The Million Dollar Hotel (2000)

Tragi-comic, romantic whodunnit set in a run down hotel which plays host to mentally ill people too poor to afford medical insurance.

Director:

Wim Wenders

Writers:

Bono (story), Nicholas Klein (screenplay)

Stars:

Jeremy Davies, Milla Jovovich, Mel Gibson

2 wins & 4 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Jeremy Davies	...	Tom Tom
Milla Jovovich	...	Eloise
Mel Gibson	...	Detective Skinner
Jimmy Smits	...	Geronimo
Peter Stormare	...	Dixie
Amanda Plummer	...	Vivien
Gloria Stuart	...	Jessica
Tom Bower	...	Hector
Donal Logue	...	Charley Best
Bud Cort	...	Shorty
Julian Sands	...	Terence Scopey
Conrad Roberts	...	Stix
Harris Yulin	...	Stanley Goldkiss
Charlayne Woodard	...	Jean Swift
Ellen Cleghorne	...	Marlene

Storyline

The Million Dollar Hotel follows the supposed murder of Izzy Goldkiss. FBI Agent Skinner is sent into investigate the crime, and to weed out the killer. When he reaches the 'hotel', he comes across many of the forgotten types of people living in the city. You have Geronimo, who is a self proclaimed Native American artist. Dixie, played with great gusto by Peter Stormare, as the 'fifth' Beatle still waiting for his royalty payments as well as recognition. Eloise, who is the neighborhood 'whore'. And then there is Tom-Tom, played by Jeremy Davies. He's the center of the story, being that he's the 'village idiot' of the bunch, and has the trust of everyone in the Hotel. Agent Skinner has a few days to find out who the killer is, while the residents of the hotel devise a scheme to sell off Izzy's fabled 'Tar Paintings'.

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Plot Keywords:

hotel | murder | suicide | painting | detective | 

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Taglines:

Everyone has something to hide.

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Genres:

Drama | Mystery | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for language and some sexual content

Details

Official Sites:

Icon/Road Movies

Country:

Germany UK USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

10 February 2000 (Germany)

Also Known As:

The Billion Dollar Hotel

Filming Locations:

Rosslyn Hotel - 112 W. 5th Street, Los Angeles, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$8,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$29,483, 4 February 2001

Gross USA:

$52,526

Company Credits

Production Co:

Icon Entertainment International, Kintop Pictures, Road Movies Filmproduktion

Technical Specs

Runtime:

122 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital SDDS

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Phil Joanou was originally set to direct.

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Goofs

The positions of the pool balls change during the voting scene.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Tom Tom: Wow, after I jumped it occurred to me, life is perfect, life is the best. It's full of magic, beauty, opportunity, and television, and surprises, lots of surprises, yeah. And then there's that stuff that everybody longs for, but they only real feel when it's gone. All that just kinda hit me. I guess you don't really see it all clearly when you're - ya know - alive.

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Connections

Referenced in See This Movie (2004)

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Soundtracks

The First Time
Written and Performed by U2

User Reviews

Too much cliché makes you blasé

It's always difficult to know what to expect with Wenders: it's either great or really bad. And the interesting part of it is, it's the very same kind of features and the way he chooses to tell a story that will keep you interested or bore you. Although not exactly a boring film, the Million Dollar Hotel gets caught in its maker's defects. The problem starts with the story. Written by rock-star Bono, the story is something like a rock ballad trying to be a movie. Worse, it tries to be a sort of "alternative moral" tale. This tender love-story between two marginals in a hotel full of sympathetic lunatics is so full of rock cliches, it ends up being a huge cliche in itself.

You watch it, you want to like the plot but oh, again that thing about the weirdos being better people because they are so much more poetic and "innocent" than normal people. You want to like the characters but oh, again we're supposed to fall for a delicate, innocent child-saint-whore woman. You want to like the performance of the actors but after a while, can't help thinking "people, let's get on with it, shall we?". You even want to make the effort of agreeing with that lovely universal message in the end : life can be so beautiful, pity we realise it too late but oh, haven't you read that somewhere already? Chinese cookie, was it??...

The Million Dollar Hotel tries so hard to be deep, it ends up being shallow. It tries so hard to be rich in thoughts, it ends up being cheap and pompous. It tries so hard to criticise "mainstream values" and self-righteousness, it ends up being mainstream and self-righteous. And you try so hard to like it... you really do... that you end up thinking : oooh pleeaaaase!