If you’ve seen Paul Greengrass’ United 93 or 22 July, then you’ll know what to expect from Anthony Maras’ Hotel Mumbai — the latest ripped-from-the-headlines procedural about the horrors of global terror. A tick-tock dramatization of the November 2008 attack on India’s largest city, the film attempts to put a face (or faces) on a tragedy that took the lives of more than 100 people. But there’s a slightly craven whiff of exploitation to the film. It’s well-made and, at times, excruciatingly tense, even if you wonder why anyone would want to sit through it. The always-welcome Dev Patel stars as Arjun, a working-class local catering to rich white tourists at the luxurious Taj Mahal Palace Hotel. Those guests, who include a young couple (Armie Hammer and Nazanin Boniadi) and a tacky Russian oligarch (Jason Isaacs), find themselves under siege when armed Islamic fanatics from Pakistan storm the five-star oasis in the name of jihad. Even with its two-hour-plus running time, the movie rarely lets up. But to what end? If Hotel Mumbai’s aim is to show the heroism of the hotel’s Indian employees who risked their lives to save their VIP clients, then mission accomplished. But Maras’ film isn’t nuanced enough to feel like more than a morbid re-enactment of a bloodbath served up as entertainment. B-<doc-sep>“I sat across the table from many of them and spent many hours, dozens of hours interviewing them with my co-writer John Collee,” Maras says. “And you feel a huge sense of responsibility because these are people's lives that we're dealing with here. That was our guiding light the whole way through to try and do justice to the experience that they endured and how difficult it was — we weren't shying away from the incredibly difficult situation that they had to go through. And then I personally think that that gives rise to another side of the story, which is not only the heroism but the resilience that is shown by all those people who survived.”<doc-sep>Amongst the many shooting terror attacks that have shocked the international community stands out the 2008 attacks in Mumbai as one of the early manifestations of the monstrous human soul. Ten members of a fundamentalist terrorist organization based in Pakistan carried out several, simultaneous attacks in India’s largest city. The carnage netted over 170 dead—most of them shot vilely and in cold blood by the terrorists and their automatic weapons. This is the difficult, grueling, but ultimately important subject of the upcoming film, “Hotel Mumbai.” The cowardly attacks had made another impact in the movie world. Some ascribe Slumdog Millionaire’s Best Picture win a few months after the tragedy to an increased goodwill toward India and the city where that movie is based. But, aside from the country of their location and the fact that they both star Dev Patel—who broke into the scene in Danny Boyle’s film—the two movies have little else in common. “Hotel Mumbai” is horror and disgust for every drop of saccharine and cuteness that the fictional game show film was. For every question the “Chai Walla” improbably got correct in Slumdog, the body count doubles in Mumbai. The tears come too, but they are of devastation, not of joy. One must note, however, that like “Slumdog,” “Hotel Mumbai,” though set against a horrendously real story, is itself significantly fictional. Ever typecast, Patel plays Arjun, a hardworking clerk in the luxurious Taj Mahal Palace Hotel in the eponymous city. That locale, which would eventually become the epicenter of the carnage, is host to American David (Armie Hammer), his stunningly beautiful wife Zahra (Nazanin Boniadi), a woman of Indian descent, and Sally (Tilda Cobham-Hervey), their nanny. David and Zahra have a newborn and are traveling through the sub-continent, and are having a romantic dinner away from the baby when the terrorists lay siege to the hotel. Completing the cast is Anupam Kher, a renowned Indian actor who plays real-life chef Hemant Oberoi, and Jason Isaacs, horrifically miscast as Vasili, a Russian Mafioso. The plot points—most of which you can likely imagine—are always less important in a film of this nature, at least less so than the crucial antecedent question: Why does this movie need to be made? Is this a story that must be relived, and, if so, can it be done without exploiting the tragedy of the victims and paying them due respect? “Hotel Mumbai,” by Australian director Anthony Maras, from a script he penned with “Happy Feet” writer John Collee, answers these questions to its benefit—if just barely. You can tell, given how the story unfolds, that many of the most gruesome scenes in the film are not strictly speaking factual. This makes you perpetually wonder what the point of some of the suffering is. “Hotel Mumbai” repeatedly and dangerously gets close to the abyss of being exploitative, gratuitous, and sensationalist. The movie can be cynically seen as not useless but only to the benefit of its studio overlords: it is to shock and awe you into forking over your theater dollars, the worst possible kind of profiteering from