I have considered doing some director rankings on this page for a little while now because I love to talk about horror movies and just film in general and there’s so many iconic or at the least well-known directors both within and outside of the horror genre that have enough of a catalog at this point that I could begin to personally rank them and start to try and dissect their individual bodies of work. I thought no better director to start with than the ever-controversial mixed bag that is Eli Roth considering he’s fresh in the news again for ‘Ice Cream Man’. A lot of people have very strong negative feelings about this guy, and they let their voices be heard on the internet. I am by no means saying I like or agree with everything he has said or did as a person over the years even, but personally, as an artist I really enjoy him and most of his movies. He has his own sort of style unlike almost anyone else in that he mixes at times shocking levels of on-screen gore and violence to an at times visceral level with a very crude, juvenile, almost college-like frat boy sense of humor and unlikeable dumb characters to top it off; and that’s just not going to be for everyone. So, with some of that out of the way, let’s get into his filmography shall we?
I should also preface this quickly by saying I do have a couple of blind spots in his filmography. He has 10 films in total as of now and I’ve seen 8 of them. I haven’t seen his recent blockbuster fiasco that was ‘Borderlands’ and have no real intention to, and I’ve also never seen ‘Death Wish’, his revenge/thriller film starring Bruce Willis but that one could be interesting. I just feel like it flew very under the radar. Now. Let’s begin!
#8: The Green Inferno
Roth’s love letter to the visceral tribal/cannibal horror films of the past. This movie is the last place spot for me, but honestly, I still didn’t HATE this movie or anything like that. I think I went in with different and higher expectations, and he just went FULL Eli Roth, which I should’ve expected and anticipated honestly, but I didn’t this time for whatever reason and it just wasn’t what I was expecting entirely. I am a horror fan, but I still cannot bring myself to watch ‘Cannibal Holocaust’ because of some of the background controversy involved in the film and the fact that I feel like I just have hyped it up to the point in my mind that now I just can’t. Some of the filming and behind-the-scenes facts of that film still just bother me. I kind of felt like this was going to be Roth’s ode to ‘Cannibal Holocaust’ and I could get away with watching a bit more of a cleaned-up version of the film with an actual production behind it where they didn’t actually slaughter live animals on film. In many ways I still think this was that in Roth’s own sort of way and I still dug plenty of moments of this film for what it’s worth. It was shocking and violent at times. I could’ve just done without some of it as well. I generally don’t mind Roth’s style and sense of humor, but a lot of it just didn’t really work for me in this one.
#7: The House with a Clock in its Walls
This in many ways felt like the odd man out and probably the hardest film to find a spot for on this list. This was Roth branching out of his usual wheelhouse and territory and making a pretty big-budget, family-friendly fantasy film starring Jack Black and Cate Blanchett and, in many ways, I think this movie really did work. I know it did for him. I mean it’s been the most profitable film for him in his career box office wise, which really should come as no surprise either considering he makes a lot of violent horror films and I believe all his other films are Rated R, and this was PG so you could market it towards all ages. Again though, this was still pretty fun, and I enjoyed it for the most part. How can you not love Jack Black hamming it up as an eccentric warlock uncle though? There was plenty of whimsy and wonder throughout the film because it dealt with magic and was shot from a kid’s point of view. It involved spells and witches and warlocks and the undead rising and all those sorts of things, but it was played out in a fun and magical manner more so than a truly spooky one. This would honestly be a pretty good Halloween time watch with the whole family, but I don’t know. It was just tough to place it for me. I think it’s mainly this low because it did drag in a few spots for me and it just feels the least like Eli Roth as well.
#6: Hostel: Part II
This placing may be controversial because I know a lot of people like Hostel: Part II even more so than the first one, but I don’t know. I’m just not one of those people personally. I will say though there was still plenty to like in this movie. I like how we got a lot more of the back story of the actual ‘Elite Hunting Club’ I believe they are called and that part of the film was from the perspective of these rich people coming to this place to BE the killers and torturers, and that it wasn’t fully just from the unassuming tourists’ perspective again. That added more meat and lore to the overall story of ‘Hostel’ which is what a sequel should do. This is where some personal bias comes into play though and I am aware of that. The first Hostel dealt with these real douchey guys that you didn’t really like or see as decent people and this second one dealt with these college age girls that were overall decent people being dragged into this same horrifying nightmare scenario and while in ways that is more affective and I totally understand why you would switch it to women instead of men in the sequel as well just to add a fresh point of view, it’s also just harder to watch for me. Not that the first isn’t either, it’s just a different sort of feeling. Therefore, I’ll probably come back to it less than the first Hostel film and that’s going to place it a little lower.
#5: Ice Cream Man
I know this placement is a rather controversial one because this has been the hot movie this month to bash. I think half of that has to do with the potential use or misuse of AI in the film and the other half is some people’s personal hatred and animosity towards Eli Roth as a person. I’m by no means supporting the use of AI in film either, but supposedly it was just used for an animated sequence and to touch up some small moments. At least that’s what I hope and want to believe so that’s what I am going with. If it came out later that it was used for a lot more than I may have to retroactively rethink this list. For now though, I really had fun with and got enjoyment out of this movie, much more so than most people it would seem. I placed it this high on the list for the simple fact that I could see myself wanting to rewatch this film more than a handful of his others. It’s a much easier and sillier watch than say a Hostel might be and it’s a turn your brain off kind of movie. Lots of gore, shocking and somewhat silly kills (the most deaths in any Eli Roth film by far), a bright and almost childlike color palette which is unlike any of his other work, and a very simple and almost non-existent storyline for 3/4ths of the film to boot. I’m not saying this movie is necessarily good by the standard use of the term, but it doesn’t take itself seriously and doesn’t want you to either. It’s like Pee-Wee’s Playhouse meets Terrifier, how can you not have some fun?
