The Royal Hotel

Kitty Green's drama, The Royal Hotel is a slow burn that never ignites. The film follows two young Canadian backpackers, Liv (Jessica Henwick) and Becky (Julia Garner), who take on bartending jobs at a remote pub in the Australian Outback. The pub is owned by the enigmatic Bill (Hugo Weaving), and the clientele is made up of a rough-and-tumble bunch of miners.

As the film progresses, Liv and Becky find themselves increasingly isolated and vulnerable. The men at the pub are increasingly aggressive and predatory, and the women are forced to constantly navigate their way through dangerous and uncomfortable situations.

The Royal Hotel is a well-acted film, with particularly strong performances from Henwick and Garner. However, the film's slow pace and lack of suspense eventually become its undoing. The film is more interested in creating a sense of atmosphere and dread than in telling a compelling story. Unfortunately, it never quite succeeds in either.

One of the biggest problems with The Royal Hotel is that it never really gives the audience a reason to care about the two main characters. Liv and Becky are thinly drawn characters, and their motivations are never fully explored. As a result, it's difficult to feel any real tension or suspense when they are in danger.

Another problem with the film is its pacing. The Royal Hotel is a very slow-moving film, and it often feels like nothing is happening. There are long stretches of the film where the only thing happening is Liv and Becky serving drinks to the miners. This makes the film feel very tedious and boring at times.

Finally, The Royal Hotel's climax is both unsatisfying and confusing. The film builds up to a major confrontation between Liv, Becky, and the miners, but the climax is ultimately resolved in a very anti-climactic way. The film ends with a number of unanswered questions, and the audience is left feeling confused and frustrated.

Overall, The Royal Hotel is a disappointing film. It's a well-acted film with a great atmosphere, but it's also a slow-moving and unsatisfying film. But I wouldn't call this film a thriller as it offers no thrills or much suspense for the audience. The film literally made me yawn a few times during its runtime.

This movie is a dramatic interpretation of the documentary film "hotel coolgardie" (I reviewed that also on IMDb)

It tells the story of two backpackers travelling through Australia and they take up a job via a job agency (very common in Australia backpacking community). Only downside the hotel is in south Australia in a mining location.

They are met with a culture shock of how rough the men are and how the women have to cope with chauvinism.

The movie portrays real life in the mining towns of southern Australia where the pub is the main gathering location and where men drink far too much.

There are a few scenes where artistic license is used to make for a more dramatic movie but all in all it's a true reflection of the experiences many female travellers have.

I recommend to watch and then view "Hotel Coolgardie" to compare.

This was a decent enough film on its own merits, however I urge anyone who enjoyed it, or even thought they were going to enjoy it but didn't, to watch Hotel Coolgardie. This is the true story documentary that the film is based on. The film is set in a very similar place, but the characters in the film, rough as they might be supposed to be, are far more clean cut than the people in real life. They are also far less sinister than the real life people, albeit it's more subtle in the documentary. Hotel Coolgardie really shows the pitfalls of isolation and toxic masculinity, and paints a really frightening portrait of rural Australia.

I read the description of this movie expecting either a drama or a crime movie, but I got neither. What I did get to see was a portrait of an Australian pub. Period. Sometimes a bit rowdy as in any pub. And that's it. What the what?

The bad: this story is going nowhere. 2 female pub employees serve beer and ocassionally hang out with some of the pub visitors. Wanna watch that for 90 minutes long? I got bored.

There is a final to this story that does not make sense at all, making me further question the capabilities of the writer of this script.

Kinda tedious. Kinda lame. Nothing much happens except some common pub rowdiness. And that is suppose to be the basis of an entire movie?

Not any good then? Jennifer Garner is a great actress. SHE was THE reason I started watching this movie, but her performance cant cover up the simple fact that this story is void of any drama or thrill. What a dud.

The Royal Hotel sets itself up as a slow-burning psychological thriller with an interesting premise and a setting ripe for tension. The story follows two backpackers who take jobs at a remote Australian pub, where they must navigate the rowdy and often unsettling behavior of the predominantly male patrons. While the film's laid-back pacing and immersive atmosphere make for a somewhat engaging watch, it ultimately stumbles in its execution, particularly in its final act.

The biggest issue lies in how the climax squanders the film's most promising elements. The pub itself, with its claustrophobic feel and the ever-growing aggression of the drunk and unpredictable customers, seems tailor-made for a nerve-wracking escalation. However, instead of truly capitalizing on this, the film meanders, failing to push the tension to its full potential. The character of Dolly, whose presence hints at something more menacing, is severely underutilized in the final confrontation. What should have been a gripping, high-stakes moment fizzles out, leaving the resolution feeling unearned.

The ending, in particular, is frustratingly weak. Instead of a decisive or thematically satisfying conclusion, the protagonists make a baffling choice that feels more like a narrative cop-out than a natural resolution. Their decision to simply walk off with their bags, after everything that's transpired, makes for an anticlimactic and unsatisfying conclusion. It's as if the film itself is unsure how to wrap things up, resulting in a final stretch that lacks impact and cohesion.

Overall, The Royal Hotel has an intriguing setup and some effectively unsettling moments, but it ultimately misses the opportunity to fully exploit its setting and characters to deliver a truly gripping thriller. It builds toward something potentially great, only to lose its way at the finish line.