Four RoomsThe first night on the job is always the worst; for Ted (Tim Roth), the new bellhop at the decrepit Mon Signor hotel--still recovering from those rough times in the Eighties--it turns out to be a night he will no doubt remember for the rest of his life, such as it is. Between his encounters with a coven of sexy witches, a marital dispute of abusive returns that plays like a malicious game of badminton (with Ted as the shuttlecock), playing nanny to the mischievous spawn of a Mexican gangster, and finally the hatchet-man du jour to a party of Hollywoodites, Ted will be lucky to live through the night at all. Poor Ted.
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Four Rooms opens with a colorful animated sequence reminiscent of the Pink Panther movies; appropriate, as like other screwball comedies, it plays a bit like a live-action cartoon. Four Rooms is a "Frankenstein's Monster" of a comedy, a collection of vignettes by four filmmakers strung together, collecting the misadventures of Ted as the warden of the hotel and its collection of lunatic attendees. The first sequence, titled "The Missing Ingredient", is really a sex comedy, about the aforementioned coven of witches--not to be mistaken for an "oven" full of witches--who discover that one of their members has failed to deliver a key "ingredient" in their ritual to revive their "goddess", Diana, she of the "questionable virginity". The witches are all different--from the icy Elspeth (Madonna) to the earthy Raven (Lili Taylor)--they begin to lose their hope in their mission, until Ted arrives and they conspire to put him to use in an unorthodox way, leaving the responsible witch, Eva (Ione Skye) to work her witchy powers over the awkward employee. The second sequence--"The Wrong Man"--is ostensibly a case of mistaken identity and/or a psychosexual drama which Ted is forced to endure between the demented Siegfried (David Proval) and his bound wife, Angela (Jennifer Beals). Ted finds himself navigating a high-wire act as makeshift marriage counselor with a gun to his head, one which leads to all kinds of madness, from heart attacks to a jaw-dropping recital about euphemisms for a certain part of "Theodore's" anatomy. Room 404: sanity not found. The third sequence is "The Misbehavers", where Ted is recruited by an intimidating Mexican gangster (Antonio Banderas) to play babysitter to his rambunctious kids, who in turn discover more than a few unsavory leftovers from the previous tenants of room 309. Ted has to deal with bartering with the gangster, who hires Ted to babysit his terrible children, overwhelming Ted with the impending threat of a criminal daddy's retribution should anything dire befall his brats. This leave Ted responsible for coughing up stale saltines and milk for the kids at bedtime, and far more nerve-wracking trials as his night progresses, while the kids gradually get up to no good, from discovering adult entertainment on the TV to other recreational activities involving filthy syringes. The musical score is a whimsical whistling of "A Sentimental Journey", which belies the fast and furious hysterics that emerge as the episode wraps up. Ted almost bonds with the kids, sharing with them some of his harrowing experiences from his childhood about scary babysitters, and almost successfully manages to keep them in bed with the threat of a vapor rub burn, only to find that these kids are more clever than he was--or is. The set design is especially important for "The Misbehavers"; key props and points of interest get revisited later with great comedic effect. And finally, that brings us to our final sequence, "The Man From Hollywood", the title itself to "Man From the South" (referred to as "The Man From Rio" by the characters), which opens with Ted at the end of his rope, calling up his boss, Betty (Kathy Griffin) to give his very final notice, only to get reeled back in to assisting the Chester Rush (Quentin Tarantino) penthouse party after already confessing his night to Betty and her stoned houseguest, Margaret (Marisa Tomei) playing Sega. The scene is pure Tarantino, featuring signature stylings such as long, uninterrupted takes as he and his compatriots--including Angela from "The Wrong Man"--lead him into a grim wager, where Ted is once again bribed into an unsavory task. By this point, Ted has pushed past the point of no return; so as the egocentric film star reveals his scheme amid bottles of Cristal, Ted has left his own inhibitions at the door--not by means of alcohol, but having the fear driven right out of him. And the price is right.
Four Rooms is twisted and wonderfully manic at times, as we watch Ted go from naive servant to jaded cynic by enduring various psychological traumas and other humiliations. Tim Roth delivers a slapstick performance as the novice bellhop, deftly portraying the physicality of a new employee running the gamut of anxiety-riddled attacks, awkwardness, and twitchy terror. Breaking up the movie into four vignettes makes for an enjoyable experience with lots of moments of rising and descending action, and the scenes are generally tight and as a result,with comedy that is rapid-fire and constant. Four Rooms has plenty of humor crammed into its modest ninety-eight minute runtime, but the pinnacle of this raw, frenetic hilarity for me is at the climax of the third episode, "The Misbehavers". When Ted checks up on the children he's been roped into watching for the last time, and after the kids' unfortunate discovery--that smell--events fly out of control faster than you can say, "Did they misbehave?" (Honestly, I've never laughed so much at one time in my life in a movie as I did watching this scenario escalate like a raging fire.) There aren't a lot of movies that attempt what Four Rooms accomplishes with such aplomb--the chance to showcase several directors' skillsets without the risk of a battle of egos. But each of the directors--Allison Anders, Alexandre Rockwell, Robert Rodriguez, and Quentin Tarantino--contribute a piece of the pie, making the recipe a buffet of comedy vignettes, each bearing the respective director's watermark.
Recommended for: People looking for a sampling of quick, potent, weird, and uproarious comedy and slapstick...and for anyone who can recall that horrible "first night on the job".
Four Rooms is twisted and wonderfully manic at times, as we watch Ted go from naive servant to jaded cynic by enduring various psychological traumas and other humiliations. Tim Roth delivers a slapstick performance as the novice bellhop, deftly portraying the physicality of a new employee running the gamut of anxiety-riddled attacks, awkwardness, and twitchy terror. Breaking up the movie into four vignettes makes for an enjoyable experience with lots of moments of rising and descending action, and the scenes are generally tight and as a result,with comedy that is rapid-fire and constant. Four Rooms has plenty of humor crammed into its modest ninety-eight minute runtime, but the pinnacle of this raw, frenetic hilarity for me is at the climax of the third episode, "The Misbehavers". When Ted checks up on the children he's been roped into watching for the last time, and after the kids' unfortunate discovery--that smell--events fly out of control faster than you can say, "Did they misbehave?" (Honestly, I've never laughed so much at one time in my life in a movie as I did watching this scenario escalate like a raging fire.) There aren't a lot of movies that attempt what Four Rooms accomplishes with such aplomb--the chance to showcase several directors' skillsets without the risk of a battle of egos. But each of the directors--Allison Anders, Alexandre Rockwell, Robert Rodriguez, and Quentin Tarantino--contribute a piece of the pie, making the recipe a buffet of comedy vignettes, each bearing the respective director's watermark.
Recommended for: People looking for a sampling of quick, potent, weird, and uproarious comedy and slapstick...and for anyone who can recall that horrible "first night on the job".