MAZE THEME Enter director Eli Roth's gruesome nightmare of terror and torture as you are locked into the infamous secret killing club for HOSTEL: HUNTING SEASON. There is no end to the Elite Hunters' thirst for blood and murder in the Slovakian hellhole, and this Halloween they're bidding to make you their next sliced, diced and drained victim. Roth's first creation for Universal's HHN will certainly deliver horror in the flesh, going full throttle on the gore content as this maze gets down and deadly in its 2011 debut.

WHAT WE EXPECT IN THE MAZE:
HOSTEL FLOORS RUNNING RED WITH GUTS AND GORE

Inspired by Eli Roth's two HOSTEL gorefests, high-paying members of Elite Hunting will pursue HHN guests deeper into the bloody halls of this secret killing club with aggressive scare tactics this season. Clearly this new theme replaces the gross-out SAW mazes which debuted at USH in 2009, only one year before the ageworn film series concluded its seven-part lifespan. Universal's press release promises HOSTEL: HUNTING SEASON will "re-imagine the film's dehumanizing torture chambers and send guests on a spiraling journey through the corrupt halls of Elite Hunting's torture factory," which certainly reads well to entice Roth's gore hounds into HHN. Let's just hope event creative director John Murdy and team are given enough rope (and cuffs, chains, nails and blades) to make the torture terror from the films feel truly palpable to maze guests.

The trick this Halloween is to make HOSTEL: HUNTING SEASON stand apart from its gruesome predecessor as a unique cinematic transfer, and not just play out as more torture-based maze scenes with a different movie title branded onto the entrance. The good news: Roth's bizarre concept of Elite Hunting is visually if not thematically distinct — assuming you've seen his two films — from SAW's running concept of deadly mastermind Jigsaw teaching a muddied moral lesson to his victims. While HOSTEL lacks such a franchise icon pulling the gory strings, the simple thought of rich businessmen (and -women) buying the right to murder traveling American teens is a horror conceit that should power the attraction on its own merits. Maze visitors should feel threatened by their mere intrusion into this cult society of psychopaths, which could make HHN's own HOSTEL feel more immediately dangerous to fans.

Let's face it: many movie reviewers balked at Roth's attempt to 'explain' more about Elite Hunting in HOSTEL PART II. There will be literally no room in this maze for such dramatic subtleties. Sheer, unexpurgated, disgusting gore will star as its franchise calling card in this mash-up translation of both films. Roth promises some of the best (worst?) torture scenes and deaths will appear in his maze adaptation, but we're hoping the filmmaker teamed up with Murdy to create some new instruments of destruction to expand on the Elite mythology of mayhem.

Universal will have to dial down Roth's blending of sex and horror quite a bit, as straight on nudity simply won't fly at Halloween Horror Nights. To their credit, Universal has not backed off on their gore content in mazes though, as evidenced in Jason's machete beheading and face-grinding of his victims just last year. SAW: GAME ON didn't spare the blood or guts in 2010 either, so HOSTEL should feel right at home atop the hill. This maze's success rests on two factors: how disturbing the execution scenes are in the rooms, and how well the actors portray these glimpses of terror to incite fear of being the next sacrificed. The Elite Hunters will have to menace both their captive subjects and attack maze goers alike to erase any boundaries that make guests feel safe in these scenes. Of course the gore needs to be visceral, plentiful and thoroughly horrific to unsettle HHN guests from the start and spike their instinct to escape this charnel house. This factory of nightmares has natural maze potential to keep guests guessing where the next scare will come from, and its industrial, cold concrete look will only add to the dehumanizing fear factor which HOSTEL: HUNTING SEASON embodies with every dead body it churns out.

Hostel Part II [Blu-ray]

WHAT WE WANT IN THE MAZE:
A GUT-WRENCHING ASSAULT ON THE MIND AND SENSES

No matter how disgustingly devious such torture scenes may be, they remain static set pieces nailed, screwed and chained into place through the maze. Gore lovers may relish these nightmares of dismemberment as a terrifying tableau, but pure-at-heart haunt fans may require HOSTEL: HUNTING SEASON to live up to its title and get guests running for their lives. A constant sense of personal menace must permeate this maze, with Elite Hunting clients — dressed in their finest blood-repelling rubber aprons and gloves — hunting down HHN guests through the dimly lit halls and basement murder rooms. Collecting blood-curdling screams will be their trophies, and a talented cast of maze actors should be drooling at this opportunity to terrify.  Roth's films, however gag-inducing are their gore effects, remain a passive viewing experience on the big screen. Directly translated to a maze, such a harmless 'tour' through Elite's gut-drenched headquarters alone will not satisfy HHN fanatics who demand that maze monsters (and creators) get in their face with first-person scares. Expect Universal to assault all your senses in this one: a soundtrack of shrieking horror, an ongoing mural of bloody murder splattered on every wall, and the stench of rotting flesh, disemboweled victims and worse offending your olfactory too. Murdy and USH have never been shy about stinking up this type of maze with professionally made 'haunt scents' sold in such disgusting varieties, and HOSTEL: HUNTING SEASON begs for such gritty, gruesome touches to turn up the fright levels another notch. Running into one of these helmeted hunters should wet a few pants as well.

FILMEDGE'S POTENTIAL FRIGHT RATING:
GORE GALORE WITH SOLID SCARES

Your FilmEdge author has never found torture-based horror films like HOSTEL very frightening as they mostly aspire to turn stomachs instead of stilling terrified hearts. Yet mazes based upon such movies can actually gain an advantage in fright since they are first-person experiences of such inhuman nightmares, and no apparent envelope of safety exists between the supposed killers and their audience. Whether HHN guests have seen both of Roth's films or not likely will have little effect on the maze's potential for success, since the Elite Hunting mythology is immaterial when a murder-happy psychopath on a dismembering spree stalks you in the dark. On the other hand, HOSTEL is an idea with little if any evolution in it and can end up a repetitive bore with room after room of torture scenes all accomplishing the same end. It will be up to John Murdy's team with creative collaborator Eli Roth to infuse the concept with varieties of kills, some shocking surprises lurking around corners and an energetic cast to elevate maze goers's fears to horrified panic. HOSTEL: HUNTING SEASON's high gore factor provides an automatic baseline of scares and gross-outs, but these trappings must be surpassed by clever maze design and amped up actors to elevate Roth's HHN debut as a must-see maze for 2011.

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