Hotels in the Movies: The Silents to the Sixties

Hotels are not always just simple backdrops in the world of cinema. In this course, we explore six films, in which hotels provide the central location and serve as a microcosm of society. The 1924 silent German film, The Last Laugh (Der letzte Mann), made during Germany’s great depression, stars a nameless hotel doorman in a high-end hotel. Grand Hotel (1932), which became a model for hotel films for decades, unfolds in a luxurious Berlin hotel where the lives of diverse guests converge. Hotel Berlin (1945), which takes place during the collapse of Nazi Germany in Berlin, and Weekend at the Waldorf (1945), also set during the end of World War II, in New York, provide a stark contrast between the European and American experiences at the end of the war. Key Largo (1948) pits a disillusioned WW II vet against a mobster and his gang who have taken over a small hotel during a Florida hurricane.  And Hotel (1967) unfolds in a fictional New Orleans hotel in financial trouble during the seismic societal shifts of the 1960s. Emil Jannings, Greta Garbo, John and Lionel Barrymore, Peter Lorre, Van Johnson, Ginger Rogers, Walter Pidgeon, Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Edward G. Robinson, Rod Taylor, and others star in these thought-provoking snapshots in time.