‘7 DAYS IN ENTEBBE’
PG-13 1:46
“7 Days in Entebbe” is, as its name suggests, a pretty conventional ticktock of the 1976 hijacking of an Air France jetliner en route from Tel Aviv to Paris by members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the Red Army Faction, a German leftist group. Or it would be conventional, were it not for the fact that the movie opens with a startling snippet of performance by Israel’s Batsheva Dance Company, making you wonder, for a second, whether you have stumbled into a screening of “Step Up 6” by mistake.
The footage of the dance “Kyr,” a 1990 work by noted Israeli choreographer Ohad Naharin, features several dancers seated in a semicircle. Clad in the generic black suits and conservative headcoverings of ultraOrthodox Judaism, they explode from left to right, in sequence, from their seats, throwing themselves ecstatically to their feet, as one dancer, in the middle of the group, collapses onto the floor in a heap, ruining the precision and symmetry of the arc.
And then the movie, by director Jose Padilha, known for his 2014 reboot of the politically charged action film “RoboCop,” begins in earnest, cutting to the hijacking, which brought more than 200 passengers, including 84 Israelis, to Uganda’s Entebbe Airport. Over the course of 100 minutes or so, the factbased drama, in reasonably gripping fashion, follows the weeklong showdown between the hijackers, including Germany’s Brigitte Kuhlmann and Wilfried Bose (Rosamund Pike and Daniel Bruhl), and the Israeli government. Finally, after most of the hostages have been released — except for the Israelis, the crew and a few French travelers — Israel sends in a team of commandos to storm the airport.
Padilha cuts back and forth between Uganda and Israel, with occasional flashbacks to Germany, where the hijacking was planned, and Yemen, where its perpetrators received military training. Infighting — among hijackers over strategy, and between Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin (a marvelous Lior Ashkenazi) and Defense Minister Shimon Peres (Eddie Marsan) over whether to negotiate — lends drama to the standoff. For several days, nothing happens, as the hijackers demand that Israel and other countries release prisoners and Israel sticks to its long-standing refusal to negotiate with terrorists. Meanwhile, military action is considered, although that is fraught with risk.
Woven throughout “Entebbe” are scenes taken from rehearsals for the dance performance that opens the movie. One of the dancers (Zina Zinchenko) — the one who falls — is the girlfriend of an Israeli soldier (Ben Schnetzer) who has been recruited for the rescue operation. Although their story delivers a message — “I fight so you can dance,” he tells her, somewhat predictably — it is a minor one in the scheme of things.
Rather, the dance itself makes a much more powerful, and ultimately poetic, point. On the most superficial level, it is a blunt metaphor for the elaborate choreography of the rescue operation, which entailed its own intense rehearsals, undertaken in a scale mock-up of the Entebbe airport that had been recreated back in Israel.
“Entebbe” is, by this reading, a fairly standard glorification of Israeli military prowess. On a subtler level, however, the dance’s themes of conformity and deviation resonate powerfully with the movie’s true theme, which questions whether Israel’s robotic stance of non-negotiation has been effective in the long run. If the nation never talks with its enemies, Rabin asks Peres, how can there ever be peace?
Although that question is articulated only toward the end of the film, it hangs, unspoken, over the entire movie, lending what would otherwise be a pedestrian thriller a subtle but potent punch. Over the closing credits, we watch another one of Naharin’s works, called “Last Dance,” which features one dancer, in the foreground, contorting himself in agonizingly angular
gyrations as a second dancer runs in place in the background, seemingly going nowhere, but with a singular, unbroken focus.
Starring: Rosamund Pike, Daniel Brühl and Eddie Marsan. (Violence, some thematic material, drug use, smoking and brief strong language)
— Michael O’Sullivan, The Washington Post
‘LOVE, SIMON’
PG-13 1:49
Some things are universal about being a teenager: The budding sexuality and sense of identity, the dramatic emotions, the profound need for acceptance and confusing inklings of first love.
