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One of my most anticipated movies later this year is Drew Goddard’s Bad Times at the El Royale. It’s Goddard’s first feature as a director since The Cabin in the Woods and after seeing about fifteen minutes of the movie at an early press day which featured one of the coolest tracking shots I’ve seen in a long time, I can say with a tremendous amount of confidence the film is going to be worth the wait.

If you’re just hearing about Bad Times at the El Royale now, the film follows seven strangers in 1969 who end up at the mysterious El Royale hotel and are offered a shot at redemption before everything goes to hell. Among the gathered rogues: a down-on-his-luck priest (Jeff Bridges), a singer named Darlene Sweet (Cynthia Erivo), an impressionable Southern girl (Cailee Spaeny) and her older sister (Dakota Johnson), a vacuum cleaner salesman (Jon Hamm), and — perhaps most enigmatic — a charismatic cult leader, played by Chris Hemsworth.

At an early press day for the film, I got to sit down with Jon Hamm, Dakota Johnson and Jeff Bridges for an exclusive video interview. They talked about the intense planning that went into pulling off the amazing tracking shot that involves most of the cast and what it was about the script that made them each want to be part of the project. Check out what they had to say in the player above.

Bad Times at the El Royale arrives in theaters October 12^th. You can watch the new trailer here.

Jon Hamm, Dakota Johnson and Jeff Bridges:

• They talk about the incredible tracking shot in the film and how Drew Goddard told them about it.
• What was it about the script for Bad Times that made them want to be part of the movie?

For more on Bad Times at the El Royale:

• Drew Goddard on How ‘Bad Times’ is His Love Letter to the Crime Thriller
• First ‘Bad Times at the El Royale’ Images Let Us Revel in Shirtless Chris Hemsworth