Movie Review: Hotel Mumbai

Hotel Mumbai *** / *****

Directed by: Anthony Maras.

Written by: John Collee and Anthony Maras.

Starring: Dev Patel (Arjun), Armie Hammer (David), Nazanin Boniadi (Zahra), Anupam Kher (Chef Hemant Oberoi), Tilda Cobham-Hervey (Nanny Sally), Jason Isaacs (Vasili), Alex Pinder (Butler Jim), Amandeep Singh (Imran), Suhail Nayyar (Abdullah), Natasha Liu Bordizzo (Bree), Angus McLaren (Eddie), Yash Trivedi (Ajay), Vipin Sharma (Hotel Manager), Manoj Mehra (Houssam), Carmen Duncan (Lady Wynn).

 

Hotel Mumbai is a viscerally exciting movie. The filmmaking chops of debut director Anthony Maras are undeniable – as he stages one great, intense scene after another in Hotel Mumbai. Scenes of people dying, getting shot – but also of them escaping, sometimes narrowly, more often than not temporarily, before being plunged back into the horror of the situation. The actors do some rather brave work here as well. And yet, when the film was over, I have to confess, that I struggled to figure out why the filmmakers felt the need to tell this story, this way. There had to be a reason – I’m just not quite sure what it is.

 

The film is a fictionalized account of the 2008 Terrorist Attacks in Mumbai – centered on the beautiful hotel the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel. In all, 10 attackers struck in locations around Mumbai – a location picked probably because of its lack of things like a SWAT team, etc. – and nearly 200 people were killed. This film focuses on a few of those attackers in this one hotel – who basically killed everyone they could, going room to room with automatic weapons, and gunning down everyone they see. They don’t care who they are, why they are there. They need to kill as many as possible. The terrorists are Muslims from Pakistan – acting on orders from an unseen voice on the other end of a radio. They have essentially become brain washed killing machines – only one of which has much a conscious left, and that’s only a little – not enough to spare very many people, but enough to make him question what he is going.

 

There is a difference, I think, between this film and something like Paul Greengrass’ 22 July from last year. Both films are hard to watch – as they portray a mass shooting in detail, showing us as many people get gunned down, and die bleeding, cold and alone. But 22 July moved on from that shooting in its first hour – and instead looked at how Norway responded to that shooting. How it had to work hard to not to lose itself in a thirst for revenge and violence. How it had to treat the perpetrator like any other defendant – let him have his day in court, let the world see how pathetic and weak he really was.

 

But Hotel Mumbai never gets there – it basically ends when the attack does. The point there seems to be the heroic actions of the staff – some of whom could have fled, and been safe before the attackers found them – but stayed in order to help the guests. Their stories here have been fictionalized – the people (other than Chef Hemant Oberoi, played by Indian acting legend Anupam Kher) are all made up. This includes the terrorists as well.

 

The lead is played, quite well, by Dev Patel – a married father, with another child on its way, he is a waiter at the hotel – who is almost sent home at the beginning of his shift due to his lack of shoes. But once there – and in the heart of the shooting – he does whatever he can to help the guests. Another major role is played by Armie Hammer as David – the American husband, of a Muslim Indiana woman – Zahra (Nazanin Boniadi) – whose has their new baby with them. David tries everything to figured things out – to sacrifice, and be a hero – and really, it doesn’t add up too much. Zahra is more effective – but neither has anything on their heroic nanny (Tilda Cobham-Hervey). There’s also Jason Isaacs showing up as a Russian womanizer – doing a Russian accent in such a way that you are reminded as to why when Armando Ianucci cast Isaacs as a Russian in The Death of Stalin, he allowed him to stick with his British accent.

 

All of this handled very well. The movie is fast paced and exciting. It is a thrilling movie in many ways – making me excited to see what Maras does next as a director. And yet – something nagged at me when I watched the film. Why this story? Why this time? It’s all very well made, and sure everything has been fictionizalied as not to cause too much pain for the survivors and the family members – although that’s questionable. Watching it, I was well aware of the skill behind it all. And also, well aware, that other than making an exciting movie, that I wasn’t sure the reasons why this film got made were clearly thought through. It’s a good film because of the reasons I have outlined. And yet, I feel like if you’re going to use a real life tragedy, you should have something bigger in mind when you do.