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The Attack | 2013 | R | - 6.6.5

Based on the popular novel of the same name by Yasmina Khadra, a well-respected Arab surgeon (Ali Suliman) living in Tel Aviv learns a dark secret about his wife after a suicide bombing attack. Also with Reymond Amsalem, Uri Gavriel and Evgenia Dodena. Directed by Ziah Douerir. [1:42]

SEX/NUDITY 6 - We see brief clips of a man and a woman kissing passionately with the woman on top of the man (the man is shirtless and his bare chest is visible); the woman is nude (a portion of the side of her bare breast is visible and her bare back is visible) and it appears that they are having sex and we then see the woman resting her head against the man's chest. A man and a woman are seen together in bed with the woman's bare buttocks visible as she is lying on her stomach and the man's bare chest is visible (previous sex is implied).
 A man crudely tells another man that people are promised "72 virgins in heaven." A man crudely tells another man that prior to blowing up the World Trade Center, terrorists had sex "like rabbits." A man tells another man that he found out that his wife had been cheating on him for five years.
 We see a man's bare chest while he is in a hospital operating room. We see a portion of a man's bare chest as he sits on a bed toweling himself dry. We see a portion of a woman's torso as she lifts her shirt for a medical examination.

VIOLENCE/GORE 6 - In a rush, we see ambulances racing to a hospital where children are shown covered in blood and on gurneys as a doctor pulls a shard of bloody glass from an unconscious, blood-covered boy; the boy's heart monitor begins to beep (the boy is dying), the doctor performs chest compressions and the boy's heart stabilizes; a man tries to push his way into an operating room as two men restrain him and the man flips over a cart as he tries to reach his obviously dying son; we see many children covered in blood with large cuts on their faces and arms, one boy is rushed into an operating room where a doctor runs and we hear his heart monitor beep (it is implied the child has died); a shirtless man, covered in blood, is strapped to a gurney (we see blood pulsating from a wound on his forehead) and he begins to scream refusing help from a doctor.
 A man tells another man that he believes the man's wife was responsible for a suicide bomb that killed 17 people, including 11 children; the man leads the other man to a morgue, where another man pulls a body out on a shelf (we see a portion of a body and it appears to only be enough mass to be torso and head) and lifts the sheet enough to reveal the woman's charred and bloody head; the woman's husband turns and walks away silently, then collapses on the ground and we see him wake up as a doctor gives him a calming medication and walks away.
 A man tells another man that the man's wife appears to have been killed by injuries only possible from a suicide bombing and the man disagrees angrily; the man continues, saying that the woman was doing it for a religion that promises 72 virgins in heaven if you die and the second man lashes out and slaps the first man; four police officers grab the man and we then see him in an interrogation room; we see a police officer shout at the man interspersed with scenes of the man in solitary confinement, including a scene of the man being tortured with extremely loud heavy metal music, and the officer grabs the man's face as the man tells the officer that he had not slept in three days and he crumples to the ground, exhausted.
 Several soldiers with guns drawn surround a car, and they pull a male passenger from the car as a second passenger jumps out of the car and follows the soldiers, shouting at them; one of the soldiers shouts at the second passenger, levels the gun at his face and cocks it. Three men grab a man and throw him out of a mosque, half-carrying him down the street before shoving him away. A man tries to approach a man walking down the street when two men shove him backwards.
 A doctor is seen getting into an elevator with a blood-covered gurney and a bloody sheet is over the gurney (it is implied that a dead body is under the sheet). We see a doctor in an operating room with a patient who appears alive but is on a ventilator. A woman purposely pricks her finger with a cactus spine (she is unharmed).
 We hear a young man's voiceover explain to his uncle that his aunt (the man's wife) had found a gun that belonged to the young man and we see the young man standing behind the woman, holding the gun behind his back; the young man's voiceover explains that he had thought about killing the woman until she offered to give the young man money to aid in his terrorist activities. A man violently rips down posters of his wife, idolized as a martyr for being a suicide bomber.
 A man shouts at another man, saying that his wife had not only killed herself but also killed 11 other families when she was a suicide bomber. A man shouts angrily at another man. A man shouts angrily at a boy. A man shouts at a woman and the woman drops a plate accidentally. A man shouts at men and women, saying that his wife was not a suicide bomber or a "killer of children." A man plays a tape of a man shouting political rants about people deserving nothing (including life) if they were not members of a religious group. We see a man watching television and the person on the television shouts that he is not afraid of using guns. A man tells a young man that 17 people, including 11 children, had been killed in a bombing. A man tells a woman that a group of terrorists had killed his wife and the woman corrects the man, saying that the woman had killed herself. A man tells a woman that he knows his wife is responsible for causing a suicide bombing. A young man tells a man that he had not wanted his aunt (the man's wife) to be part of a suicide bombing; the young man explains that the woman had "witnessed a massacre" that prompted her to be a suicide bomber. A man listens to a radio report where two people discuss the history of female suicide bombers, and then discuss the listening man's wife at length, discussing how she had killed 17 people in her suicide bombing. A man tells another man that he has witnessed people being run over by tanks. A man tells another man that his wife was not a suicide bomber for religious reasons, but really because she was tired of people being treated poorly. A man approaches a wall of his house, and we see "child killer" in Hebrew spray-painted on the wall (it is translated in subtitles). A man asks his brother-in-law why he said he was proud of his sister-in-law being a suicide bomber and the man does not answer. A man asks another man a hypothetical question about why he might think a person commits a suicide bombing. A woman poses a hypothetical question to a man, asking him to think about their lives the next time he has to operate on someone with injuries from a suicide bomber. A man asks another man if a patient had died, and the man tells the other man that he was not concerned about the health of the patient. A man tells another man that he had heard a story of a patient who was now in jail because he had punched a police officer after the officer told him that he was not allowed to smoke. A man tells his wife that when they part a "part of him dies." A teen girl tells her uncle that she could "die" while waiting for a travel permit. A man tells his teenage niece that as a child he had attempted to be a super hero; he tried to jump from a building while wearing a cape and that his neighborhood was out to help catch him, but the man's father had eventually helped him down on a ladder after warning the boy that he might be harmed. A woman tells a man that his former wife had purposefully injured herself so that he (a doctor) would care for her.
 A doctor is seen getting into an elevator with a blood-covered gurney and a bloody sheet is over the gurney (it is implied that a dead body is under the sheet). We see a doctor in an operating room with a patient who appears alive but is on a ventilator. A woman purposely pricks her finger with a cactus spine (she is unharmed). A man kisses the forehead of his dead wife in a morgue.
 People dining on a patio hear an explosion and we see a cloud of smoke in the distance.

LANGUAGE 5 - About 5 F-words, 5 scatological terms, 2 anatomical terms, 4 mild obscenities, name-calling (silly, [F-word deleted]-ups, idiot, crazy, spoiled, psychopaths, bigot), 1 religious profanity.

SUBSTANCE USE - A woman smokes a marijuana cigarette and shares it with a man who takes a puff. A man pours himself a drink of liquor and offers a young man a glass, a man drinks a glass of liquor, men and women have wine at dinner, and we see men with alcoholic drinks in a bar. We see men smoking cigarettes in a bar, a man is seen smoking a hookah, a man begins to smoke cigarettes halfway through the movie, and a woman smokes a cigarette.

DISCUSSION TOPICS - Suicide bombing, spousal trust, the Palestine-Israeli conflict, hate crimes, revenge, regret, dishonesty, bigotry, religious zealots, infidelity.

MESSAGE - Suicide bombing is a tragic event in the Palestine-Israeli conflict.

CAVEATS

Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.

We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.

Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.


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