Bad Times At The El Royale (2018) | Movie News & Review

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BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE (2018) MOVIE NEWS & REVIEW

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bad times at the el royale (2018) movie

Genre | Crime Thriller

Classification | MA 15+

Running time | 141 minutes

Released | 11 October 2018

cast

Jeff Bridges ... Father Daniel Flynn
Cynthia Erivo ... Darlene Sweet
Dakota Johnson ... Emily Summerspring
Jon Hamm ... Laramie Seymour Sullivan
Chris Hemsworth ... Billy Lee
Cailee Spaeny ... Ruth Summerspring
Lewis Pullman ... Miles Miller

director

Drew Goddard

writer

Drew Goddard

cinematographer

Seamus McGarvey ... director of photography

music

Michael Giacchino

film editor

Lisa Lassek

box office result

Worldwide $? million

Australia $? million

North America $? million

the best dialogue

Miles Miller: This is not a place for a priest, Father. You shouldn't be here.

Laramie Seymour Sullivan: [to Miles] We might need to work on your sales pitch, son. "The El Royale: no place for a priest.'

BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE (2018) MOVIE IMAGES

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BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE (2018) STORY SYNOPSIS

The El Royale is run-down hotel that sits on the border between California and Nevada. It soon becomes a seedy battleground when seven strangers -- a cleric, a soul singer, a traveling salesman, two sisters, the manager and the mysterious Billy Lee -- converge on a fateful night for one last shot at redemption before everything goes wrong.

BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE (2018) MOVIE REVIEW

Reviewed by Mark Geraghty | Review date 14 October 2018
Pop Movee Rating ⭐⭐⭐½

Drew Goddard’s BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE is an enigmatic film. The film positions itself as a Crime Thriller with literary-style pretensions to the likes of James Ellroy and the late Elmore Leonard. In cinematic terms, Goddard’s film will, without doubt, draw comparisons to Quentin Tarantino’s PULP FICTION (1994), as EL ROYALE features a number of scenes that will trigger the viewer to cast their mind back over twenty years to the moments in Tarantino’s masterpiece that pushed the boundaries of comprehension. In many ways, BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE does a better job of keeping its “strangeness” at arms length, but this doesn’t mean it’s a better movie. Far from it… BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE is an impenetrable piece of storytelling that, right up to the very end, refuses to reveal all of its secrets to the viewer.

There’s a nagging feeling about EL ROYALE that, in the hands of a more accomplished Director, the film may have been much more than what it ends up being. Drew Goddard is an experienced film & television writer, but his directorial experience is limited to his 2012 film THE CABIN IN THE WOODS (2012) and two episodes of the Ted Danson headlined Netflix series THE GOOD PLACE.

While it’s encouraging to see a Writer take the reins and deliver the finished product upon which their story is based, Goddard isn’t a visualist and his choice of Cinematographer for the film - Seamus McGarvey - isn’t one that helps. McGarvey has lensed plenty of memorable films and one of his most recent, THE GREATEST SHOWMAN (2017), was a visual treat, but, generally, the movies that he’s worked on are memorable for story or character; not visuals. Films like GODZILLA (2014), PAN (2015) and LIFE (2017) should have been all about the visuals, but, they’re largely forgettable movies (with the exception of Godzilla himself) with little visual flair. It’s shame for EL ROYALE, as this is a film that could have been steeped in a neo-Noir aesthetic.

The film’s staging makes a deliberate effort to create a sense of voyeurism with secret passageways, two-way mirrors, a deliberate lack of detail surrounding the hotel’s ownership and a shady cast of characters who have nothing in common other than the misfortune of having to “stay on the outskirts of Reno” because they can’t afford to play in the big time.

Goddard uses first-person point-of-view to reasonable effect through the first half of the film, but, by the time the action starts to escalate he opts for a much more conservative approach, relying upon traditional close-up and medium length shots with the corresponding reverse shot to capture character reactions. For middle section of the story, he uses a technique that shows the character’s first person perspective, but jumps from character to character. This helps to orientate the viewer as to what each character is doing at a pivotal point in the story, but it ends up being an unnecessary device given Goddard abandons the technique as the film enters its prolonged finale.

The reason to see BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE lies the eclectic array of characters Goddard populates his story with…

Jeff Bridges leads the cast as Father Daniel Flynn. Flynn is not what he appears to be and, unfortunately, one of the film’s trailers blew this plot element out of the water well before EL ROYALE’s release. Bridges turns in one of his better recent performances. While his trademark mumbling is present, he makes an effort to enunciate important expository lines so the viewer doesn’t miss a vital piece of information. Bridges isn’t entirely convincing, but he is solid enough that Flynn remains largely sympathetic throughout the entire film.

