Hostel "I would like to apologize to Slovaks for making them look like maniacs,"

[karyn]

from yahoo

By Matt Reynolds
Wed Feb 1, 11:07 AM ET

BRATISLAVA (Reuters) - Better known to the outside world for their ice hockey players and stunning models, Slovaks are horror-struck that the smash-hit slasher film "Hostel" is giving them a bad name.

The low-budget movie made a surprise debut in the United States, topping box office sales in early January. In the film, American backpackers are kidnapped, tortured and killed during a trip to the central European country.

"It's so sad," said Alzbeta Melicharova, marketing head at Slovakia's state tourist board.

"The events in the film are so absurd. They have nothing to do with reality. We are actually one of central Europe's safest places. It's one of our selling points."

Scenes of teens locked in a dungeon, tortured with chainsaws and blowtorches and sold to sadists have shocked this tiny, mainly Catholic, nation that is trying to lure tourists away from the beaten paths that lead to Prague, Budapest and Vienna.

This formerly communist nation of 5.4 million, independent for just 13 years, is not used to being the setting for Hollywood films, much less nightmarish ones.

The film has yet to open in central Europe, but word of it has already spread to Slovakia, where radio and newspapers have blasted it, and Slovaks are puzzled and offended.

Taxi driver Julius Horvath saw a photo from the movie in a newspaper of a dog chewing a human bone.

"It's like something from a 1,000 years ago," he said. "Like Slovaks live in the jungle."

IDEAL LOCATION

American director Eli Roth said he chose Slovakia because it was close enough to backpacking meccas Amsterdam and Prague to be a plausible diversion for his heroes, but still unknown to most Western audiences.

The film tells the story of a hostel-cum-dungeon, where wealthy foreigners pay to make snuff fantasies come true.

"I would like to apologize to Slovaks for making them look like maniacs," Roth told Reuters in an email.

"But if you look closely, the worst crimes are committed by Americans, Germans, Japanese and Dutch."

Slovakia has rebounded from 40 years of communism to become a stable democracy with a thriving economy.

Tourist brochures tout Slovakia's mountains, stretching over two-thirds of the country, and forests, covering 40 percent of Slovak land, and a multitude of ski slopes that make it the "eastern Alps."

Roth's film instead shows broken-down communist-era cars, black-and-white television sets, gangs of children who kill for bubblegum -- an amalgam, he says, of the worst American stereotypes of the old Eastern Bloc.

Melicharova has challenged Roth to visit Slovakia and see, in her words, what it is really like and the director said he would take up the offer during a promotional trip ahead of the central European release of "Hostel" on February 24.

"I think I have to be a man and go there and face the music," he said.

[Toe Cutter]

It makes me think people are too easily offended these days. It's a F-ing horror movie! Political correctness has run amok it seems. If I have ever offended anybody on this board I'm sorry. I didn't mean too. I was probably trying to be clever.


Has anybody heard about those Danish political cartoons and the controversy surrounding that? It's totally asinine, the entire middle east is protesting and boycotting Danish products because a single Danish newspaper editor commissioned cartoon depictions of the prophet Muhamed which apparently is 'forbidden'. What a bunch of cunts. Lighten up.

[vinylkitty]

I can see why that area of Europe was chosen for the setting. Some areas of eastern Europe are still quite unstable. If I people in the Southern US protested every time some horror movie portrayed Southerners as demented, inbred, cannibalistic freaks, there would be no horror genre. Toe Cutter is right people need to lighten up!

[Agent Vicious Vivaldi]

I thought it was a pretty good movie...

I didn't think it was an indication of anything...people are much too sensative apparently. Though I thought they were cool with it...I thought I read something about that.

[kellie]

I think they should have used a fake city name, just to prevent this type of thing happening. But the movie was awesome!

[Amelia G]

I think they should have used a fake city name, just to prevent this type of thing happening. But the movie was awesome!

You solved their problem in like a minute. They could really have called it anything vaguely Eastern European-sounding and had the same flick. Of course, they would have vaguely pissed off a whole region, instead of really pissing off one place. Fictional city seems like the way to go though.

[Mr Karl]

about seven years ago I saw a lot of places in europe and Bratislava was defenately the creepiest city there was, like abondoned subway stations , big empty black stairs going down , gangs of guy walking around in wife beaters, the wierdest fucking food, and the best music I could find was Abba

of course the next day I found out that I should have gone to the right upon exiting the hotel and my night would have been totaly different

[Baron_Fluffykins]

I notice they didn't get offended about the treatment of Bratislava in the film Eurotrip where the youngun's are treated as the richest people in the country for having 1.84$ American.

[One Eyed Cat]

Slovaks need no apologies. I know a few here. They just laughed at this. I remember the characterizations of Serbs while we bombed their country. We displayed an innate bigotry and complete ignorance of WW2. I don't recall any terrorist attacks by serbs or slovaks.

Of more concern should be the death threats, burning of danish embassies, and homicidal hatred displayed by Muslims over a cartoon. http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles...e.asp?ID=21127 . I somehow find this a bit more important than a Slovakian Tourist Minister wondering about a movie.

OEC