When Liv (Jessica Henwick) and Hanna (Julia Garner) run out of money whilst travelling through Australia, they take the only job they can find: a live-in bar job in a remote mining town in the outback.
This is director Kitty Green’s follow up to the excellent The Assistant, which also starred Garner. It shares similar themes of toxic masculinity and misogyny, both casual and blatant. The bar is scary place to work for young women and to say that most punters are unreconstructed males is an understatement.
Green’s screenplay, written with Oscar Redding, does not have as much nuance as her one for The Assistant did. Nevertheless, there is a palpable sense of foreboding that increases the more time they work at the bar. In that respect, Aftersun was brought to my mind as well as the more obvious comparison of Straw Dogs. The Royal Hotel is not as good as either of those but it does boast a pair of terrific lead performances and a number of shocking moments.
Rating: 7 out of 10