someone else’s misery. And, undoubtedly, for some, the movie does cross that line and cannot redeem itself from it. Ultimately, at least for this critic, “Hotel Mumbai” packs a self-contained explanation that justifies its use of fictionally horrifying sequences, of moments that seemed too cinematically staged. What occurred in Mumbai is one of the most terrible and evil human massacres of our lifetime. Worse, many populations, particularly Western audiences, forget these attacks, numbed by their frequency and disinterested because of the nationality of the victims. We need to remember the story. Also working in its favor are performances by Kher and Patel, both of whom pay respectful homage to the individuals on whom their characters are based. Kher is astounding and profoundly touching as the chef, a real life hero that crosses over almost intact to the movie. His sense of servitude, along with that of most of the Taj Mahal’s staff’s, is awe-inspiring, and even discomforting. It provides a welcome moral anchor to a movie whose central villains so horridly eschew one. The believe in the kindness of this impoverished, ill-treated man may seem like a lazy cinematic, bleeding heart refuge, but it is emotionally welcome given the brutal nature of the proceedings. The same goes for Patel’s Arjun, who thinks of the family he has left behind while trying to save that of others. In an age of shortened attention spans, of 280 characters per moment stimulation, “Hotel Mumbai” is either a sellout or a masterpiece, depending on your perspective. The point is that it grips you almost from the beginning—after a few setup scenes where we meet the ill-fated characters and follow the prepping terrorists, we are thrust quickly into unwatchable violence that is also impossible to turn away from. If you want almost uninterrupted, two hours of gripping, anxiety-inducing drama, “Hotel Mumbai” is the way to go. Ultimately, you will be annoyed by the obvious setups but you will also never forget what you have just seen. Jason Isaacs is ear-grating in the hackneyed bad guy with a redemptive arc set up. And the biggest supposed payout of all—the terrorists themselves learning from their errors, that they too have been deceived, is also obnoxious and contrived. But there is enough daring human drama to make you forgive these indiscretions, and to ultimately come out feeling disgusting—as is the movie’s clear intention. That, if nothing else, is worth seeing. Grade: B If you like what you read, follow us on Twitter @thesplashreport and @jdonbirnam and on Instagram @awards_predix and @splashreport PLEASE FEEL FREE TO SHARE THIS POST ON YOUR FACEBOOK WALL AND WITH YOUR TWITTER FOLLOWERS! JUST HIT THE BUTTONS ON THE BOTTOM OF THIS PAGE. Check out the ‘Hotel Mumbai’ trailer below!<doc-sep>It was some time after 9 p.m. on what was, until then, just an ordinary November night at the five-star Taj Mahal Palace Hotel in Mumbai, India, when head chef Hemant Oberoi answered a phone call. It was a colleague ringing to say there had been a shooting. Oddly, the chef got it in his mind that he was talking about a film shoot. But soon, it became clear that something very bad was going on. “The first thing we heard was that something was happening in the city — a gang war kind of a thing,” Oberoi, 65, tells The Post from India. “And within minutes, [gunmen] were already in the hotel.” The Taj was one target of a larger attack on Mumbai by 10 members of a jihadi group, Lashkar-e-Taiba, based in Pakistan. Oberoi frantically called his wife. The words spilled out: “Where are you? Are you outside somewhere? Be at home.” Relieved that she seemed to be safe, he leapt into action at his workplace, risking his own life to protect the hundreds of guests trapped inside the hotel. The new film “Hotel Mumbai,” in theaters Friday, focuses on what happened at the Taj during the 2008 terrorist attacks across the city. Dev Patel and Armie Hammer topline the film’s ensemble cast during the tragedy known as 26/11, which lasted from Nov. 26 to 29 and left more than 160 people dead. Oberoi is played by Anupam Kher (“The Big Sick,” “Silver Linings Playbook”). As the grand chef for the Taj group’s entire portfolio of luxury hotels across the world, Oberoi says he never considered leaving the hotel before his guests were safe. But he did offer the option to his staff of approximately 70 people working that night, all of whom he says decided to stay and assist. “To protect each guest was our foremost duty,” he says. “The guests came to our house. Their lives were at stake.” Oberoi — a culinary legend in India — realized that most of the Taj’s restaurants were too accessible to the gunmen, so he devised a plan to move patrons to a more secure location: the hotel’s private Chambers Club. In touch with the hotel’s security team, Oberoi says that he knew that the group couldn’t get to local police who had made it into the lobby without passing through the line of fire from the attackers. So he and his staff carefully shepherded hotel guests through the kitchen to the club, then barricaded