Munich

I went into this movie with high expectations. After all, it had been nominated for

Best Motion Picture of the Year

Best Achievement in Editing

Best Achievement in Directing

Best Writing, Screenplay

Best Achievement in Music, Original Score

I came out pretty disappointed. I cannot see how this movie has any chance of winning best picture. The movie must be VERY VERY good to win it if you have no quality acting in it whatsoever, and therefore this movie simply has no chance.

Eric Bana (Hulk, Troy, Black Hawk Down) showed why he is better suited for action movies. He played the main character in the movie, a guy named Avner, who was hired to lead a team to kill each of the Arabs who orchestrated the Olympic tragedy in Munich, where several Israeli athletes were first taken as hostages, and eventually massacred. Bana has no ability to show emotion effectively. You'd think, that a Jewish man, going out to avenge the senseless deaths of his own people, would at least show some kind of determination, anger -- just something, to get us (non-Jews) the sense of pride these people have, the injustice they felt during this abomination killing. Instead, I felt as much as for him as I felt for Jason Bourne in the Bourne Supremacy. At least he seemed to know what he was doing. The only difference was Jason knew what he was doing.

As for direction, I can't disagree more to Steven Spielberg's nomination. I can see what Spielberg was trying to convey, but he just didn't quite make it. I liked that the movie portrayed the Jews as guilty as their Arab counterparts. The movie admitted that they were just as wrong as the Arabs, and that both sides should share the blame for this war that they have been fighting since the days of Abraham and Sarah. So that part I did like in the movie. But aside from that, the movie was very convoluted. He would jump from scenes of the hostage killings, back to Avner's quest. There were many parts where people would be speaking in another language but there were no subtitles. I didn't understand the purpose to the Dutch woman's character. Why did she have to be so promiscuous? Why not just have an old lady carry out the killing? Why did she have to be naked when they killed her with pee-shooters? There were just too many parts in the movie that had be scratching my head thinking, "What's the point of this scene? What's he (Spielberg) trying to tell us here? Why isn't the movie over yet?"

What is the deal with Steven Spielberg's not knowing when and how to end a movie?

Overall I thought movie related some important issues. And that's the point, isn't it, of all the nominated films this year -- they all have issues that they want to deal with. Whether it is racism, homosexuality, religious wars, communism and censorship, and.. (I don't actually know what Capote is about yet). Spielberg got his message across, but in my opinion, in an awkward and confusing story with little or no acting.

Overall Rating: 71%