a good but depressing film

Rating: 7/10 (5 March 2006)

Munich is a good but depressing film.It lasts for two hours and a half and in the first half the pace is rather slow.It is very difficult to analyze the most-complex conflict of the second half of the 20th century-namely the Israeli-Palestinian one.But this film manages to do it and to do it well.At first,the people who had to take the revenge are somewhat hesitant,they still find it difficult to kill(the first Palestinian),As time progresses however ,they are more and more sucked in the spiral of revenge and violence from which there is no way out.Because it is essentially a matter of survival and the stakes are very high.Avner,the main character gradually turns into a killing machine.But all this comes at a price-and it is huge!!!He becomes paranoid,loses his friends,alienates himself from his family.Yes,this is war-a bloody,merciless war on both sides.And what is worse is that war spreads far and wide turning Europe into a Iraeli-Palestinian battlefield. The scenes of murder are really hard to bear.But they are not there for violence's sake,they make a point.In this way it is justifiable to have such graphic violence shown. There are some shortcomings such as Avnir's dreams of the murder of the athletes mixed with his having sex with his wife-I didn't like this-it was superficial.But some scenes are wonderful-when he hears the voice of his baby-daughter on the phone,when he sadly watches the kitchen through the shop-window:a symbol of home and domesticity which he misses so much.Or when one of his victims,not knowing who he is offers to give him sleeping pills seconds before being blown up. Ultimately the film is very depressing because it becomes painfully clear that no solution will come soon.There were(and are)too much hatred,too much bitterness and violence.