• Review by Leo Mayr- 10/1/18

Hotel Artemis is a crime thriller, centered around a hotel where career criminals can seek refuge and in return have to follow strict rules. For anyone thinking of John Wick right now, I’d like to mention that Bad Times At The El Royale also releases this year and, big surprise, features criminals in a hotel with weird rules. But let’s not dwell on that…

The movie has a few interesting ideas and great performances by its main cast, yet over the relatively short runtime, nothing is really developed well enough to make for a memorable experience. Cliff Martinez does an admirable job at tying the whole thing together, delivering a fun yet ultimately unmemorable score.

The score consists of mostly electronics with a few interesting sounds and textures that give the whole thing a rather unique identity. It’s a really interesting soundscape with a lot of unique and varied electronic textures and a simple theme that carries through the experience. While a lot of the music is of a more ambient nature, Martinez does an admirable job at infusing each scene with unique sounds to elevate the music from bland noise to a unique and varied soundscape.

Hotel Artemis is a well enough made movie that is ultimately dragged down by the unused potential. The film easily could have spent more time establishing its characters and developing the conflict, yet it just seems to rush through a checklist of ideas without ever spending enough time anywhere. There is some fun to be had, however, and a lot of that comes from Cliff Martinez’s score. While there’s no music that’ll stick in your head long after leaving the cinema, the various electronic textures do make for an interesting backdrop to the movie. Even if the film leaves the music hardly any space to develop.

  • 2.5/5