7 Days in Entebbe (2018)

Don't waste your money on this purely fictional political hit piece. If you want to be both entertained and educated about what truly happened- go see the original 1976 movie.

Fmovies: My father and I went into this film having heard nothing about this new dramatization of the famous rescue operation. I checked movie listings and saw this title and thought my Dad and I would like it since we're both history buffs and I loved the old TV movie that I saw many times growing up in the '80s.

This movie was very disappointing. It was frightfully boring and came across more as a pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel piece of propaganda. Under the guise of "balance," the film shows its bias. The terrorists' motives are rationalized throughout the film and great care is given to humanizing them. The Israelis are seen as dithering and even agreeing that they need to stop making war and start negotiating, as if the long-standing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians is something caused by Israeli intransigence and not, at the very least, a complicated issue with actors on both sides continuing to stir the pot. Worst of all, one of the most famous special forces operations in history, a military action that Israel is rightly proud of on so many levels, is shoved to the side. There's a strange focus in this film on a nobody Israeli soldier whose girlfriend is a dancer and the climactic "raid on Entebbe" is literally intercut with scenes from a modern dance stage performance, complete with a Broadway-style song. My father said he was "disturbed" by the inclusion of that dance performance. It didn't belong there and completely destroyed what little tension was building up. Clearly, it's only purpose was to undercut the heroism and brilliance of the actual rescue operation.

The TV movie from decades ago had a true all-star cast, with some big-name stars having small roles. This new movie shows how the political winds have changed in Hollywood.

After, at least, two movies already made about this hijaking in the past, you'd expect a 2018 film bringing some more details of it and the unbelievable military operation, to light. Otherwise, why make yet another movie about Entebbe? Well, apparently the moviemakers wanted the audience to see a "human" side of hijackers. 7 days in Entebbe is about how uneasy feelings, grievances and ,believe it of not, attempt at redemption of terrorists. That's where the focus lays, not on men, women and children under a gun, or Israeli special forces unit which conducted an operation which, since then, never been matched. At times the movie felt like a second rated prime TV flick than anything else: with poor screenplay, editing, scenery sets and pathetic attempt to depict a battle to free the hostages.

7 Days in Entebbe fmovies. Sympathizes with terrorists. Also the director thought he would be creative and mix in a dance scene with the turning point of the film but it ruined the movie.

'Entebbe' is a film that should have worked and should have been good. It had a very talented cast, it is hard not to go wrong with Daniel Bruhl, Rosamund Pike and Eddie Marsan judging from a lot of their previous work. It also is based on and tells of a remarkable and hard-hitting true story.

While not a terrible film, despite sharing all of many people's complaints of 'Entebbe' it is not as quite as bad to me as some have made out because there are a few plus points, 'Entebbe' should have been much better and that it screwed up in such an underwhelming manner is frustrating. It really does not do this incredible story justice and the cast are all better than this and deserved better. Didn't come out feeling insulted or offended watching 'Entebbe', at the same time the film left me disappointed and frustrated.

There are plus points here. Daniel Bruhl and Rosamund Pike actually fare very well in the lead roles. While Bruhl's as expected thoughtful, gravitas-filled and charismatic performance keeps one glued Pike impressed me more in the more challenging role (including having a German accent, not an easy one to master and one stereotyped very variably a lot, and having apparently to learn German, thought though she was fluent in the language already) and the one that the film tries most to develop.

'Entebbe' starts off intriguingly and there are parts where the production values have slickness and atmosphere. There is one scene that did have emotional impact and did leave me haunted, that was Pike's phone scene.

However, the rest of the cast don't fare so well and it is largely down to the way the characters are written. Eddie Marsan is just bizarre and how Peres is written and characterised felt wrong and out of kilter. Nonso Anozie is nowhere near sinister enough as Amin, the man was a monster and Anozie completely fails to bring that on screen. Ben Schnetzer's role doesn't make sense and felt under-developed. The chemistry between the actors is very disconnected, on the most part this is including between Bruhl and Pike through no fault of their own.

It's not the cast that are to blame here. The one-sided and biased way the roles are written, including trying to humanise the lead characters, making Peres' and Amin's roles one-dimensional and painting the Palestinians in an objectionable light, is more of a problem. Even when trying to tell the events from multiple, even all, view-points which fails to tell one very much and quickly became over-stuffed.

As is the less than taut and rather preachy script, that runs out of steam far too quickly and it constantly feels we are running in circles with nothing new being told and being told the obvious and the same thing more than once. The direction is both pedestrian and gimmicky, often muddled and like not-knowing-what-to-do-with-the-material standard, and too often the production values are drab and dizzying, the slow motion in the final raid was not necessary, trivialised the already too downplayed violence and made me feel uncomfortable. The scene should have been tense but was anything but, feeling too much like an afterthought.

Much has also been made of the use and cross-cutting of modern dancing. This was overused, out of place, gimmicky and not even that well choreographed. It really diluted what little tension there already was and it made it very hard to take the film seriously. Found it very annoying and even disrespectful that 'E

The fact that the raid also took out most of the Ugandan Air Force on the ground was never mentioned. And in the final credits and 'what then happened' there was no mention of the fact that the Air France captain was awarded the Legion d'honneur , and the rest of crew received gallantry medals for staying with their passengers throughout, was not mentioned. That will not go down well in France. The dance routine 'overlay' of the actual raid is both ridiculous and overdone. The political slanting of the whole has been well covered by others.