Great great film. Great cast. Love my man Jeff Bridges, A very intimate film. And the soundtrack was awesome.
I was hoping to see. Maybe I’ll be able to see it when we’re in the Midwest.
I saw it a week ago and liked it a lot. Good cast, and I also liked the set design. Beyond that, I don’t want to say too much so as not to spoil anything.
Just got back. Love the lighting, framing, an other artsy stuff that an expert could tell you about. I like the story development. I like that I couldn’t see how things were going to turn out though the “3rd reel” made certain things inevitable. I, too, will abstain from saying anymore.
Probably won’t go to see it at the el cine with the la spousa. 
Probably later at the la casa.
I’m planning on seeing it sometime this week. It is one of the few movies that I have been excited for in a long time.
Truly cringeworthy Spanglish (no offense).
I thought the ending fell apart.
[spoiler]Having the hotel clerk be this bad-ass sniper who saves everyone felt like the writers trapped themselves in a corner, and said ‘Fuck it, let’s just give one of them combat skills we’ve never hinted at before.’
However, I am wondering if I missed some detail in his room that was shown in the background when Hamm or Bridges visited it for the key/film. If there had been something in there that hinted he was ex-military the ending wouldn’t feel like a cheat. But then, given how bad he felt about his experiences in the war, why would he have any mementos? If there were then that doesn’t fit his character as shown.[/spoiler]
Yeah, I just don’t like the ending.
Also,
Give he just saved your asses, I would have taken his body from the burning building.
Yes, but it allowed the audience to have at least a bit of an OH MY GOD moment, when
[spoiler] hotel clerk, in obvious distress, is lamenting that he has done so many more bad things. Things they didn’t even know about.
“I’ve…killed people. So many people.”
[horrified] "How many people have you killed??? [/horrified]
“123” [/spoiler]
For a moment, I lost myself to that OMG reaction. Thinking he was referring to events at the El Royale that he participated in, related to certain secrets of the hotel.
Then we realize what he is referring to, and we go from horrified to extremely sympathetic.
It was a whiplash turn for me. In a movie where I just think the director is manipulating me, I’d resent it. But in this film I found it masterful. BRA-VO!
Umm,** Patch**'s spoiler shows up in my post and I can’t seem to close it? Is that what others see? Sorry if that is the case. Not sure how to quote spoilers, I guess.
Set up was better than the payoff, but it was well worth seeing.
Works for me?
Anyway, I didn’t find the reveal that amazing, even with the transition line.
The number was just too big. Basically, it’s trying to make him an amazing bad-ass, but because there’s no set-up establishing him as such, again, I just see it as writing your way out of a corner.
Also,
I was expecting the third man from the robbery to appear. He killed the brother, and didn’t find the money. Why not tail the first brother when he’s out of prison to see where the money went? Having him appear and create a situation where Bridges could get the upper hand over Hemsworth would have been better than what they did.
Re: the desk clerk
I think it makes perfect sense that he was ex-military, since it seems highly unlikely that the FBI would’ve trusted a regular civilian with such a broad assignment of ongoing surveillance, especially one so political in nature. They would want someone who could be trusted to follow orders and a war “hero” with that many kills on the battlefield would be an ideal candidate–even one suffering from PTSD and substance abuse (likely nurtured after being assigned that gig). So I think his placement in the hotel is the farthest thing from a contrivance, and the statement about his kill count is 100% in the nature of a noir-turned-horror film (which is essentially where the film dives into in the 3rd act) and is just as nicely subverted by the truth.
Bridges’s sentence was probably much longer and he only got early parole because of his death sentence diagnosis. So the likelihood of the 3rd robber just biding his time for that to happen is very low, imhoy.
By the way IMHO the identity of the person on the film is
MLK
given
The involvement of Hoover and the film handed to Darlene
Regarding that,
[SPOILER]since the guy in the film died recently, the two obvious candidates are MLK or RFK. I’m not sure there’s any reason to suspect one over the other.
And I was a bit amused at the story Miles (the hotel clerk) told of the guy and the wolf. “It wasn’t sexual but it wasn’t not sexual either.”[/SPOILER]
But
[spoiler]
Did the FBI run the operation? I was under the impression it was a mob thing. If the FBI ran it, why all the secrecy? Just go in and get it. Why hunt for microphones/ They should know they exist, and finding them is not relevant to getting the film back.
My interpretation was the FBI stumbled on the possibility the hotel was a set-up and knew someone important may have been caught (or knew for certain), sent in Hamm who confirmed it with the room search, and wanted to get the film without revealing that they were involved.[/spoiler]
Sometimes furries just want to cuddle. 
That’s not the way I understood it. Hamm knew what he was looking for in the room. He went from wall plate to wall plate, from phone to fan, etc. When he was on the payphone, he told his bosses that he had retrieved “their” items.
I believe he also mentioned that he found some that were not theirs. Which peaked his curiosity. THEN he found the other stuff, which was likely as you surmised.
But he was just on a retrieval mission. Get in, get the items, get out.
Just saw this last night. First off, I think the past few posts are confusing the Jon Hamm FBI character with the hotel employee. The way I understood it, the hotel was owned by some unknown criminal group that presumably used the two-way mirror footage for extortion purposes. However, the FBI also set up wiretaps for spying in the honeymoon suite. That’s why the Jon Hamm character got there so early and demanded that room. His mission was to dissemble the wiretaps since the hotel was no longer a hot spot for the rich and famous. In doing so, he discovered a whole bunch of other snooping devices so alerted his superiors through the pay phone outside. I thought the ending was great and neatly explained the personality of the hotel worker. My only problem was how the singer suddenly whacked the priest with the bottle near the beginning. Perhaps she somehow watched him spiking her drink, but it didn’t seem like she would go that far. But a really good film. Very Tarantino-esque.