Shonibar Bikel

This film is inspired by the real-life Holey Artisan attack in Dhaka, Bangladesh. But rather than make a film about the tragedy faced by real families, the filmmakers chose to create a fictional story based on a same premise: a group of terrorists attack a restaurant in Dhaka during the month of Ramadan and hold the patrons hostage, claiming to do so in the name of religion, murdering many of them over the course of the hostage crisis.

The characters depicted as the terrorists, hostage, and the restaurant staff, are all fictionalized. New characters are invented each of whose circumstances shed light on the hollow baselessness of the terrorists' botched mission.

Given that this is a film shot in a single take, it has the distinct feel of a one-act play, in which character drama unfolds through the dialogue. Despite the dark and tense premise, some of the dialogue elicited awkward chuckles from those of us watching and many of the lines of dialogue struck a chord as well.

I don't want to go into the details of the many interesting nuances of the film because I really think it's best to go in knowing nothing about the characters and learning about each of them as the narrative unfolds.