Dakota Johnson is sassy and tough as Emily Summerspring. Johnson’s character arrives at the El Royale shrouded in mystery and she becomes the central figure in unleashing the mayhem that occurs throughout the film’s 141 minute running time. Despite her reprehensible actions, it’s hard not to feel empathy for Emily. Life’s dealt her an awful hand and she is attempting to make the best of a terrible situation. Johnson delivers one of the two standout performances in the film and it’s hard not to feel sorry for her character, who is betrayed by the person she has spent so much of her time protecting from the evil of the world.

Jon Hamm plays Laramie Seymour Sullivan, a travelling vacuum cleaner salesman who seems far too smart and eloquent for his own good. Sullivan is the first of the group to arrive at the El Royale and his determination to secure the Honeymoon suite, despite being a single traveller, is a tip-off to the viewer that there is more to him than meets the eye. Hamm’s role, and his backstory, is the biggest missed opportunity in the film. Goddard reveals part of Sullivan’s background, but leaves it as a dangling plot thread that peters out to nothing as the film enters its second half.

Chris Hemsworth is the film’s weakest character and his involvement in the project seems to be designed to provide broad box office appeal. His bare-chested appearance in the film’s trailer is no one off occurrence. Hemsworth spends most of his screen time in open-shirt mode, but its not enough to compensate for the shortcomings in his performance as charismatic psychopath Billy Lee. Hemsworth’s accent is problematic. He’s meant to be a some kind of American West Coast late 1960s Hippie Preacher, but he doesn’t quite get the accent right, blunting the delivery of his lines and curbing the overall effectiveness of his performance. It’s a problem that been common in many of his performances, but not one that he seems to spend too much time fixing to make his character’s more authentic.

Lewis Pullman plays the sole remaining staff member of the El Royale, Miles Miller. Pullman delivers a fine portrayal of a young man whose seen more than someone his age should have. The secrets of the hotel are revealed mostly through Miller’s recollection of things that he’s done and seen while in the employ of the El Royale’s owners. Not all is as it seems though, as a Final Act revelation delivers a twist that makes Miller’s presence at the hotel very deliberate, acting as a contingency should events there ever get out of hand…

Cynthia Erivo delivers the other standout performance in BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE. It would be easy to write off Erivo’s character - Darlene Sweet - as a singer with a few affecting lines thrown in for the sake of plot development, but she turns out to be the story’s moral compass and helps some of the El Royale’s guests survive the fateful night at the hotel. As a black woman in the late 1960s, Erivo’s character has the opportunity to vocalise many of the issues currently being challenged by the #MeToo movement. Her scenes with Chris Hemsworth are a highlight, psychologically unravelling Billy Lee at a critical point in the story, refusing to participate in the very games that he is trying to convince those who follow him are the reason why “the system” must be brought to its knees. Darlene defies Billy Lee’s ramblings and declares that she’s heard it all before and that she’s grown tired of men like him...

The Verdict...

BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE is a film about the process of emotional fulfilment relative to motivation and how intention can influence outcome.

The story follows the relatively simple line that a person with good intentions will ultimately end up in better place irrespective of events that may happen along the way. It’s quite a conservative position in spite of the violence that befalls many of the film’s characters along the way.

It’s also quite a Judeo-Christian story, with a heavy emphasis on faith and a parable of the Christ story itself. Goddard’s story takes the position that misery and suffering are a part of life and even the very best of intentions don’t make people immune to bad things happening to them, but, those bad things provide an appreciation for what is good about life.

There’s also a sense that Goddard either chose not to or ran out of time & money to tell the whole story of the El Royale. A great deal of exposition is delivered in the early stages of the film establishing the hotel’s unique setting; split right down the middle by the state line dividing California and Nevada. So much, however, is left unsaid and unexplored.

Like another hotel that found fame in the lyrics of The Eagles “Hotel California”, the El Royale Hotel will let you “check out any time you like, but you can never leave”...

Characters escape with their lives, but the hotel’s mysteries will never be fully revealed because those who survive have little desire to recount what happened to them. The final scene of BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE is confirmation of this, where those with the best of intentions share nothing more than a knowing nod that they’ve escaped with their lives and they now need to get on with living.