Bridge of Spies (7/10): Hanks and Spielberg reunited

“This man, my father's friend, he was beaten. Every time they hit him, he stood back up again. They hit him harder, still he got back to his feet. I think because of this they let him live.”

Over the past few years Steven Spielberg has shied away from the big blockbuster productions and settled for historical dramas such as Lincoln, War Horse, and Munich. Now we can add Bridge of Spies to Spielberg’s list of history lessons which counts on some outstanding and understated performances from an A list cast. This is the fourth collaboration between Spielberg and Tom Hanks, and although it doesn’t rank amongst my favorite I still enjoyed the character he plays here. Hanks is James B. Donovan, an insurance attorney with a strong sense of justice who also happens to be a respectable family man. Hanks plays the character very subtly and in a way he reminded me of Gregory Peck’s Atticus Finch because both characters seem to share a strong moral code and they put their sense of justice above what the community might think of them. Here Donovan is given the task to serve as a defense attorney for a KGB intelligence officer named Rudolf Abel (played masterfully by Mark Rylance) during the height of the Cold War. You can imagine how the public reacts when Donovan begins to take his role seriously and defends this spy. It takes a toll on his family as well, his wife is played here by Amy Ryan and his children by Jillian Lebling, Noah Schnapps, and Eve Hewson. They believe in him, but also seem to be going through a similar conflict. My complaint here is that Amy Ryan is sidelined and doesn’t get to play an important role in the movie. 

There is also a parallel story going on as several US pilots are being recruited on a special mission to secretly fly U2 planes over the Soviet Union to gather intel. One of these pilots is Francis Powers (Austin Stowell) who on his first mission is shot down and captured by the soviets. The two plots come together when Donovan is asked by US government officials to try to negotiate a deal to interchange their prisoners. Spielberg delivers a historical piece with precise attention to detail giving us once again another important lesson about humanity’s unsung heroes. Donovan represents the ideal character here with strong moral values that are often forgotten or overlooked in today’s movie. I couldn’t think of a better actor to play such a character than the great Tom Hanks. However the standout for me was Mark Rylance as the soviet spy. It was a breath of fresh air to see a character like this portrayed in such a humane light. He is not the enemy here, he is a man who is doing his job and also seems to share a strong moral code. Rylance gives the film’s best performance and I think he out shined everyone in this film. The great Alan Alda also gets to be on screen for a few minutes although he isn’t playing against type or anything like that. 

Political thrillers are rarely in my interest, but I couldn’t let this film pass me by considering Steven Spielberg is the director who has made more of my favorite films than any other. Include a screenplay co-written with the Coen brothers and I was sold. The pacing of the film at times did seem to drag the movie down, but Spielberg treats the material with respect. Kaminski’s cinematography captures the era perfectly and Newman’s score adds to the emotional moments. The 50’s are perfectly captured through the art direction and Spielberg managed to transport us back to Berlin during the construction of the wall. Overall I enjoyed my history lesson once again from Steven Spielberg, but I felt that the film could’ve benefited from more thrills and a better pacing. It’s still a must see in my book.      

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (8/10): A groundbreaking concept for 1977

“We didn't choose this place! We didn't choose these people! They were invited!”

There is no other director whose films I’ve given the highest rating to more than Steven Spielberg. Being born in the 80’s meant I experienced some of his best films at a very young age: The Indiana Jones trilogy, E.T., and Jurassic Park. I cherish each of these films and the experience of seeing them for the first time are engraved in my memory. I might have been too easily manipulated by his films at that age, but it’s impossible for me not to view most of them as masterpieces. I didn’t watch Jaws until I was much older and that film blew me away, so I was hoping for a similar experience with Close Encounters of the Third Kind, which I had never got around seeing until now, but had read fantastic reviews. Fresh off the success of Jaws, many were expecting Spielberg’s next film about an alien encounter to be even more terrifying. But Spielberg had different plans and he wanted his film to stand out from all the previous B-movie alien invasion films. The concept was quite groundbreaking for the time considering his treatment of aliens here weren’t what audiences were expecting. The only other film that had taken a similar approach prior to this was The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951).

