eli Roth has a split-second cameo towards the start as a friend of a guy who fails to use a bong properly.
- Dirty Cop: The Bratislava's police force allows the The Elite Hunting to continue its criminal activity unpunished.
- Double Standard: The Slovaks were pissed off enough with the film portraying their country as an ensemble of some of the most glaring and outdated East European clichés but they certainly didn't feel much better when director Eli Roth issued a formal apology... to the Icelandic Minister of Culture for having Eythor Gudjonsson star as a drunken Icelander.
- Driven to Suicide: After Kana stumbles upon her reflection and sees the extent of her disfigurement, she throws herself at an oncoming train, her blood splattering on innocent onlookers. It's never explained, but the prioritization of beauty in Japanese culture likely has something to do with it.
- Epic Fail: In what is a borderline Deus ex Machina, the German Elite Hunter about to mutilate Paxton further slips on the fingers he cut off and is dismembered by his own chainsaw.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: The Dutch Businessman is possibly the most brutal character of the whole movie, but he's shown to deeply love his little daughter. In an alternate ending, he goes into a desperate Villainous Breakdown after Paxton kidnaps her as an act of vengeance.
- Evil Laugh: Natalya lets out multiple sinister laughs as she reveals her true nature to Paxton, and he's abducted and dragged away shortly after.
- Eye Scream: The center of arguably the most gruesome moment in the film. Kana has most of the skin around her eye blow-torched off, leaving it dangling nastily by the optic nerve. Paxton later has to remove her eye, in graphic detail.
- Fan Disservice:
- Josh wakes up in his torture room wearing nothing but his boxers. That bare torso soon gets covered in blood and carved up rather gruesomely.
- A variation. Paxton going into his second room in the hostel and meeting two beautiful girls in the middle of dressing is what makes him go Oh, Crap! and realise the Honey Trap.
- Fatal Family Photo: Both Oli and the Dutch Businessman on the train. The former is the first to die, the latter gets killed in the theatrical ending but lives in an alternate one where his daughter is kidnapped.
- Fingore:
- In the fight between Paxton and his torturer Johann, Johann's chainsaw comes loose and severs two of Paxton's fingers.
- Paxton cuts off two of the Dutch Businessman's fingers in the end.
- From Bad to Worse: Paxton gets put through the wringer. Having half your hand cut off, escaping via dead body trolley, getting outside the hostel, going back in to save a girl and having to cut out her eyeball, only for her to kill herself 10 minutes later.
- Hell-Bent for Leather: The Elite guards all wears black leather jackets.
- Hidden Depths: Paxton initially seems like a hot-headed sex addict, but he turns out to be fluent in German and tries to save other people when he discovers what's happening.
- Japanese Tourist: Kana and Yuki, though the actress that played Kana was actually British.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: The opening of the film shows that Paxton is certainly a fairly obnoxious Jerkass. That said, he proves more sympathetic as the movie goes on (between his backstory about watching a little girl drown as a kid and the guilt he feels over that to risking his life to try and save Josh and Kana).
- Karmic Death: Paxton finishes off the Dutch Businessman the same way he finished off Josh — holding him up in front of a mirror before slitting his throat.
He wasn't in the room to see how Josh actually died, however, which may imply that by being led to the same murder methods, he may be no different from him after all. - Kick the Dog:
- Natalya laughing at Paxton's reaction to Josh's body.
- The Dutch Businessman severing Josh's Achilles tendons and then casually inviting him to leave the torture room.
- Multiple Endings: The director's cut has a much darker and more ambiguous ending where instead of killing the Dutch Businessman, Paxton kidnaps his daughter, but perhaps through either
Executive Meddling or test-audience scoring, the other Rambo-style conclusion made it to theaters. - Nice Mean And In Between: At the first part of the film, the sensitive Josh is the Nice one. Paxton is homophobic, hedonistic and the jerkass Mean. Oli is a slightly mean-spirited prankster, but presented somewhat lovably.
- Pay Evil unto Evil: After running over Natalya, Svetlana, and Alexei in the street, Paxton sees that Natalya is still alive, so he goes back and drives the car over her to make sure she's definitely dead.
- Race Fetish: Defied! Paxton knows something's up when Oli supposedly goes away with Yuki, because he "doesn't even like Asian girls".
- Revenge by Proxy: The alternate ending has Paxton exact his revenge on the Dutch Businessman by leaving him be, and kidnapping his daughter instead.
- Ripped from the Headlines: Subverted, since it was rather based on a completely unsubstantiated internet rumor of Americans being snatched up and sold to torturous thrill-seekers in Central and Eastern Europe, but never has any evidence been given to support it. It did touch on the widely reported popular travel scam of attractive local woman in Central and Eastern European cities Honey Trap-ing young male tourists, but that often just leads to going to an old-town bar with elevator-only access and massively inflated bills, rather than seducing and then selling them off when inebriated to be tortured to death.
