'Hotel Mumbai' simulates a terrorist assault

In November 2008, terrorists attacked the Taj Mahal Palace & Tower Hotel in Mumbai, leaving 30 people dead before the invaders were gunned down. Hotel Mumbai tells that story in a vivid, gut-wrenching style, turning into a 2019 version of a disaster movie -- albeit one based on a real event. As the violence erupts, we meet a variety of people who are trying to save themselves and others, and, as is the case with such movies, we’re left to wonder who’s going to make it out of the besieged hotel alive. Nazanin Boniadi and Armie Hammer play a couple who has left their infant child in their room with a nanny (Tilda Cobham-Hervey) after heading to the hotel's lounge for a drink. Dev Patel portrays a Sikh waiter who almost gets dismissed for the day for wearing sandals instead of regulation footwear. Anumpam Kher appears as the head chef, a martinet in the kitchen but a man whose concern for the welfare of the hotel's guests takes on a new dimension as the movie progresses. Perhaps to further enhance the movie's international flavor, Jason Isaacs does duty as a Russian who regards the hotel as a sexual playground. Directed by Anthony Maras, Hotel Mumbai creates plenty of tension. The situation alone is enough to infuse the movie with a pulse-pounding drive. I'm certainly not the first to say this, but the comment seems unavoidable: Even a deftly made movie about a terror attack can leave you wondering exactly why you're putting yourself through what becomes a cinematic ordeal. Killing innocent people proves revolting, but do we need another helping of body-count cinema to remind us of that?