Spielberg’s film opens in a Mexican desert where a strange sighting has taken place. Several planes that had gone missing during the World War in the mid 40’s have mysteriously reappeared in the middle of the desert in excellent conditions. A French man named Claude Lacombe (Francois Truffaut) is interviewing the locals who discovered the planes with the help of an interpreter named David Laughlin (Bob Balaban). One of the locals is sunburned and shocked as he confesses that the Sun came out at night. The next scene takes place in Muncie, Indiana where a young boy named Barry (Cary Guffey) is mysteriously awakened in the middle of the night by his electric toys that all of a sudden are turned on. He walks out of the house following bright lights from the sky, while his mother, Jillian (Melinda Dillon) runs after him. The entire area is going through an inexplicable power outage. Roy Neary (Richard Dreyfuss) works for the power company and is sent to answer a service call. On his way he experiences a UFO sighting and while chasing the lights he nearly runs over Barry who was standing in the middle of the road. The small group of people that were gathered in the area became entranced by what they’d just experienced. Roy returns home to tell his wife Ronnie (Teri Garr) and children about what he saw, but they think he has lost his mind. Everyone that was exposed to the lights ended up sunburned, sharing similar visions of a strange mountain image, and humming a five tone melody. The film then follows closely Roy’s obsession and the effect that his supernatural encounter has on him and his family. 

By opening with these strange sightings, Spielberg leaves no room for doubt that these confrontations with UFO’s are real. The emotions that are evoked from these scenes have more to do with awe and wonder than they do with suspense or fear, which makes it stand out from most of his other films. Once again, John William’s score plays a key role in the movie and builds on that sense of amazement. Once Spielberg gets the actual encounters out of the way, he is allowed to focus the story on the family dynamics and that is where Dreyfuss’ performance takes center stage. His character behaves in a strange way and it’s hard to root for someone who is willing to leave his family behind to follow his visions (there is a wacky scene in which he attempts to build a model of the mountain in his living room with dirt and plants he has gathered from the yard), but somehow he still manages to be engaging. The child actor, Cary Guffey, is also very believable and in a way, we the audience, are in awe the same way as his character is. Melinda Dillon, who was nominated for her supporting performance, stands out here as well. The cast delivers, but it was Zsigmond’s cinematography which was outstanding and deserving of the film’s only Academy Award win. The build-up might have not been as interesting as the final thirty minute payoff in Devil’s Tower, Wyoming, but it more than makes up for it during those awesome final minutes. I imagine that if I’d seen this as a kid I would’ve loved it, but today it feels a bit outdated and underwhelming at times. I enjoyed this sci-fi movie, but it doesn’t rank close to my favorite Spielberg films. I fell for his more family friendly and emotionally manipulative E.T. which came out only five years after this.   

My Favorite Collection: Raiders of the Lost Ark (10/10)

“It's not the years, honey, it's the mileage.”

