Munich (2005)
The Cast
Eric Bana .... Avner
Daniel Craig .... Steve
Ciarán Hinds .... Carl
Mathieu Kassovitz .... Robert
Hanns Zischler .... Hans
Ayelet Zurer .... Daphna
Geoffrey Rush .... Ephraim
Marie-Josée Croze .... Jeanette the Dutch Assassin
Last Saturday night I watched this near 3 hour long epic movie, and almost a week later I'm attempting to review it. I say attempting because the last bad movie Steven Spielberg made was over 15 years ago, so there's almost an assured level of quality to any movie that has his name attached to it. Hell at this point you could put the tag line "As mentioned by Steven Spielberg" on a movie poster and it would gross near $50 million domestically. Which is pretty much what Munich movie did at the box office, so there, I win.
If you don't know what Munich is about, well consult your friendly neighbourhood Wikipedia entry on the subject for a more in-depth synopsis than I'm prepared to give. My biggest problem with the movie is the title. Munich means Germany to me, and I consider myself semi-well-versed in at least the broadest strokes of human history. There's probably at least fifteen dozen better titles for the movie, three of which might have increased the overall box office take. Munich's Revenge is my personal favourite, or a variation on that title perhaps.
Anyways, Spielberg himself (perhaps that should be capitalized from now on since some people view him as some sort of deity) has referred to this film as a work of "historical fiction". Boy does that open up a lot of grey areas to exploit in future cinematic endeavors. If Spielberg Himself can do it, some egomaniac filmmaker like Uwe Boll could craft a worldly tale... no, wait... Uwe Boll couldn't craft a pile of shit. OH better be careful, he may want to engage in fisticuffs with me!
So here's my review on Munich: pretty good but not great. Some great acting throughout, with Eric Bana taking on the lion's share of the movie. The movie hinges on his convincing performance, and thankfully he delivers an emotional roller coaster throughout the movie in which he's onscreen for about 80 - 90% of the near three hour running time. The locations throughout the movie and the camerawork are particularily stunning, and the supporting cast is excellent. You know how weird it is to watch an entire movie convinced that Ian Holm was part of the cast and then finding out it wasn't him at all? That's weird man.
I'm not sure if I can actually recommend the movie to anyone, as I'm pretty sure I'll never watch it again. Not because I didn't enjoy it, but because the movie doesn't pick a side and near three hours of ambiguity is far too long of a time to not know what the filmmaker intended. Great performances, beautiful cinematography, a cast with loads of chemistry and a decent enough revenge / hitman storyline is worth at least one watch. Just leave some space on your schedule.
4 / 5