Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Munich

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Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 12-26-2005, 01:33 AM:

As you all know, once in a while Spielberg feels the urge to put all his toy monsters and aliens down and make a "serious" movie.
Only a few months after his probably worst and most superfluous film ever ("The War of the Worlds"), comes "Munich".
It is based on (or "inspired by" as the title puts it carefully) the real events following the kidnapping and murder of 11 Israeli athletes by PLO terrorists during the Olympic Games of 1972 in Munich (hence the title, it has nothing to do with polka music and lederhosen, if that's what you thought).
In the following years, Israeli commandos operating completely outside any legal or paralegal perimeters hunted down and killed most of those they saw as responsible for the planning of the terror attack.
"Munich" tells the story of one of the commando leaders and his men in intense, realistic, shocking images. There is no special effects parade or hollow movie heroism on display here. It is an outstanding film, a thriller, but one with an immense depth. The complexity of the political situation, the resolve and courage of the agents on the one hand, the doubts and self-questioning and the immense psychological pressure they are under on the other, this movie presents a complex and compelling human and political drama.
People will inevitably accuse Spielberg of taking sides, whatever suits their own views best but the truth is, the movie is surprisingly balanced in its presentation of the situation and the characters. You really can't tell where it all began, who the good and who the bad guys are, and where it is supposed to end.
And I think that is the core message of "Munich".
Great performances by Eric Bana and Geoffrey Rush and the supporting cast which ironically includes Daniel Craig, the new James Bond, reminding us that this is as 007 as it probably ever got in the real world.
In scope, rather untypically for Spielberg.
Highly recommended.

Posted by Mike Heenan (Member # 392) on 12-26-2005, 12:37 PM:

Did they touch upon the debacle of the agents in Lillehammer? This was supposedly a separate team of assassins from the ones portrayed in the book Vengeance and Munich the movie.

Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 12-26-2005, 05:27 PM:

[Eek!]

SPOILERS

No, if you are referring to the incident when they killed a waiter which they had mistaken for one of their "targets". But there is another assasination in the film which goes wrong and also harms innocent people, in this case an Israeli couple.
I do not know how historically accurate the movie ("inspired by real events") is. I have read a lot about the Munich massacre and its aftermath, but I don't remember enough details. It could be that they also condensed some elements.
You only learn at the end of the film that there are other teams when the Mossad officer (Rush) tells the main character Avner (Bana). I found that a little strange. Even though they operated in utmost secrecy and with basically no ties to the Mossad, it most have come to their attention via the news or their informants that PLO people began blowing up all over Europe.

Posted by Will Kutler (Member # 770) on 12-29-2005, 01:18 AM:

News story today on MSNBC.com. Former Mossad Officers are stating that this film is grossly innacurate and that there is much disappointment in Speilberg, considering what he accomplished with "Schindler's List".

Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 12-29-2005, 06:14 AM:

Of course there is "disappointment" in Spielberg (not Speilberg) because the film is not a one-sided glorification. But this forum is not for such discussions, but for discussion of the film. Have you seen it?

Posted by Sam Graham (Member # 2889) on 12-30-2005, 04:26 PM:

CINEMA: Century 20 at Jordan Creek, West Des Moines, IA
AUDITORIUM: 9
PRESENTATION: Dolby Digital/THX
PRESENTATION PROBLEMS: None [Cool]

RATING: Three stars (out of four)

First show of the day and there's popcorn scraps and dirty foot tracks throughout this row. And I'm the only one sitting in this row. Somebody was lazy last night.

Eric Bana did a fabulous job in this movie, but I couldn't keep from thinking to myself "...So the Isrealis hired the HULK to get their revenge?!?" Especially during the last sex scene.

I don't expect this movie plays out just as each assassination took place, but factual or fictional, Spielberg tells a good story here. It's too long, but it's good.

I'm still not forgiving him for "War of the Worlds".

Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 12-30-2005, 06:37 PM:

quote:
"...So the Isrealis hired the HULK to get their revenge?!?"

No, silly, he is just an actor portraying people (and monsters), he is not the actual Israeli agent.

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 01-02-2006, 09:21 PM:

Good film. Maybe a bit over-rated by many reviewers, but it was a good, well-told story, even if it isn't totally accurate.

One of my hobbies (err...obsessions?) is picking out misused props in films. Look for the RCA TK-76 handheld television camera (not introduced until 1976), a couple of Arriflex S cameras being used for sync-sound filming (which they can't really do; the 16BL, which is what I'm standing behind in my current member photo, is the appropriate sync camera for that era), and a phone number for a payphone (212-664-7665) which is ostensibly located in Brooklyn, but isn't in a Brooklyn exchange.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 01-02-2006, 09:35 PM:

Not to hijack the thread, but the incontinuity thing I can't stand is stupid mistakes in geography. It could be people mentioning an Interstate highway that doesn't exist or run through the state where the movie takes place. Another is car chases that have footage from two completely different places. Example: Patriot Games. There's a car chase where Irish terrorists are trying to gun down Jack Ryan's wife. Some of the footage was shot in Maryland. But then other inserts were obviously filmed in Los Angeles. You could see the CA state highway symbol on some of the signs.

