Sale temps à l'hôtel El Royale

Un Tarantino sans Tarantino. Alors que dans son précédent film, La Cabane dans les bois, Drew Goddard jonglait de manière unique avec les clichés du genre horrifique, ici il se contente d’essayer maladroitement de concocter quelque chose à partir d’ingrédients de films de gangsters et d’une variété de personnages placés dans une situation précaire. Mais le problème réside dans ces personnages. La définition des deux antagonistes (les filles) est vague et leur collision accidentelle avec l’intrigue principale (Jeff Bridges à la recherche de quelque chose) apparaît comme superficielle. Et le personnage qui fonctionne le moins et qui constitue même le pire casting du film est celui joué par Chris Hemsworth, qui aurait dû au contraire faire décoller la fin du film. Sale temps à l’hôtel El Royale ne parvient pas non plus à exploiter correctement le potentiel du motif d’être « au mauvais endroit au mauvais moment ». Le mélange des différentes temporalités n’est pas développé de manière intelligente et le rythme est inutilement lent par endroits, reposant sur des dialogues qui manquent de raffinement. Jeff Bridges s’en tire toutefois avec les honneurs, Dakota Johnson est mieux adaptée au rôle d’une garce qu’à celui de l’ingénue de Cinquante nuances de Grey, et le jeune Lewis Pullman, dans un rôle secondaire, est finalement celui de tous qui fait le plus sens. (05/12/2022)

C'est un peu Tarantino, un peu La Cité de Dieu, un peu de quelque chose que nous connaissons et que nous ne parvenons pas à nommer, et ensemble ça fonctionne et tient la route. Comme à l'habitude, je me dois de critiquer la longueur : sans une longue introduction, le film aurait eu beaucoup plus de rythme et de dynamisme. Les personnages sont bien développés, j'ai aimé le concept des histoires par chambres, tout comme Chris Hemsworth qui, pour la première fois, joue un rôle négatif de parfait idiot. Réflexion faite, il est difficile de trouver des personnages positifs dans ce film. (05/11/2023)

Drew Goddard, the director of the great The Cabin in the Woods, did not please me at all with this one and after a long time I left the cinema completely bored. (I guess the other four people in the cinema fell asleep and my friends said after an hour that if someone doesn't die and soon, we leave). I had high hopes for this film, the trailers were promising, there decent actors, an attractive premise, and there was also the similarity to both Identity and The Hateful Eight, which I liked, but this one unfortunately failed with me. The film is 142 minutes long and doesn't offer enough enticing material to fully entertain and satisfy the viewer. The hotel with a hidden secret was fine, the sets are nice, the music is great music, and at first I was even entertained by the unknown mystery, but it didn't really go anywhere. Most of the time is given to Jeff Bridges and Cynthia Erivo, who are probably the least interesting characters in the film, with only Dakota Johnson surprisingly pulling it off as an actor, and then Chris Hemsworth, but he shows up half an hour before the end, and that felt like a letdown. The twists and turns are unexpected but not shocking (Lewis Pullman slightly surprised in the ending), the dialogue is futile and the lack of blood and action scenes is a minus for me. There is only one shootout at the end and it's over before I could say shoemaker. Too bad the director didn't pull something in the style of The Cabin in the Woods, it would have fit nicely here. A tedious and not very entertaining film, but it has its own vibe. 60%. (23/10/2018)

Several people arrive at a small hotel in the middle of nowhere. They have nothing in common at first glance, but in a few hours most of them will be dead, and the rest will be really upset. Drew Goddard directs a smart film in the style of Tarantino with interesting characters, good actors and fun direction. It does run out of breath a bit towards the end, but overall it manages to entertain quite nicely thanks to the ideas, the characters and a few rough twists. It probably won't be a genre classic like The Cabin in the Woods, though. (12/10/2018)

I would give it 5 stars and would possibly be raving about the return to the dark 90s and how this is the best film of 2018 if it weren’t for some particular moments of the screenplay. This way the movie “only” qualifies for a pretty good genre film which reminds me of the best gangster movies of the 1990s put into a rainy, Seven-like feel. Have you noticed how the rain plays an important role in the atmosphere of similar films? It’s a pity I didn’t have the chance to experience a downpour comparable to the one in the movie in real life this year. Films are soon going to be the only thing reminding me of what rain even is. Anyway, from a film-making point of view Bad Times at The El Royale is a real smash. The closed setting of the hotel sometimes made me feel like I was watching an adaptation of some Agatha Christie detective novel. The well-written characters and dialogues then reminded me of Tarantino. Only here they fortunately didn't launch into endless discussions about nothing and most of the two and a half hours was pure action. All acting performances were brilliant but you gotta applaud Jeff Bridges in particular. (31/12/2018)