Bad Times at the El Royale is a thrilling neo-noir from start to finish

Bad Times at the El Royale writer and director, Drew Goddard has outdone himself with a thrilling neo-noir film set in a seedy motel at the state-lines of California and Nevada where four strangers fight for their right to escape

Welcome to the El Royale, a bi-state establishment where everything that can go wrong will go wrong. Directed and written by Drew Goddard, who made his directorial debut with The Cabin in the Woods and is a hero for creating the Netflix series Daredevil, Bad Times at the El Royale  pieces together a compelling story that puts all his skills in one basket. Combining suspense, solid writing and killer action scenes that start up like jump scares.

Bad Times at the El Royale is a thrill-ride from it’s very opening moment where the film draws you in with a quiet scene that ends in a bang. The suspense is escalated by the lack of sound. Only natural noises break the silence as a man mysteriously digs up the floor boards in a hotel room, slowly prying apart each board with careful precision. At one point he faces a mirror, which is the camera, and combs his hair unaware that he’s being watched by the audience. It’s incredibly unnerving.

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The film takes place over one long night in the El Royale, a former gambling hotel built on the border of California and Nevada. Like some of its guests, the hotel is a shadow of what it once was. Struggling singer Darlene Sweet (Cynthia Erivo), salesman Laramie Sullivan (Jon Hamm), posing priest Father Daniel Flynn (Jeff Bridges), Emily Summerspring (Dakota Johnson) and her mentally unstable sister Rose Summerspring (Cailee Spaeny) all take up rooms for the night. It doesn’t take long for things to turn sour.

Like its guests, the hotel is not what it seems. Turns out the El Royale is a creepy hotel, some kind of pervert hotel, where each room has a one-way mirror so the employees can spy on the guests. As per instructed by management, the young concierge who runs the hotel (Lewis Pullman) videotapes guests doing dirty deeds and mails the tapes off.

Each guest has something to hide and the fact that they’re all being spied on only complicates things. Things get more lethal when cult leader Billy Lee (Chris Hemsworth) shows up to “rescue” one of his followers.

The film is broken up into segments that go back and forth in time, showing different perspectives given by each character. A single event may be shown four different times, slightly changed for the altered point of view. It’s rare when a film gives supporting characters individual times in the spotlight.

Every character gets a chance to tell their story and explain how they ended up at the El Royale. This ends up drawing the film out to an almost painful extent, while building a maze of overlapping plots that inversely make it wonderful.

Full of famous faces, no one lags behind. Every actor, even the unknown Cailee Spaeny, gives a solid performance. Haters of Dakota Johnson, who only hate her for being associated with Fifty Shades of Gray, should feel differently about her after this. Playing a cold-stone criminal with a dark past, Johnson may have kept her soft-spoken voice but there is nothing soft about her.

Jeff Bridges and Jon Hamm give their usual best and Cynthia Erivo’s performance is one for the books. Most known for her performance on the Broadway adaptation of “The Color Purple”, Bad Times at the El Royale is only her second feature film. You’d think she was already an acclaimed Academy Award winning actress.

But it’s Chris Hemsworth who steals the show. Not just how he dances around shirtless like an extra in the Magic Mike movies, but his charismatic performance is miles away from sweet Thor. No niceties, only an intimidating presence made of seductive anti-religion speeches and unpredictable violence. His presence takes the film from thriller to psychological riddle.

Just as all films do, Bad Times has something to say. Behind the criminal violence, there is a political story at work. The Civil Rights Movement and the Vietnam war created strong political debate during the 1960s, which is where the film takes place.

Despite the setting, Goddard doesn’t directly address any period points. Every topic is discussed with vague interest, as if it didn’t matter. And that’s because it doesn’t.

Hiding beneath the plot in Bad Times at El Royale, is an allegory for societal strife that hasn’t changed in more than 50 years. What happened then is not so different from what’s happening now. Government corruption, culture war, sex scandals; take away the stars and the plots are all the same. If it wasn’t for the fully stylized set to fit the ’60s, I would have thought this film was taking place during the Trump administration.

If there are any faults, it’s the length. Scenes go on forever without end. Just when you think it’s about to end something happens that goes on for another 30 minutes. It has a run time of 140 minutes, and at least 80 percent of that is talking or singing. However, it’s hard to complain about the long talking sessions because the dialogue is so good. It’s so good that it made a long line at the check-in desk feel exciting.

Bad Times at the El Royale is playing in theaters worldwide and is rated-R for strong violence and language.