Weekend of Torture

It was lunchtime at the Fangoria Weekend of Horrors and several hundred fans were hungry for blood. Good thing they were at the Hostel: Part II panel. Writer/director Eli Roth and actresses Bijou Phillips and Vera Jordanova were on hand to discuss the film, which opens June 8, and the "heartbreaking" work that went into performing and filming its grisly scenes. The sequel builds on the premise of 2006's Hostel. In the first installment, audiences followed several young Americans on a trip to a Slovakian youth hostel — a trip that quickly turned to torture and torment at the hands of wealthy, sadistic clients. This time around, the male protagonists are replaced with a trio of women (Lauren German and Heather Matarazzo star along with Phillips) led by a mysterious classmate (Jordanova) to what's supposed to be a relaxing spa. But Hostel: Part II is far from relaxing. Even after the success of its predecessor — the film grossed $20 million and hit the box office at number one in its opening weekend — studio execs were initially reluctant to give Roth greater rein for his gory vision. "They read [the script] and said, 'You simply cannot do this,'" says Roth. In fact, German censors found the finished film so gruesomely realistic that it needed cutting even with the country's "18" rating, the equivalent of an American NC-17 but without the stigma, according to Roth. The director found the requested changes surprising — and a little insulting. "I said, 'Guys, this isn't Happy Feet 2," says Roth. "People know what they're getting." In a film that features German hung upside down and shackled during one torture sequence and a particularly bone-chilling scene between Phillips and an old man that was screened at the panel's conclusion, the censors weren't worried that the gore was too much. They were worried about Phillip's too-real reactions. "If you have someone that's great, the pain becomes really real," explains Roth. "When Bijou was in agony, it was
	Published: 2007-05-23 Provider: IGN