Not a problem... I figured that I had your tastes pegged. Why? Because as of late I have been renting a myriad of these inadvertently.
See, I'm a huge fan of the Slasher Genre. My boyfriend is a huge fan of the Monster genre. We take turns. He'll rent "The Hidden" and I'll rent "Touristas." However, it seems that a lot of the newer seemingly slasher films tend to be more exploitative and torture-centric.
Everytime a new-to-us movie turns out that way, my boyfriend LOVES to point out, "Thanks for the torture." Because it's REALLY not my thing. I swear. :p Glad my dabblings in the wrong subgenre has been good for SOMEthing. ;)
Yeah, that's the trouble with the newer films. I think that a lot of them are drawing from the books of teenie-slashers (what I consider Scream and I Know What You Did) and combining them with the pages of pure torture, which was revived by Hostel (which you might want to check out if you haven't seen it, though it's more pure torture than anything else).
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Re:
The Decent. This is an absolute fantastic movie, but I'm not sure if it really coincides with your above criteria. I classify it more as a Monsters film (with lots of delightful claustrophobia). It lacks the exploitation and torture aspects that you seem to be looking for. HOWEVER, this is definitely in my horror top-10, so I am NOT going to say, "Don't see it."
Re:
Captivity. Since you didn't really like House of Wax, you might not like Captivity. Honestly, I HATED the film, but I thought it might be something that you'd like. It's definitely torture-centric, but the Big Bad is SERIOUSLY weak, the settings overly elaborate (you seem to like more of the simple settings, whereas the setting here is a giant mansion torture chamber essentially), and the ending is LAME. But just throwing it out there. In case.
On the other hand, if you're willing to diverge into Monster territory, you might want to check out
Jeepers Creepers, which I thought was INCREDIBLY underrated. It definitely has aspects of the creepy and macabre torture that you seem to enjoy and definitely emphasizes the concept of the vulnerable hunted. It might be a good Runner Up to add to your list.
Also, you might want to check out
Tooth and Nail. Again, this was NOT a movie that I liked (actually I HATED it), but you might enjoy Michael Madsen dressed up like a viking (and leading a viking clan) mercilessly hunting down a surviver colony in a post-apocalyptic America. The movie itself was weak, the reasons behind the apocalypse LAME, the ending TERRIBLE, but you might enjoy the hunting scenes (which is a good 2/3 of the movie).
SPEAKING of this year's 8 Films to Die For, definitely see
Borderland. I would say that, by far, it was the best of this year's After Dark film festival. It starts out as a seemingly cliche Spring Break movie, but it is a lot more complicated than that. It has elements of torture and exploitation, and also really elongated and intense death scenes. It took a while to get into, but I trust you, once you do, you will not regret it.
Oooooo, I looooooove seeing the victims become frightening primal... One of the few things that I enjoy about victims-become-victimizers films (not always my favorite genre because I feel, for the most part, it's poorly done). Thanks for the recommendation, Rod.
I'm adding it to the Netflix queue now.