#4: Hostel
Hostel is probably the most infamous film of Roth’s and the one that “put him on the map” in the mainstream sense and people started to consider him as one of THE guys of modern horror at the time after its success. It came out right after the first couple Saw’s and many people “saw” this as almost a more visceral and reality-based take on that “torture porn” concept at the time. So, after that, for a little while Roth and the Saw franchise had a friendly war over who could deliver more gritty, brutal, hard to watch sequences with the release of Hostel: II coinciding around the same time as the releases of Saw III and IV. Fun times. This movie was weird too in the sense that it almost felt like 2 movies in that the first half and the second half were nothing alike. The first half revolved around these college age douchebags backpacking through Europe and trying to pick up women. It almost felt more like a coming of age, sex comedy for the first 30-40 minutes and then once this trap starts to set in and people at the hostel start disappearing and the hosts start acting different the entire tone of the film shifts into an unsettling mystery and leads to eventual torturous horror. This was a pretty cool concept and a sort of throwback to the gritty, boundary pushing exploitation films of the past that have heavily inspired Roth throughout his career. It’s admittedly just not a film I’m always going to be in the mood to watch, but I appreciate it.
#3: Knock Knock
This is another movie that took quite a bit of hate I felt like and I just don’t understand exactly why really. I mean it was certainly an adult…or adultery movie if you will. Bah-dum-tsss. That joke landed if you’ve seen the movie. In all seriousness though this was just a crazy, strange, yet highly intriguing film. It was different too because it was a one-off story involving a small cast of characters and took place inside a single location over the span of a single weekend and I appreciate that about it. This was also sort of out of the wheelhouse of the usual work of Eli Roth in that it was more of an erotic-thriller than a true horror film. Crazily enough, Keanu Reeves starred in this movie and played this somewhat cornball dad who stayed home for work while his wife and kids took a weekend getaway. These 2 younger women knock on his door in the middle of the night in the pouring rain saying they’re lost, so he reluctantly lets them in, and they quickly begin pushing boundaries and start trying to push him into things until he is eventually wrapped up in it…quite literally. After that, their game has begun, and for the next couple days these girls make his life a living hell and set out on a mission to completely destroy it while he unsuccessfully tries to rid himself of them. It was just an interesting movie and a pretty damn original concept as well. Ana de Armas and Lorenza Izzo were great in it and played absolute lunatics and it was kind of wild and funny seeing Keanu in a role like this as well.
#2: Thanksgiving
It’s kind of crazy that in Eli Roth’s entire film catalog this is his one and only true “slasher” film thus far, and that it was a holiday themed one, a ‘Thanksgiving’ themed one at that which is about as rare as it gets. I really enjoyed this one though because it was a true teen slasher film that focused in on a core group of characters and did not hold back on the gore or death sequences while also really leaning into the Thanksgiving holiday of it all and it has now become a yearly watch for me right around the holiday weekend every year. There’s a lot of that good Roth humor and wit in this film as well and it lands pretty nicely for the most part. The story takes place in Plymouth, Massachusetts, it cold opens on a Black Friday riot, the killer is wearing a John Carver mask which is basically just a pilgrim mask, a turkey mascot in a parade gets his turkey head knocked off with an axe. I mean how much more Thanksgiving fun do you need?! This movie really was a lot of fun though and pretty funny at times as well while also being brutal, and that is when Eli Roth is often at his best. To think this entire film came to be all because of a fake trailer that was played in Quentin Tarantino & Robert Rodriguez’s joint horror project ‘Grindhouse’ just as a joke and blossomed into a reality about 15 or 16 years later. It has a very original vibe as well with the Massachusetts and holiday theme, while also feeling like an ode to slashers before it, like Scream, as well.
#1: Cabin Fever
That’s right though, Roth’s first film is still my favorite of his films. It felt like he came out the gate immediately swinging and showing Hollywood and the horror community that he had something new and fresh to bring to the table. This film was an entirely original concept that played into the cabin in the woods, camping in isolation type horror themes, but made a gnarly virus the ultimate villain or evil of the film instead of a masked killer or entity. I love it. It maintained a violent and nasty, tense sort of atmosphere while still carrying a silly, weird, funny vibe with it as well. Which is something Eli Roth has gone on to do in various other projects, but I still think I enjoy the balance of humor the best in this one or Thanksgiving. This movie doesn’t take itself too seriously, but it’s still a level of serious because of the threat of the virus. The originality of that story itself and the simple beauty in the fact that this was his first movie and it was made for less money than probably any project he made after it and therefore done in more innovative and practical ways with what he had to work with makes this just carry a special place for me. The characters are all kind of hate-able which is also a common theme in Roth’s films, but I dig the story so much and there are some downright funny parts in the movie I think as well. Cabin Fever put Roth on the map from a Hollywood sense. It made way for his big break. Quentin Tarantino loved it so much that he wanted to work with him after seeing it and especially after they bonded over their love of old exploitation films. He ended up being one of the main producers on Roth’s next film ‘Hostel’ probably because of ‘Cabin Fever’ and those 2 films alone were enough to cement him a place within the modern horror space.
That’ll do it for this one though folks! Make sure to like my page on social media or come back to the website often to keep up with all my latest posts over things like horror film reviews (old & new movies), new film reviews of things I go to see or watch at home, WWE premium live events, NFL news and updates as the season is beginning to rapidly approach, and even occasional rankings lists like this one! New posts released weekly! Thank you for taking some time out today to give me a read and until next time, be good to one another!
