Average Rating: 5/10
Reviews Counted: 14
Fresh: 5 | Rotten: 9
No consensus yet.
Average Rating: N/A
Critic Reviews: 3
Fresh: 0 | Rotten: 3
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Average Rating: 3.1/5
User Ratings: 534
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
Apr 3, 2006 Wide
Feb 5, 2008
All Critics (15) | Top Critics (3) | Fresh (5) | Rotten (9)
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.
Too many characters and so much plot that no single scenario ever develops into an absorbing drama.
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.
a tragicomic ensemble piece about people on the edge and love on the rocks.
An unfunny ensemble that completely wastes the talent gathered and the material it's based on.
...an overly quirky yet strangely compelling drama...
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.
An ensemble piece with spirit, vitality and a heavy dose of dark, twisted humour.
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.
The quirky script is packed with good lines and off-the-wall moments and the stories are surprisingly moving in places.
Extremely watchable, even though it's a bit fragmented and unfocussed.
It's movies like this that make me avoid "comidies".
July 15, 2008Super 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
March 13, 2008Super Reviewer
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