the doors and waited. All the while, they reassured guests and served them sandwiches, cookies and beverages. But as gunfire continued and no help seemed near, Oberoi had to act again. Around 3:15 a.m., he says they began an evacuation, sending staff members to lead guests out through his office, down a stairwell to an employee exit, and onto the street. Not everyone made it out. Over the four-day attack on the Taj, a reported 31 people died, many of them hotel staff members. Among those lost was the chef’s trusted deputy. “He was trying to come out of one of the dining room areas to tell me, ‘Sir, I think the terrorists are coming down from the steps, and they might be there now,’ ” says Oberoi, pausing to collect himself at the memory. “He opened the door, and he [saw] the terrorists standing there.” Oberoi estimates that he and his team brought about 150 people to safety. “When absolute horror was staring him in the face, [he and his team] rose up and did something quite extraordinary,” says director and co-writer Anthony Maras. Their “example . . . could be an inspiration for all of us, particularly in the times that we’re living in right now.” More than a decade after the attacks, Oberoi says, “Everybody in the world should pray for peace. Everybody.”<doc-sep>
'Hotel Mumbai' a flawed but visceral account of mass killings in India A kitchen employee (Dev Patel) joins other staff members to protect guests when terrorists attack the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel in "Hotel Mumbai." Courtesy of Bleecker Street "Hotel Mumbai" - ★ ★ ★ Seriously? Bleeker Street distributes its graphically violent terrorist attack thriller "Hotel Mumbai" less than two weeks after the deadly anti-Muslim mass shooting spree in New Zealand? Good thing that box office doesn't count in a film review. With that in mind, "Hotel Mumbai" can best be described as a flawed but combustible combination of a taut suspense thriller and a classic 1970s disaster movie ­­­­­­­--­ ­­­­­­­­all it lacks is an all-star cast and the exploitative tagline, "Who will survive?" Producer and "Slumdog Millionaire" star Dev Patel plays a devoted Sikh husband and loving dad named Arjun, a kitchen worker at the prestigious Taj Mahal Palace Hotel in Mumbai, India. He has no idea that on this day in 2008, young, zealous jihadists -- who look like grad students on a camping trip ­-- have just arrived in Mumbai under orders of an Islamic terrorist commander called "Brother Bull" in Pakistan. They must execute 12 carefully planned attacks on high-profile targets, including "the Taj." This will all be, Bull assures them, for the greater glory of Allah. Director Anthony Maras and co-writer John Collee interviewed survivors and witnesses to the three-day attack to create this sometimes riveting (yet, way too long) account of the mass murder. Wisely, they don't let Armie Hammer's solitary white American male, David, turn "Hotel Mumbai" into another white savior drama. David has come to the gorgeous Taj with his wife Zahra (Nazanin Boniadi), their newborn and their nanny, Sally (Tilda Cobham-Hervey). The true heroes of the story turn out to be the brave Taj employees, most of whom opt to stay in the hotel and protect their guests. Among them, two staffers take the lead: Ajun and the tough master chef, Oberoi (a forceful Anupam Kher), who by all rights, should have been the main character. After limping through an awkward opening, "Hotel Mumbai" launches into a gut-grabbingly grisly, horrific assault of machine gun bullets and grenades used to slaughter defenseless, screaming people fleeing through the lobby and hallways. Arjun (Dev Patel), center, serves hotel guests (Nazanin Boniadi, left, and Armie Hammer) in "Hotel Mumbai." - Courtesy of Bleecker Street The visceral realism of these attacks is hard to watch sometimes, especially when we see exactly what bullets can do to human bodies at close range. The impact of the violence becomes even greater when Maras, who astutely understands that constant graphic kill-shots will turn off viewers, alternates between on-screen and off-screen shootings. Aided by Volker Bertelmann's throbbing, pulsating score (perfect for an all-out horror movie), Maras also constructs scenes of unyielding suspense as patrons we come to know are placed in jeopardy again and again. Meanwhile, only six members of the Mumbai police show up, not trained or equipped to handle this terrorist action. Special Forces troops are on the way ­­-- but it will take them at least six hours to arrive. "Hotel Mumbai" can be considered a bookend for 2004's "Hotel Rwanda," the true story of how hotel operator Paul Rusesabagina (Don Cheadle) saved more than a thousand refugees' lives during the 1994 Rwandan genocide campaign. There, the killers made large machetes their weapon of choice. That sounds messy, but next to the bullets in "Mumbai," the violence was a model of restraint. • • • Starring: Dev Patel, Armie Hammer, Nazanin Boniadi, Anupam Kher Directed by: Anthony Maras Other: A Bleeker Street release. Rated R for language, violence. 122 minutes