So I’m continuing to write these short reviews for some of my favorite films which I’ve never had a chance to comment on. It’s about time I give Steven Spielberg some love for one of the earliest films I have the memory of seeing. I don’t know how old I was when I first watched Raiders of the Lost Ark, but if my memory isn’t playing a trick on me I have to say this is the first movie I actually fell in love with (perhaps it has to do with the fact that it was released on my birth year). Raiders, First Blood, The Goonies, Romancing the Stone, Back to the Future, the Star Wars trilogy, and ET (I’m not including animated films) are the films that made an impact on me during my childhood; and either I watched them on repeat or the images have simply stuck in my memory. The opening scene where we are introduced to Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) as he is trying to steal a golden idol from a cave deep in the Peruvian jungle has always fascinated me. He’s forced to escape when he’s crossed by Belloq (Paul Freeman) and the traps go off as we are introduced to the adventurous tone of the film accompanied with the fascinating score by John Williams that has changed the fast-paced blockbuster genre forever. That is all we needed to be introduced to such a fascinating character. As a young boy I imagine I’d easily get distracted by a feature film, but all it took were those opening minutes for me to be hooked to the TV screen for its entire runtime. What followed was one action-packed adventure after another like the scene where Indy faces off a swordsman with his gun, the snake pit scene, the chase sequence involving a truck and some jeeps, and several others that continue to excite me today. It helps that Harrison Ford was playing the titular role and he absolutely owned the part. This is one of the best collaborations between George Lucas and Steven Spielberg and everything about this film was a thrilling experience. Harrison Ford turned Indiana Jones into an iconic figure, and several sequels have followed the success of Raiders without ever being able to match it. Even the romance between Ford and Karen Allen works in this film along with the comedic moments that make this adventure such an exciting and thrilling ride.       

My Review: Lincoln (7/10)

¨I could write shorter sermons but when I get started I’m too lazy to stop.¨

Lincoln is without a doubt the most iconic figure in America’s history and for that fact alone this movie is worth checking out considering it is a well researched biopic directed by one of the best contemporary filmmakers: Steven Spielberg. Lincoln may not be as entertaining as it is informative, but none the less this is a film that will stick with you and help you understand perhaps a bit more why Lincoln remains such a beloved and respectful figure in our society today. This film will win several Academy Awards and perhaps even Best Picture thanks to a wonderful lead performance from Daniel Day Lewis, a great supporting cast, and a brilliant screenplay from Tony Kushner, who had previously worked with Steven in Munich. What stands out about this biopic is the way in which Spielberg presents it by deciding to focus on a specific period during Lincoln´s second term as President. The film doesn’t have flashbacks or tell us anything about Lincoln’s past life, but rather focuses on a specific period in time where the President is trying to abolish slavery by getting the 13^th Amendment passed in the Constitution. All this occurring while the Civil War is going on of course, as we see how Lincoln brilliantly manages to maneuver both things at once. By deciding to film the biopic this way we can focus on an important period in Lincoln’s life, without having to go through his entire life. I felt that this way we were able to learn much more about the President and his actions than we would have if we were given every specific about his entire life. By focusing on this specific period we really learn and understand the person that Abe is. I thought this was just a brilliant way to approach the film and it worked wonderfully.

The film takes place during Abraham Lincoln’s (Daniel Day Lewis) second term as president in 1865 while the Civil War is nearing its end. Lincoln knows that if he wants to abolish slavery once and for all in America he will have to do it before the Civil War is over. Concerned about the little effect his emancipation act will have on the slaves after the war he begins to push for the 13^th Amendment to be passed before peace is reached. The Senate has already passed the amendment, and now it is up to the House of Representatives to pass it. He knows he has the votes from the Republican Party, but he still will need about 20 Democratic votes in order to get the amendment passed. In this political game that Lincoln begins to play he tries to extend the Civil War as much as possible in order to get the amendment passed, although he knows that the longer he extends the War the more innocent lives will be lost, including that of his son Robert (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) who has decided to join the War. This crisis of conscience that Lincoln faces begins to take a toll on him and his family, although he manages to maintain his serenity through these troubled times. Sally Field plays his wife Mary, while David Strathairn is William Seward the Secretary of State. Tommy Lee Jones is Thaddeus Stevens, one of the Republicans in the House of Representatives who highly favors the amendment.

