He who takes the sword...

Rating: 7/10 (29 March 2006)

...shall perish with the sword. That's what my grandmother already used to say. The problem are the so-called collateral damages (killing innocent people, etc). It looks like this movie has roused great hostility in Israel you can never tell why since it's not for or against Israel nor for or against Palestinians. It doesn't take sides in that conflict. It only shows a bunch of murderers on both sides but we all know already that terrorists and secret agents are flour of the same bag either they belong to CIA, KGB, Mossad, ETA, IRA, Hamas or the likes of them all, all of them beneficent organizations that only want our well-being and plead the best causes in this world. With a slight inconvenience: to achieve their purposes they don't show the least respect for human rights a despicable thing of course. Consequently my comment will stick exclusively to the movie as such without making any reference to the fact that we are in the presence of Israelis and Arabs since its action could occur with any other groups with the same type of conflict. What this movie proves thoroughly is what anyone of sense already knew i. e. that these selective murders of hostages, terrorists, or secret agents not only don't solve any problem but aggravate them all by creating a spiral of violence in which one killing by one side leads to ten killings by the other and so on. The structural problems behind the conflict remain unsolved. And besides that it achieves nothing on practical terms since the murdered terrorist's and secret agents' bosses are immediately replaced by even worse ones. Furthermore we have here a technically well made movie like it is Spielberg's point of honour (by the way isn't he also a Jew?) and a well told story that may not be true in every detail but is certainly true in general terms according to what I said above. Another important feature of the movie is that terrorists and secret agents are shown not as the usual inhuman robots but as human beings with their joys and sorrows, their families and beloved ones, their weaknesses and incompetences, their doubts and uncertainties and even now and then some stings of conscience when they reflect upon what they are doing. The story has nevertheless a few gaps. Besides the apparently facility with which the location of the terrorists to kill is done as well as with which most killings are prepared and done, we never know what kind of organization was the one who informed the killers of the whereabouts of the men to be killed and what was its ideological affiliation as it seems very doubtful that they did it only for money since according to the words of one of its members and of its chief (a curious personality) they never worked for or against any government. Anarchists? We'll never know. And what kind of efficient network they had which allowed them to locate everybody so quickly? But in conclusion this is a movie made with much solidity upon a very momentous and important theme.