New Rose Hotel (1998)

User Rating:

4.2/10   

Director:

Abel Ferrara

Writers (WGA):

William Gibson (short story)
Abel Ferrara (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

19 March 1999 (Italy)

Genre:

Drama | Mystery | Sci-Fi

Plot:

Maas and Hosaka are two large Corporations in the future world. They are fighting to get control over the best minds of the world...

Plot Keywords:

Future Noir | Defection | Italian Woman | Brothel | Flashback Sequence

Awards:

2 wins & 2 nominations

Cast

Christopher Walken	...	Fox
Willem Dafoe	...	X
Asia Argento	...	Sandii
Annabella Sciorra	...	Madame Rosa
John Lurie	...	Distinguished Man
Kimmy Suzuki	...	Asian Girl #1 (as Naoko 'Kimmy' Suzuki)
Miou	...	Asian Girl #2
Yoshitaka Amano	...	Hiroshi
Gretchen Mol	...	Hiroshi's Wife
Phil Neilson	...	The Welshman (as Phil Nielson)
Ken Kelsch	...	The Expeditor
Andrew Fiscella	...	Sex Show Man
Rachel Glass	...	Sex Show Woman #1
Roberta Orlandi	...	Sex Show Woman #2 (as Roberta Orlan)
Erin Jermaine Serrano	...	Sex Show Woman #3

MPAA:

Rated R for strong sexuality and language, including some sex-related dialogue.

Runtime:

93 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Certification:

Iceland:16 | Australia:MA | France:U | Germany:16 | Italy:VM14 | USA:R

Company:

Edward R. Pressman Film

Quotes:

Fox: Po-tay-to, po-tah-to, you know. Government, corporation, it's the same thing.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in A Short Film About the Long Career of Abel Ferrara (2004) (V)

The only successful William Gibson adaptation

When making movies out of fiction, most of the time it doesn't work, unless the original text is purely telegraphic in style. If it's good prose, it's not usually the larger actions that we see that make it good - it's something more ethereal within the style itself that give it quality. William Gibson's noir-influenced techno-satire would seem perfect for adaptation, but anyone who's suffered through (or even enjoyed) JOHNNY MNEMONIC suddenly realizes that the characters' tough-guy dialog sounds utterly preposterous when actually voiced by a human being.

In NEW ROSE HOTEL, director Abel Ferrara finds the emotional heart of a very spare Gibson short (one of the best things Gibson's ever written, and blessedly short on actual dialog) and creates a recognizable near- future world and characters who seem as comfortable with this subtly accelerated reality as we of 2005 are with plasma-screen TVs and mobile phones. The structure of the film can be extremely off-putting to those without enormous patience - it's very slow-paced, and halfway through we see the almost the entire story over again, but very slightly changed. As far as I can tell, most of the scenes were shot twice from different angles. The entire point of Abel Ferrara's approach is to visually represent the phrase, "If only I knew then what I know now". NEW ROSE HOTEL really needs to be seen at least twice to be understood, and only lets go of the intelligence and daring of the direction and the performances after repeated viewings.

Christopher Walken plays Christopher Walken, under the guise of the character "Fox", but I've rarely seen Walken so simultaneously comfortable and affected in any other role. Willem Dafoe has to play younger than he looks, and we get to watch his character learn what a fool he's been, writhing with embarrassed disgust and fear as he discovers that the source of his predicament is his own stupidity and sentimentality. A very young-looking Asia Argento plays Sandii with more depth than she is regularly given credit for - her style is so subtle and genuine that she hardly seems to be acting, and as far as I've seen, she isn't, but she's so sexy and vulnerable that I'm more than willing to watch.

It's a shame this film is so under-appreciated; it's definitely my favorite Ferrara film, and one of my top two Christopher Walken films. And lots of Asia in her underwear - what's not to love?