From the moment that the film begins you get a sense that you really are seeing Abraham Lincoln, the icon himself come to life. Daniel Day Lewis immerses himself completely into his role in such a way that you forget that you are seeing a portrayal of Lincoln, and actually begin to see Lincoln himself. Daniel is a tremendous actor, he surprised us all in There Will Be Blood, and once again he outdoes himself. I wouldn’t be surprised if he wins his third Oscar for his tremendous performance here. He is the highlight of the film. The rest of the cast is also brilliant: You have Sally Field, Tommy Lee Jones, David Strathairn, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, James Spader, Hal Holbrook, John Hawkes, Jackie Earle Hayley, and Jared Harris among many other great actors. The entire cast here is magnificent as they transport us into the past in such a way that you forget you are watching a film. Everything about this film works really well, but I felt it worked more as a history lesson than as a piece of entertainment. This is not an action film, it doesn’t focus on the Civil War, but rather it takes a more personal approach as to the persona of Lincoln and the strategic politic mind he had. This is a film that will help you understand more about the man and how he managed to end the Civil War while at the same time abolish slavery. This is perhaps the greatest historical American political film ever made. Unfortunately I’m not a fan of politics and I did find this film a bit heavy handed, but it was a wonderful experience and it helped me understand and learn more about the man Lincoln.

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My Review: War Horse (6/10)

¨Separated by war. Tested by battle. Bound by friendship. ¨

War Horse might be about a miraculous and beautiful horse, but the movie has nothing miraculous about it. It`s a well filmed movie, but the story and the performances are very melodramatic at times. The scenery is gorgeous, but the pacing is slow for a two and a half hour long movie. The Academy seemed to like this Steven Spielberg film more than I did since it received six Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, but despite the excellent performance from the horse (or should I say horses?) this won`t be among my favorite films of the year. Of course it has the typical Spielberg narrative that has made him such a loveable director, but I felt it was way too melodramatic at times. War Horse is based on the novel written by Michael Morpurgo, while the screenplay was adapted by Lee Hall (Billy Elliot) and Richard Curtis (Notting Hill, Bridget Jones`s Diary, and Love Actually). The main protagonist of the story is this beautiful horse (played in the most part by the same horse from Seabiscuit), but the rest of the cast in this film are far from memorable. The War scenes really didn’t impact me at all in the way that Spielberg did in Saving Private Ryan, but I guess he couldn’t go that far if he wanted to make a family film. It does have some strong scenes however that might be difficult to watch (like when the horse gets caught up in the barb wires). War Horse is a good movie, but far from memorable and one I wouldn’t enjoy watching again.

The story takes place during 1914 in a small English town named Devon where a young teen named Albert (Jeremy Irvine) is seen watching the birth of a foal. That foal grows up to be a beautiful strong horse and is taken to an auction to be sold. Devon`s father, a farmer named Ted (Peter Mullan) is mesmerized by the animal and decides to buy it despite it not being a plough horse, but a thoroughbred. Devon is happy about his father’s decision, although his mother, Rose (Emily Watson) is upset because Ted has spent more money than they can afford on an animal that won`t help them in the far. To make matters worse, their landlord (David Thewlis) wants his rent money and demands after the harvest season or else he will take the land away from them. Devon tells his parents not to worry, that he will train the horse and teach it how to plough. Together Devon and the horse, which he names Joey, accomplish the impossible and plough the land in time for the harvest. However, a heavy rain ruins the harvest and everything is lost for Ted and his family. In order to pay the rent he is forced to sell the horse to a soldier, Captain Nicholls (Tom Hiddleston) since the country is at the brisk of war against Germany. That is how Joey begins his transition from one owner to the next, and from one band to another, after the English are defeated in a battle and the horse is taken by the Germans. Whoever his owner may be they will soon find out that he is no ordinary horse.

