OT: Bad Times at the El Royale (NO SPOILERS)

I went out to see this movie, which I suppose is better recommended as a rental (and how is that term used nowadays? Its not a rental tape, it might be a Redbox DVD, but not a Blockbuster DVD -- you can order from your cable company or off streaming.) But I read that the movie was long and my personal rule is: go to the theater where you can concentrate on the movie AND.. "go out to the movies" once in a while. A fine habit for decades now.

"Bad Times at the El Royale" is a rare bird: NOT a remake or a sequel or a superhero movie, rather the kind of movie that the studios put out in the fall. This one opened with the full "20th Century Fox" logo and fanfare -- its not a "Fox Searchlight" indie; its got some money behind it, principally demonstrated by a cast with some names in it and very plush production values. I expect it will make some money in theater -- not a lot -- and then roam the cable dial for years as a good movie to watch on a Saturday night.

No movie is TOTALLY original, and this one borrows from Agatha Christie and The Hateful Eight: 7 disparate characters arrive at the same isolated rundown Lake Tahoe hotel-ish motel(its too big for a motel, too small for a hotel)....and they all have secrets. Some have secret identities, some have secret missions.

You got: Jeff Bridges (as a priest.) As our Nicholsons, Connerys, Hackmans and Redfords leave the stage...Mr. Bridges moves into "senior national treasure status" and I watched him with pleasure. I've grown up with him.

You got: Jon Hamm(as a vacuum cleaner salesman with a rich Southern accent.) Bridges and Hamm are the first clues that this will be a good movie -- they are pretty careful about the scripts they choose. In Hamm's case, his distinctively funny yet menacing salesman pretty much dominates the expository dialogue that sets up the movie -- he owns the movie for awhile until the other characters "jell."

You got: Dakota Johnson, as a mysterious woman who signs "F U" into the hotel register. She's trying to move on from the "Fifty Shades" series, yet she now trails the sexuality of that film. Her clothes stay on in this film, but tightly on a nice body, and she's just plain sexy(its that waif-like, girl next door face that does it). Yet haunted. And troubled. And dangerous. (A reminder: she is the daughter of Don Johnson, whom she facially resembles, and Melanie Griffith, whom she does not ; and she is the granddaughter of Tippi Hedren, who is very much alive and in Dakota's life.)

You got: Chris Hemsworth(as Charles Manson, pretty much -- this is the first of several movies out to undercut QT's Manson movie.) Lest I seem too sexist about Dakota Johnson in this film, let it be known that Mr. Hemsworth plays his role mainly with his shirt off(or fully open) to reveal his six pack and Thor-sculpted body at all times(if Manson had looked THIS good, he would have had 1000's of followers.) I did like that, in one shared shot, Jeff Bridges (who once upon a time was as young and sculpted as Hemsworth, in Thunderbolt and Lightfoot and in Cutter and bone, for two) is now "the old guy" standing next to himself of 4 decades ago. The baton is passed. And Old Jeff Bridges is still a cool guy.

You got: Nick Offerman...the amusing self-parodying "middle aged macho man"(with big moustache sometimes, big beard others) from Parks and Recreation and marriage to that Will and Grace lady. Offerman is a "name" now, but the irony in this movie is that in his two scenes, you can't really see him: he is filmed in continuous long shot at a distance in one scene, and wearing a mask in the other. But that's him, and he's a name.

Those are the "names" in El Royale, but two other lesser known actors anchor it, too:

You got: Cynthia Erivo. An African-American actress who proves the true lead of the picture -- all the "names" are pretty much supporting HER. And, in an art film touch, Erivo, playing a wannabee Motown-Diana Ross lounge singer, is allowed to sing, one, two, THREE songs all the way through, acapella, at different junctures in the picture.

And you got: Lewis Pullman, as the spindly, scaredy-cat sole employee of the El Royale, in bellman's uniform but also desk clerk, bartender, and housekeeping.

With its "motel in the middle of nowhere" setting, and its weird sole proprietor (who, yes, can peep in the rooms); El Royale has some Psycho/Shining lineage, and given that we're in Lake Tahoe, some Rat Pack nostalgia. The fictional El Royale is a hotel which sits on the California/Nevada state line, which runs through the hotel (you can only gamble on the Nevada side) , the room wings, the parking lot. This is based on a REAL, now closed hotel called the "Cal-Neva Lodge," where I once stayed with my family in 1969 and where I swam from "Nevada to California" by simply swimming the length of the pool.

Funny thing: Bad Times at the El Royale is set in 1969, too. So...such nostalgia.