- Sacrificial Lion: Josh, who in the Developing Doomed Characters part of the film is presented as genuinely nice and likable, more just the tag-along than the complete hedonists his companions are.
- Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: Played for drama, where the sensitive wannabe writer Josh struggles to connect with his more stereotypically manly friend Paxton.
- Shout-Out:
- When the guys arrive at the hostel, the lobby TV is playing a dubbed version of Pulp Fiction, which was directed by the same Quentin Tarantino that encouraged Roth to make the film and produced it.
- Paxton seeing Natalya, Svetlana, and Alexei in the road - and promptly running them over with his car - can also be said to reference Butch running over Marcellus Wallace.
- The use of "Willow's Song" from The Wicker Man (1973) is also an ominous bit of foreshadowing.
- Spared by the Cut: In the alternate ending, the Dutch Businessman lives, but his daughter ends up being abducted by Paxton in revenge for Josh's death.
- "Ugly American" Stereotype: Paxton embodies this at first - complaining that a foreign dub of Pulp Fiction doesn't have subtitles, and travelling to Europe solely in the pursuit of drugs and sex. That being said, his Icelandic friend Oli is no different.
- Villainous Breakdown: In the alternate ending, the Dutch Businessman has a fear-induced one when his daughter gets kidnapped by Paxton, panicking trying to find her before screaming her name in anguish to a point it made for Unintentionally Sympathetic an Alas, Poor Villain moment for him, hence the ending change.
- Would Hurt a Child: In the director's cut, Paxton doesn't kill the Dutch Businessman but kidnaps his daughter.
Tropes in Part II
- Action Girl: Beth is more badass than any previous protagonists by a fair margin — she gives Stuart, her torturer, a brutal Groin Attack with garden shears and beheads the woman who tricked her and her friends into going to the hostel in the end. Oh, and she becomes one of the club members... i.e. the villains of the movie.
- Angry Guard Dog: Todd gets mauled to death by a pack of them as punishment for refusing to kill Whitney.
- Anti-Climax: Between Beth simply buying her freedom from the Elite Hunting Club and her final scene only showing her killing Axelle and nothing more, the movie seems to simply come to a grinding halt rather than end.
- Auction of Evil: One scene shows wealthy people typing on their cell phones/computers, bidding for the right to torture and kill the women displayed on their devices' screens. The bidding is in the tens of thousands of dollars.
- Berserk Button:
- Beth does not respond kindly to being called a cunt. Stuart finds this out the hard way.
- Stuart, when his wife is mentioned.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Stuart seems much less enthusiastic about torturing someone than his friend Todd, but in reality he chose someone who looks almost exactly like his wife and his hesitancy in selecting weaponry is simply because he wants to beat her to death with his bare hands.
- Blood Bath: One of Elite Hunting's clients is a woman who slices up Lorna as she's nude, suspended and captive with scythes and sickles, and bathes in the blood that spills out of her wounds. The client just so happened to be named Mrs. Bathory as a Shout-Out to the Trope Maker.
- The Cameo: The old man cannibal? That's Ruggero Deodato, director of Cannibal Holocaust.
- Chekhov's Gun: Beth's fortune. Beth was revealed to hold a vast fortune, the point of its mention not made clear until later.
- Depraved Homosexual: Possibly Axelle who may be lesbian or at least bi or maybe using her sexuality to manipulate Beth and maybe depraved. Or maybe she's just ruthless.
- Face/Heel Double-Turn: Todd and Stuart start out as the ones wanting to torture though Todd is very interested while Stuart is extremely reluctant but does not want to let his friend down. By the end, once Todd accidentally cuts Whitney, he gets horrified and tries to help her while Stuart starts increasingly enjoying brutalizing his victim.
- Face–Heel Turn: Stuart. He was Evil All Along, but only "discovered" himself near the end.
- Fan Disservice: If the image of Heather Matarazzo naked isn't tainted by her being captive and hung upside down, the small detail of her body being slashed by a scythe might do it.
- Gorn: Possibly more so than the first film. Todd's corpse is mangled as he is eaten by dogs, Lorna is exsanguinated by Mrs. Bathory, not to mention having her throat slit to put her out of her misery, an old man eats one of his live victim's legs on a plate in the background, Stuart's penis, the entirety of it, is ripped right out from between his legs, whole, by Beth, and Beth severs Axelle's head in front of a group of kids. Should we go on?
- Heel–Face Turn: After acting all badass throughout, Todd quickly realizes the reality of his actions after unintentionally wounding Whitney whilst playing with a saw, leaving the room disgusted.