The cast is perhaps one of the weakest links about this movie. I didn’t find the performances very memorable and the drama seemed really forced at times. The best actor by far was the horse. Since the horse switches from one owner to another, there are several characters and different stories and some work better than others. The movie begins very slow, but once the war begins the story picks up at times. The final thirty minutes are really intense and do lift the movie, but it`s too bad it takes so long to pick up. The beginning is really slow and melodramatic and I feared the worst for this film, but thankfully it does get much better and the ending saves the movie. Even the performance from Jeremy Irvine seems to pick up in the second half (I really hated it in the first part). Tom Hiddleston`s role wasn’t very attractive either, I didn’t enjoy his performance, it seemed too forced. My favorite character in this movie was Emilie, a young girl that lived alone with her grandfather who finds the horse in a windmill. She was played by Celine Buckens and her role was hilarious. She has some funny lines, but as most characters she isn’t in this movie for too long. The barbwire scene was also pretty memorable and I loved the way the scene was resolved in such a comedic matter. If only War could be avoided in the same way. In conclusion we learn a lot from this miraculous horse and how animals too suffer in middle of men`s wars and differences. Too bad the pacing and the narrative was a little off, but the film is still worth a watch.

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My Review: Super 8 (9/10)

¨She used to look at me this way, like really look, and I just knew I was there, that I existed.¨

As a true fan of Lost (the best television series ever in my opinion) I was really excited about J. J. Abrams`s latest film, Super 8, which as usual he not only directed but also wrote. Abrams is one of my favorite directors and I`ve really enjoyed all his films. Add Steven Spielberg, who was one of the producers of this film, to the mix and this was perhaps one of my most anticipated films of the year. Fortunately, it didn`t disappoint and it even exceeded my expectations, although this didn’t even come as a surprise for me considering how well he managed to reboot the Star Trek franchise a couple of years ago. I was also a big fan of Cloverfield, which some people disliked, but I thought was really well crafted. Super 8 might be compared to Cloverfield in some ways, but I think it is a much more complete film in the sense that there is more character development going on. The whole mysterious monster thing was only a side story and the true heart of the film relied on the relationship between the kids and their friendship. Super 8 is really a nostalgic film that seems to pay homage to some of Spielberg`s early films like E.T., Close Encounter of the Third Kind, and The Goonies. That was the mood that Abrams kind of set with Super 8 and what makes it stand out from all the rest of the modern disaster/monster movies. Even the title suggests this nostalgic feeling considering that Super 8 mm film were one of the first formats used for home movies before the invention of video. The movie even has this dark and dirty visual style to it making you think you are actually watching an old classic (until you see some of the dazzling visual effects like in the train crash which remind us this is a modern movie).

The story takes place in a small town in Ohio during the summer of 1979. A group of young kids who are friends from school are making a super 8 movie about zombies. Joe Lamb (Joel Courtney) is helping out with the make-up, Charles (Riley Griffiths) is directing, Cary (Ryan Lee) is helping out with the sound, Preston (Zach Mills) is filming, while Alice (Elle Fanning) and Martin (Gabriel Basso) play the main actors. One night the five kids are out by the tracks filming their movie when all of a sudden they witness a catastrophic train wreck. Several explosions take place and parts of the train fall everywhere, but miraculously the kids are unharmed. Joe tells his friends that this wasn’t an accident; he witnessed how a truck drove straight at the train in order to provoke the crash. While the kids were shooting their movie the camera kept rolling so they decide to develop the film the very next day, but have to wait at least for three more days until they can actually see the footage. Meanwhile some mysterious things begin to take place after the accident: the dogs all of a sudden have disappeared, motors from vehicles are missing, and even some people have gone missing as well. Joe`s dad, Jackson (Kyle Chandler), is the town sheriff so he begins to search for answers, but the US Air Force (to whom the train belonged to) seems to be concealing what was really inside the train. Jackson discovers that there was a lot more to the accident then what they are actually telling him.