I guess what pisses me off about that shit is the filmmakers believing no one will notice. We do notice. Immediately.

Posted by Mike Heenan (Member # 392) on 01-02-2006, 10:55 PM:

Not to be a dig at you bobby, but I'm sure only nitpickers notice this stuff right away. Unless it's a glaringly bad film and I'm checking my watch, I know I dont notice stuff like this, unless with multiple viewings and even then maybe not.

Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 01-03-2006, 02:35 AM:

That is not true, Mike. I remember how deeply shocked I was when I watched "Gladiator" which is set in about 180AD, and in the one scene in the dungeons of the Collosseum in which they pick up armor from a big table you can clearly see one which is obviously an Anglo-Saxon helmet, that means, from more than 300 years later!
I was not only shocked but also hurt and felt ridiculed by the makers of that film. Did they think they could get away with that? Did they really think we, the audience are that stupid that we wouldn't notice that? Apparently they did.
But they were wrong. When I left the theater, a lot of people were talking about that, and that was the beginning of the big worldwide protests against the film when people picketed the theaters in (historically correct) Roman outfits.

Posted by Rick Hunter (Member # 1606) on 01-03-2006, 02:46 AM:

quote: Bobby Henderson
I guess what pisses me off about that shit is the filmmakers believing no one will notice. We do notice. Immediately.

Not to mention cars that have been taking part in a prolonged chase or travelling sequence yet still have shots with water vapour coming from their exhausts.

Posted by Martin Brooks (Member # 1269) on 01-10-2006, 10:40 PM:

I never noticed the geographical errors in Patriot Games, but in Ransom, characters walk around the corner and wind up five miles away in Manhattan. That always bugs me.

I also hate it when movies use one of the equipment transport trucks to block the end of the street. It's always so obvious to me. You can practically see the permit in the window Even The Godfather did that.

When a set or other cities stand-in for Manhattan, they always seem to be on a North-South block that has a dead-end. That really doesn't happen in the real Manhattan (with only a few exceptions.) It really makes the streets look fake.

On TV, Law & Order always displays fake addresses, I would presume because they're afraid of getting sued. And I've always hated when the movies or TV shows use phone numbers in the 555 exchange. That has always sounded really phony.

As I've posted elsewhere, there were a few geographical errors in King Kong, but it really didn't hurt the film. It's just that they obviously tried so hard to get so much right, I'm surprised at what they got wrong.

Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 01-11-2006, 07:15 AM:

If it makes you all happy, there were a few such errors in "Munich", too.
For instance, the scene in Athens doesn't look like Athens at all. It could be, after all even though I have been there many times, I obviously don't know every street. But it simply doesn't look right. Athens is not a city with many historic buildings and a mediterranean flair, it is an ugly mass of 60s and 70s style concrete blocks.
In the same scene, Avner (Bana) asks a guy who appears to be just passing by for a light - in German, and in wrong German on top of that. In Athens? (For those who don't know, Athens is in Greece).

Not an actual "geographical" error, but when you hear people speak German in American movies, it's often incredibly bad. I mean characters who are from Germany, like the terrorists in "Die Hard".
Or in "Guns of Navarone", the character played by Gregory Peck is an (American, but supposedly perfectly fluent in German) officer who leads the commando. After they climb the cliffs and overwhelm the guard, the telephone in the guard post rings. Peck answers the phone in hilariously bad German. OK, that response also triggers an alarm, but for someone who is supposedly perfectly fluent and has worked undercover, it is really extremely bad.

Posted by Will Kutler (Member # 770) on 01-14-2006, 02:52 AM:

So, I finally saw this film this evening at Harkins Superstitution Springs 25 in Mesa, AZ.

The presentation was beyond pathetic! The Kodak Digital pre-show was running in flat with scope masking...absolutly horrible. Mentioned to a theatre manager to fix it and he tried blowing smoke up my ass about Kodak Digital not having the ability to adjust for proper masking!

Then, the film was a late start and patrons had to track down another manager to get the film started.

Unless I am wrong, I was lead to believe that this theatre has a "dedicated" projection staff. Could not prove it by me...horrible multiple, non-stop horizontal black and green scratches from the first trailer to the final credits...was platter scratches.

Also, the screen was badly stained in multiple areas, possibly from someone throwing a soda-pop or something at it?

To make matters worse, the theatre was not cleaned between shows, as I nearly tripped and fell on a cardboard concession tote box that was left on the floor of the seat isle I decided to settle on.

As for the content of the film....YAWN! There was no sense at all of even accurate, basic undercover intelligance work.

