Human Skin Inn 2: A simple test of everyone's ability to withstand

Director: Eli Ross

Writers: Eli Ross

Starring: Lauren Germain / Roger Bart / Heather Matarazzo / Biyo Phillips / Richard Burki

Genre: Thriller / Horror

Country of Production: United States

Languages: English / Slovak / Italian / Czech

Release: 2007-06-08 (USA)

Runtime: 94 minutes

Also known as: Terror Hostel Stop 2 / Homicidal Room 2

IMDb link: tt0498353

Before watching the sequel, I had a rough look at the synopsis of the story, and to be honest, the interest was not very large, and the story was almost the same as the first episode, nothing more than a man becoming a woman. But because the most fundamental kind of pornography and violence in life still watched the second episode completely, it was found that the production level of the second episode was significantly higher than the first episode.

If pornography and violence are unreservedly highlighted in the first episode, there are far fewer scenes like this in the second episode, and they can almost achieve the perfect combination of beauty and violence, which is what is missing in the first episode. Of course, this has a certain relationship with the gender transposition of the protagonist of the film.

In the previous episode, the surviving Parricks was finally in a different place without escaping the fate of the arrangement, and the scene showing this fact is extremely powerful, the headless deceased sitting at the table, a kitten silently foraging at the neck of the deceased, no shouting, no spurting of plasma, and all that remains is a silence, but in this static picture, the eerie and terrifying atmosphere is completely created. It can be said that this lens takes violence to a higher level, that is, the hidden nature of violence, the silence of violence, and any possibility of violence. Compared with Western films, the static horror images of the East are very obvious, and the body of this shot basically belongs to this style, and the docile kittens are in stark contrast to the scene after the brutal slaughter. And does the symbolism of the kitten herald the film's potential for female violence? I am afraid that this point is also somewhat implied. Parricks' death has doomed the film to be less bloody, and from the bottom of his heart to the audience violent and bloody cruel stimulation.

Three girls is almost a replica of three boys, and the stupid Lorna wants to be a writer (why does anyone who wants to be a writer seem a bit out of place?). The confident Whitney and the film's protagonist, the low-key Beth. Three girls are lured by a sexy model to the inn of death. Due to the gender change, in the opening part, the mirror image of the plot has also undergone a major change, first of all, the reduction of pornographic shots, the sexual chase in the eyes of the boy has become the sexual harassment in the girl's heart, there is an important scene on the train, and the three girls have been insulted and intimidated by a group of rogues, from which we can also see the film's focus on women.

In comparison, there are huge differences in the three girls' concepts of men, Lorna is shy but eager for love, so of course she is the most vulnerable to temptation or deception, Whitney is libertine, so her hope to be able to completely gain the recognition of others with a feminine charm is actually a manifestation of unconfidence. But Beth is different, she has more masculine qualities, first of all, she inherits property and provides for her father, and from this point of view alone, she is a strong woman, so she has a natural resistance to men. Therefore, Beth's love initiative is by no means so strong, and in the face of Whitney, Beth has a natural desire to protect, in fact, there is a kind of same-sex tendency in it. One of the most important roles is the model Axel. Although the film is not directly represented by the camera, it is not difficult to guess through the eyes of several girls that this model is actually a transgender person. For such a person, Beth showed trust and good feelings, no doubt, Beth accepted the model's bisexual identity, thus countering that Beth's sexual consciousness is actually bisexual, psychologically, she is both a female desire and a male desire to conquer.

Compared with the first episode, Xiangyan has lost its real power and is replaced by a female psychology, and this psychology is obviously sexually conscious, so the pornographic shots are hidden and no longer shown through the male perspective, which is in line with the plot.

