This Is It

Rating: 9/10 (8 February 2006)

Not a totally faultless film - Rush's performance is perhaps too inconsistent, and it may be a little over long - but this is Spielberg's Best Film all round. I'm thinking possibly because it is his most morally 'ambivalent', and it contains many curious facets. Previously his serious films seem to have been built of neatly constructed and shaped cubes that are stacked with great surety, and yet somehow this regularity seemed to deny the randomness of 'real life'. MUNICH contains many odd-shaped components that when stacked into an impressive whole, create the unease and unpredictability of human existence. Life's not made up of bad guys and good guys - rather there are good guys who do bad and vice versa. It's an impressively mounted piece of work, and one can't help wondering if the speed of the production process which meant shooting in June, and delivering finished prints by Christmas, has aided in eliminating the opportunity for an overly studied and crafted feel. MUNICH is a valuable contribution to debate on current global geopolitical questions, smartly articulated in the final scene, with the final pan sounding a premonitory but discreet warning of things to come.