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Munich (2005)

Genre: Thriller/History

Director: Steven Spielberg

Certificate: Munich was rated 15A by the Irish Film Censor's Office (www.ifco.ie) i.e. suitable for those of 15 years of age or upwards. Persons under 15 must be accompanied by an adult.

Violence = strong. Drugs = mild. Sex/Nudity = moderate. Language = strong.

  Review

Steven Spielberg’s gripping political thriller based on the events that followed from the massacre of the Israeli athletes by Black September at the 1972 Munich Olympics.  The first 20 minuets are the attack itself brilliantly inter-cutting a re-creation with actual archive footage.  After the disastrous shoot-out at the airport the Israeli's decide that the only way for them to react is set up a death squad to hunt down those it felt was responsible for the events.

Munich
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A Mossad agent called Avner (Eric Bana) is recruited to head up the team but for political reasons he can have no official contact with the State apart from his handler Ephraim (Geoffrey Rush).  Avner puts together his team (which includes soldiers played by Daniel Craig, Ciaran Hinds, and Mathieu Kassouitz) and they set out to wipe out the leadership of Black September.

At first they see it as merely a job that soldiers in the modern age have to fight but as time passes the killing begins to take its toll - they try and minimise collateral damage but in the very nature of what they are doing this is hard to avoid.  To complicate things they receive a lot of information from a shadowy French group who seem to know far more about the people they are hunting than they should and Avner has to balance trusting them without ever really knowing who they are - not helped that the whole thing is presided over by a very enigmatic Papa (Michael Lonsdale).

Bana is superb in the role - as the film progresses he becomes more and more haunted and his doubts over the reason and end results of what he is doing grow - a lot of the tension is between those in the group who see things very black and white - led by Steve (Daniel Craig) - and Anvers' faction.

Spielberg has been critised by both sides for either siding with one or the other or by being too even-handed.......as the leading Jewish film-maker in the world he handles the moral dimension very well - there is a key scene where Avner and a PLO fighter debate the issues (the PLO fighter doesn't know who Avner is) that gets to the heart of the matter - both sides see their view as absolute.

The final part of the film has all the people that Anver has killed replaced by even more extreme versions and the fact the film stops about 1975 and watching it 30 years afterwards with no sign to an end to the killing… it’s a very sobering experience… and does make you wonder if it will ever end.

Easily one of Spielberg’s best films and one of the best films I have seen this year.

Reviewed by George Kaplan, Premier Movie Reviews 2006.

RELATED MOVIE REVIEWS:  STEVEN SPIELBERG: A.I. (Artificial Intelligence),  Catch Me If You Can,  Minority Report,  The Terminal,  War Of The Worlds.  ERIC BANA: Black Hawk Down,  Finding Nemo,  Troy.  DANIEL CRAIG: Layer Cake,  Road To Perdition.  CIARAN HINDS: Calendar Girls,  Lara Croft: Tomb Raider: The Cradle Of Life,  Road To Perdition,  The Phantom Of The Opera,  The Sum Of All Fears,  Veronica Guerin.  GEOFFREY RUSH: Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl,  Finding Nemo.

Main Cast

Eric Bana

Daniel Craig

Ciaran Hinds

Mathieu Kassouitz

Hanns Zischler

Ayelet Zurer

Geoffrey Rush

Gila Almagor

Michael Lonsdale

RATING

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

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