Countless movies (and books and songs and TV shows) plumb the agony and elation of teen romance, but “Love, Simon” brings fresh perspective to the genre by focusing on an experience unseen in coming-of-age tales: What high-school first love might be like if you’re gay.
This film treats 17-yearold Simon Spier’s quest for love and self-acceptance with the tender, timeless, Hollywood touch of John Hughes: It’s a classic story of a first crush made groundbreaking by centering on a closeted gay kid.
Nick Robinson is Simon, a shaggy-haired high-school
senior who describes his life as “totally normal.” He has a loving family and the same clutch group of friends for years. Simon is gay — he’s known ever since a recurring adolescent dream about Daniel Radcliffe — but has kept his sexuality a secret from everyone.
He finally finds an outlet after an anonymous post on the school’s online gossip forum. A student calling himself Blue confesses that he’s gay but hasn’t told anyone, and Simon writes to him, using a pseudonym. They begin an anonymous pen-pal friendship that turns into a deep connection, and Simon starts fantasizing about Blue’s real identity.
He keeps this all this from his friends, who are drawn in classic Hughes tradition: There’s awkward, self-conscious Leah (“13 Reasons Why” star Katherine Langford), who’s been crushing on Simon since they were kids; Abby (Alexandra Shipp), the transfer student and hottest girl in school; and Nick (Jorge Lendeborg Jr.), a nice-guy athlete who serves as Simon’s heterosexual foil.
All the other “Grease” and “Sixteen Candles” archetypes are here, too: The bullies, jocks and popular kids, the wacky administrator (played oddly over-the-top by Tony Hale), and the no-nonsense drama teacher (Natasha Rothwell, as much of a hilarious standout here as she is on HBO’s “Insecure.”) Jennifer Garner and Josh Duhamel play Simon’s dreamy, slightly farfetched parents.
Simon’s life starts to unravel when the school’s class clown, Martin (Logan Miller), finds his secret emails. Martin threatens to expose the exchange — and Simon’s gay status — unless Simon agrees to set Martin up on a date with Abby.
As with any story set in the emotional minefield of high school — especially in the era of social media — dramatic social chaos ensues for everyone. And it rings painfully true whether you were the Leah, Abby, Nick, Martin or Simon of your teenage group.
The heart of
“Love, Simon” lies in the authenticity of its characters, which were born in psychologist-turned-author Becky Albertalli’s debut novel, adapted by “This Is Us” screenwriters Elizabeth Berger and Isaac Aptaker, and brought lovingly to the screen by director Greg Berlanti. A veteran writer and producer of such teen fare as TV’s “Riverdale,” ‘’Dawson’s Creek,” ‘’Supergirl” and “The Flash,” Berlanti knows this world intimately, both personally and professionally. He says he was “a closeted gay high schooler” himself and celebrates “Love, Simon” as the first mainstream Hollywood coming-of-age film with a gay lead.
The success of “Black Panther” and the momentum behind #MeToo are propelled by the idea that representation matters, and “Love, Simon” is part of that conversation. Movie fans who aren’t white and straight have long projected themselves onto the big-screen stories of those who are. But we all want to see our experiences validated, to have our stories deemed significant, to feel that we are not alone and that others can identify with what we’ve gone through.
“Love, Simon” is a universal story, even if you’re not a gay teenager. The challenge of figuring out who we are and standing comfortably in that identity might begin in high school, but often lasts a lifetime. As Simon so aptly says: “No matter what, announcing who you are to the world is pretty terrifying.”
Starring: Nick Robinson, Jennifer Garner and Josh Duhamel. (Thematic elements, sexual references, language and teen partying) — Sandy Cohen, Associated Press
‘TOMB RAIDER’
PG-13 1:58 Review unavailable
Lara Croft, the fiercely independent daughter of a missing adventurer, must push herself beyond her limits when she finds herself on the island where her father disappeared.
Starring: Alicia Vikander, Dominic West, Walton Goggins and Daniel Wu. (Sequences of violence and action, and for some language) — IMDB.com