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This piece was written during the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike. Without the labour of the actors currently on strike, the film being covered here wouldn’t exist.

It only takes the mere presence of women in a land that’s mostly dominated by men to have everything spiral out of control so fast. Kitty Green’s followup to her first narrative feature The Assistant, which took an unflinching look at what went on behind the scenes in a male-dominant workspace, The Royal Hotel goes for something with a much larger scope – perhaps even embracing genre conventions at that. Because that’s also how The Royal Hotel plays out; as if it were almost like a horror movie about the experiences of women in a spot where men take control of everything.

Starring Julia Garner and Jessica Henwick, The Royal Hotel tells the story of Hanna and Liv, two women on vacation in Australia while their finances are in the gutter. Eventually, they take a job at the Royal Hotel, a bar in the Australian outback hoping to repay their debts, but eventually they find that with being some of the only women around, a situation unfolds at the bar that slowly starts spiraling out of control. That’s all one really needs to know about The Royal Hotel before coming in, because the true story upon which this film is based on is rather horrifying at that – and I think Kitty Green made a wise decision with letting the whole thing unfold as if it were a thriller.

Green’s influences are clear as day: taking from films like Wake in Fright and Walkabout, which explored the horrifying side of the Australian outback. But even when we’re mostly within the indoor setting, the best thing about a film like The Royal Hotel is present in how Kitty Green makes you feel the tension arising from so many factors: the perspectives of outsiders in a land they’re unfamiliar with, the nature of the area itself, but also a very blunt look at what women experience on the daily while they’re just doing their job. Where The Assistant takes an approach where you feel the pressure building up on the inside, The Royal Hotel is a film that captures the unease more outwardly, like a thriller.

But I also find that when Green embraces the elements of a genre thriller, it seems like there’s another film being made entirely with her more restrained sensibilities behind the camera. For me, that’s where The Royal Hotel seems to feel like its own commentary is muddied. Given the actual story which this film was based on, I also can’t help but feel as if this ends up doing her own message a disservice. Eventually, the repetitive nature of The Royal Hotel was something I found had become really hard to truly connect with in this film – especially when the two leads feel underwritten, even when there’s a greater point being made about the nature of men in a working environment like what they’re made to experience. This obviously isn’t the fault of either Garner or Henwick (both of whom are excellent), but it just feels a bit frustrating.

Considering the films that Green is taking influence from, part of me also feels like she could have embraced those genre’s more outwardly elements in order to pull us in more. With how this film presents itself, it seems like she’s stuck within trying to tell a story with the same restraint that lets everything unfold so cleanly. It seems like there’s also a bit of a dissonance there and the real-world horror which the film is built up from, which only makes the payoff feel unearned. But with how well-crafted each moment of a small microaggression between how the men and women interact with one another in this run-down pub, I also couldn’t help but feel as if there’s not nearly enough to latch onto as its point is rather simple – making even those moments feel lesser with how bleak its context is.

There’s stuff to admire about The Royal Hotel, because Kitty Green and Julia Garner are unstoppable in their collaborations with each other. Yet it seems to me that there’s not nearly enough to carry itself as it all rings a little too simply, with the nature of the real story upon which The Royal Hotel was based on. At times it’s horrifying, and Green deserves the highest marks for getting us into the headspace of feeling those aggressions slowly building up one by one as it leads us into a room with a ticking time bomb. But even as things as shown here can go off the rails, part of me wishes that the film was able to do the same rather than keep everything a tad too clean.

Watch the trailer right here.

All images via Neon.

Directed by Kitty Green
Screenplay by Kitty Green, Oscar Redding, based on the documentary film Hotel Coolgardie by Pete Gleeson
Produced by Liz Watts, Emile Sherman, Iain Canning, Kath Shelper
Starring Julia Garner, Jessica Henwick, Toby Wallace, Hugo Weaving
Release Date: October 6, 2023
Running Time: 91 minutes