Good as a thriller

Rating: 7/10 (21 January 2006)

This film is a thriller combined with a message film. As the former it succeeds brilliantly; I was riveted during the run-up to and execution of every, well, execution. I loved the details that we were shown and the fact that these events weren't rushed. But I felt the film dragged somewhat whenever it veered into delivering the "message." I found the lead assassin's home life uninteresting and too much time was spent following that main character's personal life after he came in from the cold. Throughout the film I kept wanting to know more about how the Israeli government viewed the operations; the end part would have been the time to explore that aspect. Since the film is only "inspired by real events," there's no reason the director couldn't have inserted some scenes showing high officials debating the merits of the operation upon its conclusion. Surely there must be some scholarship or rumor about this aspect of the decision to go after the Olympic terrorists. I also felt the prominence of the "message" seemed to make the lead characters less interesting than the minor ones, such as the elegant Louis and his "Papa", who are delicious to watch as they have no scruples. A little bit of doubt would creep into anyone's mind who does the kind of job these men did, but too much doubt makes the characters seem weak and indecisive. All throughout the film I enjoyed the characters who seemed to know exactly what they were doing and didn't care what all the consequences were, be they the shadowy information brokers, the Mossad handler (Geoffrey Rush) or the terrorists like Ali. Despite some of these characters only brief appearances, they were the ones I was intrigued by. It's no surprise that of the five assassins I enjoyed Daniel Craig the most, even though I'd see any film with Eric Bana. Overall an excellent thriller weakened by extraneous messages.