Entebbe aka 7 Days in Entebbe (2018)

(On Cable TV, June 2020) The 1976 Entebbe Raid is a real-life dramatic event well worth a film adaptation, but at the end of 7 Days in Entebbe I’m left nonplussed at the approach chosen in dramatizing the true story. From the get-go, the choice to humanize the hijackers (through film leads Daniel Brühl and Rosamund Pike) is puzzling—since you can’t really accidentally hijack a plane and such hijackings depend on the willingness to commit mass murder, their demise at the end of the film is nothing to shed tears over. The film ends in even more dubious thematic territory by tying the hijacking to Middle East conflicts and adopting a cheap rhetoric of both-side anti-violence—and makes the whole thing even more dumbfounding through an action sequence intercut with an interpretative dance performance. Saying that the climax is nothing like you’ve ever seen before is not a compliment in this case. Still, director José Padilha aims high (even as he misses his target) and can depend on Brühl and Pike as remarkable performers. The execution is slick and the real events are credibly portrayed, even if the film is remarkably annoying when it keeps repeating its obvious points over and over again. It doesn’t build to anything except a confused, frustrating and barely adequate thriller inspired by true events. I’m reminded of Truffault’s “no war movie is anti-war,” quote—there’s a contradiction in 7 Days in Entebbe in wanting to draw us in through the promise of violent retribution and then immediately decrying said retribution. Sure, you can make the statement—but you’re mocking your own efforts at portraying it, and exasperating everyone who was lured in.