Well I think its commenting on people’s obsession with violence. Between movies, TV, and more importantly the news people use violence as a form of entertainment. They have for thousands of years. However since our society is now more “civilized” its easy to forget that Hostel and gladiator matches are supplying the same thing.

He does this by toying with our inner desire for violence. He shows us awful, dragged out, torturous scenarios and then doesn’t even show us the pay off. Be it when the boy gets shot, or when the mom strips.

And also the film was just brilliantly acted, brilliantly directed, and absolutely masterful in the suspense it created. In the scene where the boy is trying to hide in the house, Haneke uses lights turning on to create multiple situations of the boy being a “deer caught in the headlights”. That scene was one of the most terrifying scenes I have ever witnessed.