In 2028 Los Angeles, a riot breaks out over water privatisation. Seeing an ideal chance, career criminal Sherman (Sterling K. Brown) wages a bank robbery that leaves half his crew dead and his brother Lev (Brian Tyree Henry) critically injured. Realising how much that idea backfired, Sherman, Lev and the other survivors now take refuge in the nearby Hotel Artemis, a secret local hospital that only treats criminals, run by Jean "The Nurse" Thomas (Jodie Foster, made up to appear older), who's not left the place in 22 years because of agoraphobia and grief over her son's death. Jean's rules are strict: no weapons, no non-members and no killing of other guests. As Sherman and his crew get acquainted with Thomas and vice versa, the authorities hunting Sherman down outside learn he's in the Artemis, and so now they're going in; meanwhile, on the inside Sherman finds other foes to combat.
Hotel Artemis, English writer-director Drew Pearce's feature debut, is like a futuristic version of Bad Times at the El Royale. Only, minus all the unmistakable swagger and assertiveness that partly made that film such a rollicking, suspenseful great time. In its defence there is a touch of futuristic science fiction to it, with Thomas' robot-aided surgery and 3D printing, but these elements are too brief to offer any true uniqueness and their inclusion also felt slightly jarring to me. There's just nothing immediate here to forcefully grab and hold your attention (or at least mine) and that was the fatal missing ingredient for me here.
Foster, of course, is solid as the Nurse and even wears the aging make-up very well, but her co-stars mostly go through the motions here and the supporting female roles are very derivative and one-dimensional. The action scenes are all shot (pun intended) very clearly but staged unimaginatively, and Cliff Martinez' soundtrack is no different there. Therefore, paying a visit to Hotel Artemis was harmless enough, but I won't be checking in there any time soon for a stay.
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