This is a strange one, if you’d ask me. On the face of it, Bad Times at the El Royale is a very entertaining film, even admirable, and lovely to look at. At the same time, it relies so heavily on a certain aesthetic that the form threatens to overpower the film in a way that is a bit of a shame.
To be short, director Drew Goddard seems to have wanted to film a Quentin Tarantino movie. It has many of the same characteristics: a focus on elaborate monologues, prodigious use of music from specific eras, a mystery in which nobody is who they seem and which ends in a lot of bloody violence. And since the whole film takes place in a single hotel, Bad Times especially seems to ape The Hateful Eight. It even stars Jeff Bridges as an old badass and the story also has a murderous woman, so the similarities keep on coming.
Still, Bad Times has its own brilliant moments. What’s particularly interesting is how the storyline jumps around a bit chronologically, so we see the same events from the viewpoints of different characters, and each time take the next character to move the story forwards. That makes the film feel fresh and exciting, and gives us little surprises each time. Another unique selling point of this movie is that it shows off the actress and singer Cynthia Erivo. Many scenes actually play out with her singing in the background, and the first time this happens during a rather striking scene in which no one talks, the film is lifted up in a strange, haunting mood.
But then, the director started to fall in love too much with his own film and the whole thing became just a bit too self-indulgent. The monologues and posturing began to drag; particularly when a new character suddenly enters the scene in the second half. Cynthia Erivo sings just one or two times too often, in my opinion, so that my mind started wandering while waiting for the film to continue.
Overall, this was still quite the positive experience. Jeff Bridges does some very effective grimacing and I liked seeing Dakota Johnson in something other than a Fifty Shades of Grey film. Hopefully she can shrug off that image and keep building her acting career.
What may be challenging at the start of the film is just how much mystery is maintained in the story and how little we are told what is going on. We learn about this strange hotel and then we see four guests arrive, one after the other, and through some dialogues we learn a bit about who they are, but why they are all at this hotel is not explained yet. And when they all start behaving strangely, many viewers may wonder what the heck they are looking at, but for others that is part of the fun of letting a story unfold in a very controlled manner and keeping up the mystery and tension.
8/10
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