The first hour really keeps the suspense and mystery building as we try to discover what was in the train. The relationship between the kids is actually the primary focus of the film and the mystery kind of works as a side story. Elle Fanning does a terrific job with this film and deserves an Oscar nomination for best supporting actress since she actually steals every scene she`s in. She is the heart of the movie, and her relationship with Joel Courtney`s character reminds us a lot of that first innocent love. The chemistry between both actors is actually very intense and far more believable than that of the lead characters from most of today`s romantic comedies. Super 8 manages to mix well the action and suspense with the drama and character development, while at the same time remaining funny. It`s all these mixed emotions that remind us of those 80`s Spielberg blockbuster action movies. I couldn’t help but think of Drew Barrymore in E.T. when I saw Elle Fanning in this film; watching the kids investigating the mysteries reminded me of The Goonies; it’s just all these emotions that the movie evoked that gave me this sense of nostalgia while keeping me entertained at the same time. I really enjoyed this film and loved the performance from the kids, especially from Elle Fanning. I was so interested in these characters that I actually enjoyed the first half of the film over the second which focused more on the monster and the action. Super 8 is definitely worth watching, especially if you were a fan of some of these early Spielberg movies.

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My Review: Jaws (10/10)

¨What we are dealing with here is a perfect engine, an eating machine. It's really a miracle of evolution. All this machine does is swim and eat and make little sharks, and that's all.¨

Jaws marked a before and after in American Cinema; it became the first true Blockbuster movie and it has since influenced films for 35 years. Before Jaws came out, there weren´t any summer movies (perhaps many critics regret this since summer movies aren`t necessarily recognized for its artistic value), but this movie set the standard for what a summer movie should look like. Jaws also launched the career of Steven Spielberg as a director since he was largely unknown by the general public. So you may ask yourself what made this film such a success. There are a great amount of factors that I consider helped turn Peter Benchley`s bestselling novel into such a terrific thriller. First of all John Williams`s score is breathtaking. The suspense he created with a few notes that accompanied the shark`s point of view with the camera where masterful. There was no need to see the terrible shark; the music alone built the fear in us. Sometimes we fear more what is unseen than what is actually seen, and in the case of the shark it was much scarier not knowing where it was going to come out from in the water. The shark tales and pictures we see of people who have been attacked by sharks throughout the beginning of the movie are sufficient enough. Spielberg has already inserted fear in our minds before we even have a chance to see the actual beast. This technique was one of the reasons the movie was so successful. Everyone remembers the speech about the sinking of the USS Indianapolis as one of the highlights of the film and that is because it worked just like a scary tale in the middle of a campfire in the woods works, because it takes the atmosphere and the context and plays with our imagination inserting fear into our minds.

Jaw takes place in a fictitious island resort named Amity Island. Summer is approaching and the town is getting ready to receive thousands of tourists coming to its beautiful beaches, but a local teenager has just appeared washed up in the shore attacked by some sort of animal, probably a shark. Local Police Chief, Martin Brody (Roy Scheider), is investigating the incident. According to the forensic report the cause of death was a shark attack. Brody thinks it is best to close down the beaches until the shark can be killed, but Mayor Larry Vaughn (Murray Hamilton) stops him and says this will have a huge economical impact on the town. It is too soon to scare off the tourists and he gets the forensic doctor to change his report on the cause of death, so Brody reluctantly has to follow the Mayor`s orders. The next day another incident takes place, although this time it occurs in plain sight, and a local boy is killed by a shark. Brody closes the beach and the boy`s mother offers a reward to whoever catches the shark. Sam Quint (Robert Shaw) is the local shark hunter who knows they are dealing with a very big shark and tells the Mayor that if he wants the shark hunted then he will have to get paid a lot more than the reward the woman is offering. Matt Hooper (Richard Dreyfuss) is an Oceanographer who comes to the Island to help Chief Brody with the case. Together Hooper, Brody, and Quint set sail on the Orca to try to hunt the shark that has everyone panicking. They will soon find out that they are gonna need a bigger boat.

Jaws is considered by many as one of the greatest thrillers ever made. It is no surprise that after this movie came out very few people wanted to get into the water. The shark was in everyone`s nightmares. Jaws actually took home three Oscars, one for the musical score, another for the Sound effects, and a third for best editing under Verna Fields who took a lot of the credit for the success of the movie during that time. Spielberg was overlooked as a director, but he later proved in his other movies he was one of the reasons the film was so successful. He was a visionary in his field and was able to create one of the best thrillers without great visual effects. The secret was building the suspense through the unseen and showing the shark as little as possible. By the end of the film we were so immersed in it that we even believed the improbable ending and didn`t even feel cheated by that final climax scene. Spielberg combined suspense and thrills with comedy and action to perfection. Each character played an important part in the film and Brody, Hooper, and Quint became popular characters in movie history. This may have been one of Spielberg`s first films, but it still ranks among his best work because it managed to terrify audiences for ages to come.  