Upon arriving at the inn, the three girls were immediately put on bidding, and two characters appeared, Todd and Stuart. The appearance of these two characters can be said to completely abandon the pure killing in the first episode, and instead introduce some metaphysical thinking. Why kill? There are still some places in this world that have no laws, rely on money to dominate, and people can do whatever they want. On the one hand, Todd and Stuart represent the institutions of power that hold money, and on the other hand, their conversation begins to discuss the act of killing people, as the timid Stuart says, whether our behavior is perverted, but Todd explains that it is a process of being able to re-recognize ourselves. Where there is no law, the process of re-understanding oneself is power, relying on money, and killing is just a form, or a ritual, a ritual that can make oneself strong.

Interestingly, for two men, their prey is three maidens, so the strengthening of money and power is almost entirely reflected in this relationship between hunting and being hunted.

Lorna's death is a scene in which the film unifies eroticism and violence to the extreme. The client turned out to be a woman, and she killed Lorna for a blood bath. In all the texts of the world, the hatred of women towards women is far more terrible than the hatred of men against women. When the candle is lit, when the struggling Lorna is cut off little by little, the comfortable client is enjoying a feast of the female body, and blood not only becomes a hobby, but also shows the cruelty between women. Women can kill other women with impunity for their own enjoyment or nobility, which is the violent manifestation of reality in the film.

Lorna falls into the trap of her own desperate hope for love, and Whitney forgets to be vigilant because she tries to show off her feminine charm. Whitney's death is more prominently marked by Todd's change, when he is full of confidence to become a superman, he shows weakness in the face of life and death, so he retreats. This is not only the need for the fullness of the characters in the plot, but more importantly, the idea of gaining great power by killing people to gain self-confidence is reversed here, and the director negates the theory that coldness can make people strong through Todd's transformation, which is the obvious point of the director's consciousness.

Beth's battle with Stuart is the focus of the film. Beth's arrest still has a certain inevitability, because she believes in the model, so the way the three girls are caught is different, but it is all out of a kind of cognition of the woman herself, but this cognition sometimes becomes less warm. Then there's Stuart's transformation, which is not a pervert or a powerhouse, so he tries to let go of Beth, but Beth's inadvertent words make him change. Oppressed by his wife, killing people becomes an outlet, and the purpose of venting is actually to make yourself strong. Although his powerful roots are ridiculous, only in the victory over his wife, there is no doubt that this gender contest has put Stuart in a state of turmoil. There is a hatred of women. But can men really leave women? When Beth seduces Stuart with her rhetoric, the man fails again, and he is finally tied to a chair by Beth. Beth was freed by her financial strength and, more importantly, she cut off Stuart's genitals, an act that was itself highly sexually symbolic. Stuart has nowhere to vent because of the oppression of his wife, this timid and cowardly act is more like an eunuch, so Beth's behavior only beat Stuart back to its original form, and from another point of view, Beth also completed the transformation of her female identity, that is, from the beginning of the gender blur to a purely male identity, rich and will use money, which is a representative feature of a social person, killing a man itself is a substitute meaning, is beyond the male, especially the final killing of the model, Psychologically and physically, he has completely become a powerful power.

The film's complete transformation of the pornography in the first episode into the embodiment of female consciousness is undoubtedly successful, but we must not judge that this film has a so-called feminist color, because the biggest winner in the film is by no means the woman itself, but money, a kind of power, the confrontation between women and men and the implementation of violence are vulnerable in the face of money, and the reason why Beth can save herself is not because of female identity, but because of more money. So, going back to what Todd said, where there is no law, it's money that makes people do whatever they want, and makes people make the most of their potential for violence and evil.

Whether it is the hunter or the hunter in the film, as well as the people who watch the film, they are suffering from the torture of money, so pornography and violence obviously no longer dominate in this episode, but only become some kind of product of the money figurine, which is a social problem, which is masked by various manifestations and then summarized. The behavior of the stray children in the film who refuse to refuse candy and ask for money also illustrates this point.

Finally, although the plot of the film killing the child shows the coldness and cruelty of the people behind the scenes, it seems to be contrary to the theme, and this kind of shot in American films is generally not used, so the child killing shot is undoubtedly a major taboo in the film, and I don't know how it passed the US teletrial.