- Hourglass Plot: Todd and Stuart. The former starts out looking forward to torturing his victims, while the latter is clearly reluctant. Todd ends up disgusted with himself and refuses to kill Beth, which leads to his death, while Stuart turns out to be unrepentantly depraved underneath his passive façade.
- I'm a Humanitarian: The old man briefly seen He slowly cuts away at Miroslav's leg, puts it on a plate, and happily eats away at a table in the background.
- Kill the Cutie: Sweet, naive Lorna.
- Loves the Sound of Screaming: During Lorna's torture, Mrs. Bathory cuts off her gag and pokes/tickles her skin with the scythe just to hear the poor thing shriek and beg for her life before Bathory bathes in her blood. Judging by the woman's reaction, this only arouses her even more.
- Meaningful Name: As mentioned, the woman who bathes in Lorna's blood in the second film is named Mrs. Bathory.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Todd is overcome with guilt at his actions after accidentally pushing the buzzsaw into Whitney's face.
- No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: When Todd literally quits his job on the spot and becomes overcome with guilt from the buzzsaw incident, he is literally punished for it by having a pack of dogs sic after him and gruesomely eat him alive in the elevator.
- Pre-Mortem One-Liner:
- Punished for Sympathy: Todd suffers this graphically. Quitting his job after disfiguring his victim with a buzzsaw costs him his life when dogs are sent after him. The terrifying part is the fact that when the elevator door opens, we get a front row seat of his mangled corpse that the dogs are still feasting on.
- Redemption Equals Death: Todd's attempt at saving his morals by refusing to kill Whitney is answered by the Club with an unleashed pack of dogs, who promptly eat him.
- Saying Too Much: Stuart accidentally lets slip the fact that he knows Beth's name, despite the fact that she'd never given it. He hand waves her suspicions by claiming that he had overheard her friends talking.
- Screw the Rules, I Have Money!: Beth's penultimate attempt to escape capture, before she realizes exactly what the rules are.
- Severed Head Sports: The film ends with a group of juvenile delinquents playing soccer with the head of the woman that betrayed the protagonist and her friends to an organization of serial killers.
- Slashed Throat: How Mrs. Bathory finishes off Lorna.
- Soundtrack Dissonance: Carmen's Habanera
plays while a cannabalistic old man eats Miroslav alive. - Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome: The film's opening focuses on Paxton, ending with a sharp curveball as his girlfriend walks downstairs one morning and finds his decapitated corpse sitting at the dining table.
- Unwilling Suspension: Lorna (played by Heather Matarazzo) is suspended upside down over what looks suspiciously like a bathtub. What follows is a recreation of the Elizabeth Báthory legend.
- The Vamp: Natalya and Svetlana.
- Would Hurt a Child: Sasha, the leader of Elite Hunting, confronts the gang of juveniles in the woods and forces them to sacrifice one to him as penance for hurting Beth and thus messing with his organization. They squabble with each other and finally push one of their members forward, who Sasha then shoots in the head without hesitation.
Tropes in Part III
- Asshole Victim: Mike is the first of the core group to die. Considering how much of a jerk he was, it's safe to say no one will miss him.
- Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: We think the dork-looking guy at the beginning of the film is a future victim of Elite Hunting Club and the kinky couple are the traffickers. But in an interesting subversion, the dork-looking guy is the trafficker and a member of Elite Hunting Club.
- Entitled to Have You: Carter feels this way about Scott’s fiancé Amy, which is why he wants to kill Scott.
- Hell-Bent for Leather: In the third movie, Justin gets tortured by a woman dressed in a leather cat suit.
- Human Pincushion: Justin's death involves several crossbow arrows being shot at his torso, with a final one being shot through his head.
- Impaled Palm: When Amy is seemingly about to pour Carter some wine, she instead drives her corkscrew through his hand (and the table) as she reveals she hasn't fallen for his scheme.
- Karma Houdini Warranty: Just when it seems like Carter will not only get away with leaving Scott for dead and stealing Amy, he's captured by the not-quite-dead Scott with a little help from Amy, and savagely slaughtered with an electric tiller.
- Male Gaze: Even for a series as sex-focused as Hostel, this one in particular contains a gratuitous amount of close-ups on women's rears.
- Not Quite Dead: Carter locks Scott behind a gate seconds before a system of rigged explosives annihilates the Elite Hunting building, seemingly killing him. However, when Carter later begins his plan to seduce Amy, it's revealed that not only did Scott survive the blast (albeit with gnarly burns on his backside), but he colluded with Amy beforehand to take Carter out once and for all.
- Tear Off Your Face: How Mike is killed.
- Viva Las Vegas!: The setting of the film.
