Set in the aftermath of the 1972 massacre of 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics, Munich recounts the dramatic story of the secret Israeli squad assigned to track down and assassinate 11 Palestinians believed to have planned the 1972 Munich massacre -- and the personal toll this mission of revenge takes on the team and the man who led it. Eric Bana stars as the Mossad agent charged with leading the band of specialists brought together for this operation.

Inspired by actual events, the narrative is based on a number of sources, including the recollections of some who participated in the events themselves.

There are times when making movies, directors and producers seem to forget their audiences and they are so intent on trying to cram everything they can possibly cram into a movie that the movie loses a little bit of its effectiveness. Munich is a wonderful movie that is so riveting at times its like you are tracking the Arabs yourself but then at times it forgets itself and becomes somewhat boring as it mires itself in every small detail of every small job the characters must pull off. It is not necessary for us to see every moment of every job or even all the jobs for the movie to be effective, in fact if they skipped a few of the events they could have tighten the storyline and kept the audience that much more enthralled. The movie is nearly three hours and it feels like it is three hours at times and at other times whole hours slip by as you are so engrossed in the characters. The movie is a powerful look at the conflict that is still nearly tearing the Middle East apart as bloodshed just leads to more bloodshed. After everything they do and everything they endure they change nothing except themselves and how they feel about a mission they no longer believe in. The movie tries to teach tolerance and that a piece of land is not more important than the lives it cost to take it but sadly those who should hear this tale will not. You and I may feel the power of the movie but it will not change the Middle Eastern conflict but it not bring back the lives lost nor the blood shed.

Eric Bana may be one of the finest young actors in Hollywood that nobody has really heard of and that’s because not only has he not really done that much yet but also because he has mired himself in several roles critics can easily take pot shots at him like Troy and the Hulk. But it is Bana that sells this movie as you can almost visually see his character grow as the movie progresses as he evolves the movie evolves right along with him. He loves, he lives, he kills, and he regrets. But he is not alone as Daniel Craig and Geoffrey Rush add their own stories of change and not wanting to change. Craig is happy with who he is and he hates freely, he never questions the mission and he never questions himself. Geoffrey Rush is the more cautious type he believes what he is doing is right he just wonders if their might not be a better way to go about it and eventually he loses faith in what they are doing as well. The movie is a character driven movie as you learn to feel for and understand each of the four and in the end its not the events that mattered but the lives they forever changed. The movie is powerful, it is drawn out at times, and it is a movie you must see.
4 stars out of 5