Munich

In the tragic aftermath of the 1972 Munich Olympics, a Mossad agent (Bana) tracks Palestinian terrorists who assassinated Israeli athletes.

AMG Plot: Much as Steven Spielberg followed 1993's special-effects blockbuster Jurassic Park with a far more downbeat and personal project later the same year, Schindler's List, in 2005 after tearing up the box office with War of the Worlds the director closed out the year with a powerful and thoughtful drama about the human costs of international terrorism. The 1972 Olympics in Munich, Germany, were supposed to be a peaceful gathering of outstanding athletes from around the world, but on September 5, the games took a sinister turn when eight masked Palestinian terrorists invaded the Olympic village, killing two Israeli athletes and abducting nine others. The kidnappers demanded safe passage out of Germany in addition to the release of Arab prisoners in Israeli and German prisons, but when they arrived at the Munich airport they were met by German police and military forces, and in the melee that followed, all nine hostages were killed. In the wake of the killings, the Israeli government gave Mossad, the nation's intelligence agency, a special assignment — to track down and eliminate the Palestinians responsible for the death of the Israeli athletes. A young and idealistic Mossad agent (Eric Bana) is assigned to the four-man unit created to wipe out the Olympic terrorists, but while he believes in serving his country, as their bloody work goes on he begins to buckle under the weight of his work and wonders if he can morally justify his nation's acts of revenge. Munich also stars Geoffrey Rush, Daniel Craig, Mathieu Kassovitz, and Ciarán Hinds.

AMG Review: Munich differs from all of Steven Spielberg's previous historical epics because, for the first time, the director is using the past to comment on the present. One of Spielberg's peerless talents is the ability to create tension-filled sequences. Munich's structure, following the exploits of a group of Israeli agents hunting down the terrorists responsible for the murder of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics, allows Spielberg to put this talent on display throughout the movie. Each of these sequences is varied so that the film avoids becoming visually repetitive even though it clocks in at close to three hours. Though the film works strictly as a thriller, the excellent script traces the gradual emotional and psychological changes that occur to Avner (Eric Bana), the man leading the group. While he never questions the importance of what he does, or really the moral authority to do it, the film does not flinch from the consequences of living in a constant state of alertness fueled by paranoia and fear. The film acknowledges both the visceral thrill and the interior decay that results from vengeance -- a word that once served as the film's working title. Munich does not carry the weight of history that, say, Schindler's List does partly because Munich exists not in a black-and-white world of good and bad actions, but instead reveals a world full of grays. Munich, although about historical events, is very much about what America asks of itself during the war on terrorism. The screenplay is savvy enough to make these themes universal so that the film will not lose its power over time, but setting the film's final sequence with the World Trade Center in the background should tip audiences to the fact that Spielberg has created a very personal reaction to current events. Taken with the same year's politically pointed remake of War of the Worlds, Munich reveals Spielberg to be, at 60, a director committed to making important films that address the tenor of the times.