The Million Dollar Hotel (2000) – 2/5

Definitely not a one-in-a-million movie

„The Million Dollar Hotel“ is a co-production between Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States of America and this film is from the first year of the new millennium. The inclusion of Germany here stems mostly from Wim Wenders being in charge of directing the film. He is surely also among the biggest names attached to the project and I will get to the others a little later. Anyway, this film was restored recently and today they showed the finished digital version at a pretty big movie theater here in Berlin. I am not sure if this version will be shown a couple more times in the coming weeks or if it was really a one-time thing, but it is not too important anyway. As you can see from my rating, I would not really recommend the watch. The creative driving force behind the project was not Wenders, but singer Bono from U2. He shot a music video on top of the building mentioned in the title and this was apparently inspiring enough for him to also make a full film dedicated to it, even if it is more about the people living in there than about the building itself. You can say that this is not a nice place in Los Angeles. Many junkies there, disabled people and the building also exists in real in the Los Angeles area and I found out that sadly today not a lot is better compared to the year 2000 or 1999 already despite almost 25 years having passed since then. Sad state of affairs. But today we wanna talk about the film: Wenders was also present tonight and answered a few questions after the screening. That was the main reason why I went. For example, apart from some of the stuff I already talked about, we also find out that he was initially just there to advise and not immediately selected as the director. He even kinda had the task to suggest a director that could fit the project. I am glad I went last night to see him and he is always interesting to listen to. The only thing I was not too happy about was how he badmouthed Mel Gibson.

The latter is on this film playing one of the biggest supporting characters, maybe the biggest even. So he is definitely a very big name here. Another would be Milla Jovovich, who was very pretty back then and reminded me a bit of the young(er) Olivia Wilde. Her acting was okay, but not great. Same can be said about almost everybody else from the cast. The one person there that I would really wanna mention is Peter Stormare. His performance as John Lennon or rather a John Lennon impostor was one of not too many highlights of the film, especially if we are looking at comedic highlights. Many will know him from „Fargo“, but here he is at least as good, if not better. I was pretty young when this film was released and not particularly into movies, so cannot say how Jovovich was perceived back then. She was surely in a really big Hollywood film before that and even played a key character there. Centenarian Gloria Stuart that most will know from „Titanic“ is also in here, but sadly she has nothing to really work with. She worked with Wenders on other occasions, also in her very final performance. Jimmy Smits will be mostly appreciated by the TV people, the ones who love watching the small screen. I like him, he has always great recognition value and I thought of „Dexter“ first when reading the name. Julian Sands also deserves a mention. He did not have a lot of screen time, considerably less than Smits for example, but every time he was on, he was pretty commanding. And of course I must also mention the lead actor and that would be Jeremy Davies. Definitely not a star by any definition from today’s perspective, but I mostly remember him from „Justified“ now. Interesting to see him as a lead in a Wim Wenders film. I will comment more on his character a little later. I also felt that I saw Richard Belzer in one scene on the stairs, but cannot find him in the credits, so not sure if it was really him. Blink and he will be gone.

Also not credited is Tim Roth, but he was definitely in this movie. We see him in a crucial scene towards the end and also afterwards on some photographs. Aside from that, his character is always talked about as he is the victim in an ongoing murder investigation. His character is the son of an influential media mogul. If we take a quick look at the crew again, you will read the name Nicholas Klein there as the second writer next to Bono. I think the two were friends, maybe still are, but Klein has not been too prolific over the years. He worked with U2 of course and this is also not his only collaboration with Wim Wenders. As for Bono himself, he is also in this movie. But again it is the case that if you blink during the wrong moment, he will be gone. He also has no dialogue, just stands there on one occasion. Finally, Wally Pfister, an Oscar winner now, and known for working with Chris Nolan mostly, was also part of this film in a smaller position. Pretty interesting because this is from the same year that he was already the man in charge of the photography from „Memento“ and working for almost a decade in the industry. If we look at the plot, I must say I had some issues with this film. I was honestly curious who killed Roth’s character, but the solution and the road to finding out was shoddy to say the least. It may have had to do with my personal perception that I did not like the protagonist at all. I was also wondering if he was maybe just pretending to be disabled, but turned out he wasn’t. The jump down there from the building, so basically a second suicide, just not an assisted one this time, made for an okay framework that goes back to the beginning of the film, but it was still a bit strange because in the end it almost looks as if he jumps right after Roth’s character dies, but the truth is that there were many days in-between. Of course, an artistic choice, but here I would say that it did not feel half as memorable as it could have felt.

This is also true in terms of everything linked to Mel Gibson’s character. The scene when he was talking to the victim’s father in the car relatively early on was a bit on the cringeworthy side there with the dialogue how he says he has to finish fast because he wants to see his fiancée on the weekend. I did like though that Gibson was not the kind of cop who knew the real truth when everybody was misled, something you often see in films. He was actually wrong and helped the one who did it escape. Same can be said about the father where the usual route would have been that he says he suspects that the confession is not authentic, but he simply believes it and he is right. Well, in a way he is right because the protagonist’s confession came rather from the background that he was doing his friends a favor. Must have been quite a revelation too for Jovovich’s character when she finds out what really happened and who did it. With her I was a bit unsure from the very start. Is her character actually real or just a figment in the imagination of the men surrounding her? I mean they all had their malfunctions, most even in their heads, so it was a very legitimate possibility. But at the latest when you see her being interviewed in a way or filmed when she is praying or something, and we see her on the screen, then we know that she is actually a really existing person and there is no longer a way back to saying that she does not exist. As for Mel Gibson and his character, I already talked about a moment that I did not like too much and there are others too. One would be when he sits there and talks to the group and shows us and them how tough he is. Or wants to be. I mean if we look at his health background, then he has managed an impressive career, but now it comes back to him in a way that actually maybe to some extent he also could be somebody living inside the Million Dollar Hotel, but he is on the other side of the law. But the scene I was just talking about was so strange, how he fires a shot in the air to get their attention, maybe their respect or fear even you could think and at the same time we see that everything is under water and nobody seems to care at all. They are just still talking about the toilet issue from a few days ago.

Alright. Later on, those scenes when he is physically suffering and waiting for an item to be delivered that he needs to function again, to be able to work again, these scenes did almost nothing for me here. I mean Mel Gibson was a global superstar at that point and I think he is definitely a talented actor and filmmaker, but with this film here he was kinda wasted. Despite the decent amount of screen time he got. Perhaps he should have declined when Bono approached him. Must be among his weakest films overall. There was also this scene when he shows up in some dark alley and saves Jovovich’s character from being raped. Another moment there when it was clear that the young woman does exist. This was still so odd. I mean nobody talked about this scene later on ever again. It could have been the entire foundation for another movie, but it was just simply forgotten, especially by Jovovich’s character herself, despite how it must have been a really traumatic experience in theory. This is pretty much it. There were more than just a few issues here that got me thinking that this could have been a much, much better film overall with more precision and better attention to detail in the screenplay. But Bono is only a good song writer, if at all. Okay, let’s not be too harsh here. I surely do like some of his music. Not gonna lie. But a good film writer he is not. I also don’t blame Wenders. There are some okay shots in here and there are probably not many directors out there, if any at all, that could have turned this screenplay into a good film. It was just lacking in class. The decent moments are rare enough and then also more about comedy than depth. One example would be the beaver talk. Overall, I come to the conclusion to give the outcome here a thumbs-down. Not recommended.