Bad Times at the El Royale

Stop if you’ve heard this one before: A priest (Jeff Bridges), a backup singer (Cynthia Erivo), a salesman (Jon Hamm) and a rebel (Dakota Johnson) walk into a deserted hotel lobby in 1969. Alas, the payoff in this pulpy noir is not as satisfying as the cool premise would suggest. It turns out these people are not who they seem to be — and on a dark and stormy night, all secrets are revealed in the most convoluted way possible. Think tangents and flashbacks and twists and scenes from multiple points of view and, oh, hello there Chris Hemsworth and Chris Hemsworth’s abs! Whatever writer-director Drew Goddard is trying to say over these 140 minutes is lost in the swirl of overambitious storytelling.

It’s set in the ’60s, but Hamm insists, “This is so different from Mad Men.”