I just watched the movie Hotel Mumbai. It is the first time that I managed to finish less than a quarter of my popcorn during a 2 hour movie. To me, this was a horror movie. I usually laugh while watching horror movies. But this movie isn’t fiction. It brings back memories of the actual incident.
The movie is based on the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. Ten gunmen of a terrorist outfit based in Pakistan came to Mumbai by boat and opened fire in several places, killing around 175, and wounding about 300. The coordinated attacks occurred in several landmarks across the city, one of them being the famous Taj Palace. Many foreigners were taken captive there. The movie focuses on what took place inside the hotel. In an interview, the director stated that extensive research was done, and that the movie strays very less from the actual incident. From what I could read online, it does seem to be the case.
I was then a small child who was happy to have got a holiday from school. Today, I understand the impact of what really happened. Nobody I know was involved. If it has such an impact on me, I can only imagine what it did to those who were part of it.
As I now see it, this is no different from the Jallianwala Bagh massacre. People going to extraordinary lengths to get what they want. Men who are puppets in the hands of evil masterminds, carrying out mass murder in exchange for promises of salvation and petty amounts of money to get their families out of poverty. Call me crazy, but I pity those boys who carried out the attack. They were children. Their extreme poverty was used to brainwash them and make them weapons. And for what? For a partition of two countries that happened ages ago. Who suffers for the ego clash between a handful of politicians? As always, it is the common man. Out of the hundreds killed, only a small percentage were wealthy influential people. Most of the victims were just normal people going about their daily chores. All I can ask is, why them?
A point that I wasn’t really aware about before watching the movie is the remarkable courage the staff of the Taj exuded. It doesn’t matter that the characters portrayed in the movie were a combination of multiple real people. All these people, showing the smallest acts of kindness, wanted to go back to safety just as badly as their guests did. Yet they stuck on there, ensuring the safety of their guests, some even sacrificing themselves in the process. I really like that this movie is not from the perspective of the those who have become war heroes, but that it tells the lore of the unsung veterans.
Unlike a lot of people, I refuse to blame religion. I have several Muslim friends, and they’re all definitely peace-loving amazing people. All I know is that this is the work of the evil human mind, using religion as a tool. I feel convinced that the inventor of religion did it with the purpose of uniting humanity to praise this universe and its creator. However, the human mind is such that, even if we were to start all over again, we would still end up in the same place: doing more bad than good to this planet and its inhabitants.
In conclusion, this movie isn’t for the weak hearted. It will definitely leave an impact on your mind.
Makeba 