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My Review: Munich (9/10)

¨We are supposed to be righteous. That's a beautiful thing. And we're losing it. If I lose that, that's everything. That's my soul.¨

Munich is a very powerful and emotional movie that combines thrills with human drama. I went into this film expecting it to be simply a revenge movie, but it is much more than that; Spielberg doesn`t take sides and brings a lot of interesting elements that open up the debate between Israel and Palestine and which country is really the enemy. Steven Spielberg is one of the greatest directors active in American cinema and he has directed several masterpieces, Schindler`s List being perhaps the best one. Munich will probably not rank amongst his best work, but it`s still a great and powerful film that required a lot of risks on Spielberg`s part as a Jew because in Munich he never takes sides and by doing so both sides have declared him an enemy. The movie is based on George Jonas`s book ¨Vengeance¨ and the screenplay was adapted by Tony Kushner and Eric Roth (Forrest Gump and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button). The screenplay was beautifully written and also nominated for the Oscars along with four other categories (editing, directing, score, and best picture), although it went home empty handed. Those were probably the strongest elements the movie had, which was finely edited and the score really enhanced the film. I thought that there were also some very good performances from the cast, especially Eric Bana who gives his best performance to date, and Ciaran Hinds who also nails his role. Spielberg has only directed the fourth installment of Indiana Jones since Munich in 2005, but we will be hearing from him soon.

The film opens with the 1972 murders that took place in the Olympics of Munich. 11 Israeli athletes were murdered by a terrorist group called Black September. Munich focuses on what happened after these murders took place although there are several flashbacks during the movie returning to this attack. Prime Minister Golda Meir (Lynn Cohen) didn`t negotiate with the terrorists and therefore the hostages were killed, but now she decides to allow for a black operation to take place in order to kill some of the men behind the planning of the 72 attack. They hire Avner (Eric Bana), a Mossad agent who had served as a bodyguard for Meir, to lead the assasination squad which consisted of five men. The other men hired for the job were Steve (Daniel Craig), the driver, Hans (Hanns Ziechler), an expert at forging false documents and passports, Carl (Ciaran Hinds), the man in charge of doing the clean up after the assasinations took place, and Robert (Mathieu Kassovitz), the bomb expert who knows more about dismantling them than creating one. The men resign from their official jobs and the Mossad and work as black operatives not tied to the government. They only receive a list of eleven men they have to kill and have to get the rest of intel on their own and work as a terrorist group and the only connection they have with the government is the payment they receive in the Bank and through a middle man named Ephraim (Geoffrey Rush). Avner contacts a man named Louis (Mathieu Amalric) who finds the location of almost every name given to him in exchange for a high price.

The movie begins very slow, but once the assasinations take place the thrills and suspense begin to play a big part in the film. This is not your average revenge film, it`s much more than that. It opens ethical questions and dilemmas on several issues. Even the characters feel remorse for what they do and end up questioning if they are doing the right thing. Ephraim and Avner have very insightful conversations which open up the debate on this issue. It seems as if every murder that takes place is retaliated by the other group, and every leader that is murdered is replaced by a new one so the war will never end. Some leaders justify their actions by claiming it is the price to pay for building their home and having a land. Speilberg is very clever and doesn`t take any sides in this movie, he doesn`t justify the violence and makes you debate over who the true enemy really is. Munich is a very powerful film that relies on good direction from Spielberg and a solid performance from the entire cast. I really enjoyed this emotional thriller and it will leave you debating several issues.

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