By Lee Pfeiffer
I hadn't seen Hotel since it opened in theaters in 1967 and I was a tender lad of 9 years-old. I thought it was talky and somewhat boring at the time, but upon viewing the DVD release from Warner Archives, I have to say that I relished every minute of it. This is do in no small part to the fact that the film is packed with great actors that audiences used to take for granted, but whose presence is now sorely missed. Hotel follows the pattern of those all-star dramas that were so popular in the 60s and 70s. It traces the relationships between a disparate group of glamorous types who intermingle over the course of a few days at the elegant St. Gregory Hotel in New Orleans. (Envision The V.I.P.S - with room service.) Melvyn Douglas (who must have excelled at playing doddering old men when he was still in grade school) is the proud owner of the once great hotel that will be forced into foreclosure unless he can find either an investor or a buyer. Enter Kevin McCarthy as a deceitful real estate magnate who wants to con the old man into making a deal to sell him the property so he can turn its elegant aspects into a crass commercial joint. Mediating all of this Douglas' right hand man, hotel manager Rod Taylor, who has to solve the financial crisis, handle McCarthy's seductive mistress (Catherine Spaak) who he is having an affair with, cope with a civil rights scandal when a black couple are denied a room, and try to locate a brazen cat burglar (Karl Malden) who is robbing rooms- while their occupants are asleep. And you thought your life was busy.