Heather Matarazzo

  • Welcome to the Dollhouse (1995)

    Welcome to the Dollhouse (1995)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, July 2019) Considering that I disliked Hostel II largely because it killed off Heather Matarazzo’s character midway through, you can imagine that I’m no more favourably inclined toward Welcome to the Dollhouse. No, her character doesn’t die in here … but considering that she plays a junior high outcast who spends the entire film being treated cruelly by schoolmates, teachers and family there is a limit to watching the amount of abuse even a fictional character can take. From writer-director Todd Solondz, the gratuitous cruelty is the point of his dark so-called humour but that means the film is actively unpleasant. At times, it seems as if Welcome to the Dollhouse presses every one of my buttons as an aggravated filmgoer: the low-budget muddy realistic filmmaking; the episodic structure; the character who becomes a cosmic black hole of suffering; and the lack of a satisfying ending. It’s all there, so no surprises if I’m less than enthusiastic about the result. An ordeal more than a film-going experience, I can happily live the rest of my life without having to watch Welcome to the Dollhouse ever again.

  • Hostel Part II (2007)

    Hostel Part II (2007)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, June 2018) Yuck. I mean, that’s what the filmmakers were after, right? When you make a movie about people being tortured for fun (for the torturer’s fun, not the victims), you’re aiming both for appreciation from gore-hound horror fans (of which I am not) and for condemnation from mainstream audiences, further reinforcing the appreciation from the fans. Hostel II picks up soon after the original Hostel, not forgetting to kill off the first film’s protagonist before getting down to business with three new victims. Despite writer/director Eli Roth’s avowed aim to squick the mundanes, it’s all very familiar and dull for much of the film. It really does itself no favour by horribly killing off Heather Matarazzo’s likable character—thus forever earning antipathy from the audience. If they hadn’t done that, I may have had a better appreciation for the film’s third-act twists and turns: the changing power dynamics between the two would-be torturers, or the way the final girl outwits the system through money and merciless violence. (Those who claim that Hostel II has deeper thematic value may not be wrong, but they’re clinging to intellectual scraps left by a filmmaker far more interested in the sight of exposed viscera.)  All I’m left with is the basic yuck and the certitude that I don’t need to see Hostel II ever again.