Bad Times At The El Royale (2018) - Like It Or Not!

★★★☆☆

The film starts with an intriguing opening where a man enters a seemingly motel room, locks the door, checks the window, makes sure he's safe and not followed, then he moves the furniture, rolls up the carpet, pries open the wooden floor, hides a bag of something underneath, and then puts everything back in place. As it develops, it manages to keep us interested with frequent changes of POV, flashbacks and backstories to finally make up the whole picture which is kind of entertaining but weird and not so inspirational after all. It reminds me of some of Tarantino's films but less violent and dramatic!

Sure it's scary to be in a hotel where there're two-way mirrors peeking at you like those in the El Royale! Well, it seems like we're endowed with the nature of wanting to peek at someone else's life. We all sort of like movies because they somehow do work like a chance for us to peek at someone else's story, their privacy as entertainment so to speak, comfortably on the big screen! So to be or not to be is indeed the question! We all like to peek but not to be peeked. That's the very perverted part of our nature I guess!

The highlight of the show is supposed to be when the cult leader Billy Lee played by Christ Hemsworth arrives at the El Royale. It could be my bias but the whole film's well acted except the part of this guy! The ending sort of makes me sad and sigh. Over what? I think it's that life itself is like a gamble undoubtedly. It's, like it or not, of constant choices to make and whatever you choose, you lose! And there's no such a thing as a perfect decision that would please everyone!