CHECK IN FOR A GOOD TIME AT THE EL ROYALE

MOVIE
Bad Times at the El Royale
Jeff Bridges, Cynthia Erivo, Dakota Johnson, Jon Hamm, Chris Hemsworth
Director: Drew Goddard
Review Ray Chan

If you don’t know Drew Goddard, you’ll surely know of his works such as TV’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Lost, and the eerie The Cabin in the Woods, which looked at events from a deconstructionist perspective, an approach he takes to another level in his second movie, the noir Bad Times at the El Royale.
    It gathers a group of strangers in the lavish motel which straddles the California/Nevada border, once home to the stars but now, in the late 60s, fallen on hard times.
    The front desk is unoccupied when guests start turning up: Laramie Seymour Sullivan (Jon Hamm), a travelling salesman; Darlene Sweet (Cynthia Erivo), a young black aspiring singer; Father Daniel Flynn (Jeff Bridges), an avuncular yet addled Indiana priest; and a wordly-wise mystery woman in sunglasses (Dakota Johnson). A young clerk, Miles (Lewis Pullman), eventually emerges from the maintenance closet and rooms are duly assigned.
    Once that setting is established, the viewer is enticed by the promise of good times at the Bad Times, as each person, much like in most accomplished mystery offerings, has something to hide. The rooms are all surreptitiously monitored via one-way mirrors, which provides Goddard the means of presenting the backstory of each occupant.
    The movie is broken into chapters, each named for a room number (or maintenance closet), and often ending with a surprise reveal about the guests.  The plot keeps on thickening, with new details and possibilities arriving at a frantic pace.
    The way everyone’s stories mingle and merge while redolent songs play in the background evokes memories of Tarantino offerings that twist and turn and tell tales from different perspectives which have to be pastiched together to make sense. But this film is one that’s more interested in telling an entertaining story than in being mysteriously aloof. Goddard gives much screen time to each character, thereby keeping the audience in suspense as to who the main protagonist is.
    The story takes a turn when Chris Hemsworth, playing a cult leader, arrives on the scene. He plays a solid enough role, but his accent, drifting between Australian, English and forced American, can prove to be irritating, particularly as his enunciation has often left much to be desired.
    Bridges, Jones and Pullman are the outstanding actors here, pulling off their roles with passion, panache and pulchitrude. But despite their performances, and the potential shown in the first half hour, there’s a slightly disappointing end to the movie, likely because there is no central theme to link the disparate threads, while others may feel the conclusion is unsatisfactory as it appears to let the bad guys win.
    Ultimately, while the audience may be kept on the edge of their seats expecting the twisted journey to reach a memorable destination, they may feel that as it turns out, the trip to the El Royale itself was the main focus all along.

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