CAST: Lauren German (Beth), Heather Matarazzo (Lorna), Bijou Phillips (Whitney), Roger Bart (Stuart), Richard Burgi (Todd), Vera Jordanova (Axelle), Stanislav Ianevski (Miroslav), Milan Knazko (Sasha), Jay Hernandez (Paxton) SCR: Eli Roth DIR: Eli Roth STUDIO: Lionsgate MPAA: R for sadistic scenes of torture and bloody violence, terror, nudity, sexual content, language and some drug content. RUNNING TIME: 93 min OFFICIAL SITE: www.hostel2.com Eli Roth is a sick, sick man. And that's a compliment. Devised as a two-parter, his Hostel opus tells the tale of obscenely rich people who pay bid top dollar for the privilege of killing innocent people, but only after they mutilate, eviscerate, rape, pillage and plunder. Twisted? Absolutely. Worthy of screen treatment? Well, somebody was going to get around to it, so it might as well be someone like Roth, who has acquitted himself nicely in print as a person who deeply understands the language of cinema. In Creative Screenwriter magazine, he recounts the story of when he told William Freidkin that The Exorcist was the scariest horror movie he'd ever seen. Friedkin's response was that he didn't make a horror movie, he made a drama about a young girl possessed by the devil. That explains a lot. Filmed in the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Iceland, any viewer that were to stumble into this film halfway would think they wandered into a college road move by way of The Godfather. Roth frames his wide screen opus with magnificent and ominous shots of gothic architecture and atmospheric vistas. Many have lumped the Hostel films into the same "death porn" category as the annual Saw films, but the difference is the presence of an auteur's hand. Hostel Part II, as much as it seems like a cheap sequel, is actually the flip side to the original, in which we followed a bunch of guys without knowing what they were stepping into. Roth, knowing that we know everything, flips the angle and shows how people bid, travel to Slovakia, mingle with their intended prey, and how the “workers” at the factory prepare for the show. It's all the more disturbing because of how matter-of-factly it's presented. Some people put on a suit and tie when they go to work. Some people have to make sure the sickles are sharpened. This time, we follow four young women - two friends, a tag-along acquaintance and the beautiful foreign chick (Vera Jordanova) who becomes their new best buddy. Like Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof (QT “presents” this film), the women all have distinct voices but sound like women sound when they hang out. The performances, by familiar character actors, are all solid. Roger Bart is great as the conflicted half of an American duo seeking add “that edge” to their business dealings back home. Lauren German is the more grounded of the four girls, but the role with the most heft. At one very desperate point, she has to change strategies about four times -- it's a great marriage of character writing and performance that one would not expect from a "hack 'em up" flick. The characters all seem to have enough backstory and baggage that they don't seem obligatory or stock. And Roth even forbids himself from bowing to horror conventions. When bad things happen, they are usually not accompanied by a sudden blast of horror music and a jolt. Instead, we can all see it coming. (In all fairness, there is a dream sequence that leads to a surprise death, but nobody screams and violins don't screech. Even his clichés seem like homages). Roth plays around with conventions, setting up characters a certain way, only to deconstruct them when the going gets tough. He also knows how to create suspense. Several sequences are very tense, not the least of which a scene with a gun and a bunch of wild young boys called the Bubblegum Gang; or the moment when Bijou Phillips realizes a kindly old woman is not there to help her escape. The deaths are not plentiful, but they are memorable - especially what happens to poor little Heather Matarazzo, the awkward girl from Welcome to the Dollhouse. If you don't know, I'm not telling. The Hostel series, especially part II, is an interesting beast. It's almost too heady for the gore crowd and way too violent for the art crowd. But for my money, I can't wait until Eli Roth decides to depart the horror genre and do something that -- pardon the pun -- cuts a little deeper. --reviewed by DENNIS WILLIS