A handful of oddballs and misfits cross paths at a motel overlooking one of Canada's more recognizable landmarks in this independent comedy. Phillie (Craig Ferguson) is the alcoholic and deeply depressed manager of the Niagara Motel, a shabby inn a stone's throw from the Canadian side of the Niagara Falls. Phillie's guests at the moment include Michael (Kevin Pollak), a sleazy director and producer of porn videos who is attempting to persuade Loretta (Caroline Dhavernas), a pretty young waitress
at a nearby diner, to star in his latest series of adult movies; Denise (Anna Friel) and R.J. (Kristen Holden- Reid), a drug-addled couple struggling to regain custody of their child; Henry (Peter Keleghan) and Lily (Wendy Crewson), whose marriage is already starting to crumble before temptation presents itself to Lily; and Boris (Damir Andrei), the Niagara's short-tempered owner. Over the course of their stays, the folks staying at the Niagara will witness an unplanned kidnapping, meet the motel's in-house prostitute, encounter a down-on-his-luck staple salesman, and get uncalled-for advice from a born-again social worker. Niagara Motel received its world premiere at the 2005 New Montreal Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
A blue chip cast is wasted in the painfully unfunny ensemble comedy Niagara Motel, about a gaggle of self-absorbed nitwits struggling to make ends meet on the Canadian side of the tourist mecca.
The actors are more or less on the same page, trying as much as possible to underplay this overheated material. But that doesn't help when the page itself is a scribbled sheet of foolscap crammed with narrative tangents and thematic jottings.
I'm not exactly sure what compelled me to finish watching this so-called "black comedy," which is a little heavy on the black and far too light on the comedy.
The lives of nine assorted down-and-outers converge in frequently funny and sometimes tragic ways, giving Yates a chance to put his own spin on a template perfected decades ago by Robert Altman and reinvigorated in recent years by P.T. Anderson.
Yates has given himself so many stories to tell here that his only plausible excuse for Niagara Motel's total lack of dramatic tension or laughs is a script that fails to include a solitary good line.
It's movies like this that make me avoid "comidies".
July 15, 2008
Curtis Lilly
Super Reviewer
A movie about some people who are staying or living at a dumpy Niagara Falls motel or eating at a nearby diner. Everyone has problems of some sort, and the movie deals with their lives. I didn't mind the acting, but I thought the writing left a lot to be desired. Each of their stories were not connected enough and
sort of ho-hum.
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