On November 26, 2008, 10 members of a terrorist organization stormed Mumbai, targeting multiple busy, touristy places for maximum impact. They set off bombs and shot wildly into crowds. They entered the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel and kept guests there hostage for four days. Many died. Hotel Mumbai is the story of that hotel’s siege, and of the people trapped inside, waiting to die.
Arjun (Dev Patel) is part of the wait staff at the prestigious hotel restaurant. He misses out on serving one of the night’s big spending VIPs, Vasili (Jason Isaacs) when it’s discovered by his boss that he forgot his proper shoes at home. Guest is God, Arjun is reminded, but instead of going home for the night, he borrows ill-fitting shoes and will spend the next 4 days regretting it deeply.
Beautiful Zahra is also dining among the guests that evening, newly arrived in Mumbai after a shotgun wedding to David (Armie Hammer) and the subsequent birth of their child. David is awestruck by the hotel’s luxury, but as they cower behind an upturned table when the shooting starts, the thread count of the tablecloth hardly matters as the new parents panic about the status of their newborn in an upstairs suite with their nanny, Sally (Tilda Cobham-Hervey).
Hotel Mumbai is tense pretty much from its second or third minute, and it never lets up. It’s difficult to sustain such a pace – difficult for actors, for film makers, and for the hearts of all who watch. 125 minutes is a long time to be hanging on the edge of your seat, jaw clenched, barely remembering to breathe. But the cast collectively does such a good job reminding us that these are real people: people tired from travel, people just trying to earn a pay cheque, people just wanting to make it home alive to their families and friends who are watching events unfold at home, helplessly.
The stakes are of course very high as Hotel Mumbai does not flinch away from the unspeakable violence. The script of course dials up tension with the addition of a baby who could cry at any moment, giving them away to killers with no conscience. But for me it was the hotel workers, people who are paid a pittance to treat their guests like actual gods, who could have escaped themselves but chose instead to stay behind to help keep their guests safe. That said, I did wonder why, out of the 164 people dead and 308 wounded, the film chooses to focus on 3 white people, possibly the only 3 white people there. Does director Anthony Maras not trust that I will be sufficiently horrified by the deaths of brown people?
I’m a little squeamish about what this means. The movie criticizes the Indian government for inadequate resources and features a throw-away white English lady who accuses her rescuers who “speak their [the terrorists’] language” and wear turbans, of being terrorists themselves. Is this enough commentary on the inherent racism of such a movie? This story should be about the many Indian men and women who died that day, and the Indian heroes who helped others to survive. But it’s hard to believe in that premise when the camera lingers longingly on action hero Armie Hammer, while brown people fall behind him, like extras in their own movie.
ASSHOLES WATCHING MOVIES 
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I haven’t seen the movie yet, but i remember the day it was on TV while i was in mumbai 15kms away from where it happened. I agree with you saying they should have focussed mire on the indian men and women who played more important roles and lost their lives while saving others in the movie. Others could have been added as a part of the same (read:white people).
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It’s probably because they made the movie for western audiences. That doesn’t make it right.
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Well, that really does sound amazingly weird indeed. And it also doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. Despite the fact that I still think I will see this one, it’s a strange point of view to take for a film. It pretty much passes means that it almost entirely ignores what this movie should really be about 😢
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It’s a well-made film. I just wish we were past the white-washing. Something to keep in mind while watching.
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Definitely agree with that. It’s truly sad that this just keeps happening 😢
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Tbh, in my opinion this was a very well made movie.
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Oh when did you get to see it?
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Oh no, I haven’t seen it, it’s just from what I’ve read about it. It seems like a very well made movie in my opinion.
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I do want to see this one in spite of the white-centric nature of it. Perhaps the money men insisted on a ‘name’ .
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I’m sure they did, but in 2018 we need to be better than that, and we need to allow minority actors to make names for themselves becasue they never will as long as we keep white-washing, which is a self-perpetuating cycle.
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I know, I can’t fathom why it’s taking so long!!
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You know, I wanted to see this for Dev Patel but 1) I didn’t know Armie Hammer was in it, so that’s a minus for me and 2) Focusing on the white people is going to be a problem. Why? As you said.
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Well there’s quite a lot of Dev Patel, so you’re in luck.
And yeah, it’s insulting that they think we won’t be able to relate if there isn’t a literal white person in there. Um, I think I could manage to relate to hotel guests. Or the reservations clerk! This is not exactly out of the box stuff, it just happened to happen in India!
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