For those of you wishing to understand how Mossad operates, I suggest the following: All of the agents who took part in the Eichmann abduction are now known...Peter Malkin (who actually tackeled Eichmann) is a well known artist and educator/lecturer. Many of those agents have written books about Operation Eichmann. An interesting thing to note is that not all of these Mossadnicks were best of friends, and in many instances there were, and continue to be, a clash of alter egos among the team members. However, if one reads all these books, one can piece together what actually happened and can see how Isreali intelligance largly relied on "humanit" rather than James Bond type gadgetry.

Posted by Mike Heenan (Member # 392) on 01-14-2006, 12:41 PM:

Actually Will, wasn't it Rafi Etan who caught Eichmann, with his bare hands (supposedly)? Most of these guys are "company men" so any versions of their stories are likely approved by the company before release. I know Etan is banned from visiting the states after the Promis software situation.

Posted by Will Kutler (Member # 770) on 01-14-2006, 06:15 PM:

Isser Harrel was actually present in Argentina. Eitan was the team leader. Malkin actually tackled Eichmann with his famous words "One, moment, sir". Zvi Ahroni was the chief interrogator.

From what I gather, there continues to be a clash of egos between Malkin (who died earlier last year) and Ahroni.

It seems that Harrel hand picked each member of the team. Malkin was a martial arts and make-up/disguise expert. As such, Malkin was chosen to tackel Eichman, and Harrel left the operational planning to Malkin, who was a very experienced field operative. Ahroni was not an experienced field operative. Anyhow, the two clashed about the operational plans for the actuall capture, and due to experience (et al) Malkin's plan won out.

All in all, there was someting like 30 agents involved in the Eichmann kidnapping.

Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 01-14-2006, 07:44 PM:

The Eichmann operation was completely different from what followed the Munich massacre. Kidnapping somebody in and smuggling him out of a foreign country must be much more difficult than locating and blowing up a bunch of people. I don't see how you can compare that and what insights the reports of agents who were invovled in the Eichmann kidnapping bring to the the Munich story. That was a different operation at a different time and in different places under different circumstances. I don't know how historically exact the film "Munich" is, how compressed and adapted to the needs of the dramtic medium film the story is, but what I saw in the movie fit quite well with most of what I had read about what happened after Munich 1972.

Posted by Will Kutler (Member # 770) on 01-14-2006, 09:15 PM:

Michael

Although what followed Munich and the Eichmann kidnapping were two different operations, there are basics that would apply to any undercover operation. And the film "Munich" violates all these basics:

Paper trails...remember at the beginning of "Munich" where the Mossad accountant wants reciepts. Never occurs in real life, as recipts leave a paper trail. Mossad agents reported their expenses via an honor code of sorts. It was in fact a reciept paper trail by an inexperienced member of the Lillehammer team that lead to the arrests of the fellow team members.

Being inconspicious! The entire film "Munich" had the Mossad agents socializing in public with each other and speaking in public areas about their operations. Look at Operation Eichmann to see what the agents did to remain inconspicious.

I could go on and on...but even a novice could see how full of [bs]

the film "Munich" was. Gee whiz, if agents in the field operated as they did in the film, they would have all been uncovered before they even got started.

Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 01-15-2006, 03:55 AM:

"Even a novice" could see that? You mean, as opposed to a veteran agent like yourself? Come on, only because you read one or two books, that doesn't make you a secret service insider. AFAIK, the book the movie is based on has the reputation of being well researched.

quote: Will Kutler
Paper trails...remember at the beginning of "Munich" where the Mossad accountant wants reciepts. Never occurs in real life, as recipts leave a paper trail. Mossad agents reported their expenses via an honor code of sorts. It was in fact a reciept paper trail by an inexperienced member of the Lillehammer team that lead to the arrests of the fellow team members.

There is a very massive contradiction in your statement here. First you say no receipts were collected, then you say some agents were exposed because of such receipts. That doesn't make sense (I am sure a veteran detective like yourself can easily see that [Wink]

).
I think it's quite possible that the bureaucrats wanted to know what happened with the tons of money they gave the agents.
Obviously, they wouldn't get receipts from the French informers from whom they bought so much information for a lot of money. That is what remained for me the only open question of the film: why did they have to spend so much money to buy that information? Didn't they have agents who could research the whereabouts of the PLO people themselves?
But all these detail questions, as interesting as they may be in themselves, aren't the point of the film at all. The film is not a simple thriller about a bunch of people blowing up some other people. It is about the people themselves, about the historical situation they find themselves in, about the complexity of that situation, about the extreme toll it takes on the people involved in such operations, what it does to them and their families, their doubts and fears. The movie doesn't try to be some kind of real life 007 adventure movie.

Posted by Will Kutler (Member # 770) on 01-15-2006, 08:21 PM:

Michael

Cut the sarcasm. No, I am not an experienced "agent". However, many Mossad missions are things of legends. And legendary Mossadnicks like Malkin, Harrrel and others have written about their exploits and what they did to overcome various obsticals.

Once again, cut the sarcasm and personal attacking and go do some legitimate research on your own.

Posted by Mike Heenan (Member # 392) on 01-15-2006, 08:37 PM:

Actually, the receipt thing has been confirmed by a retired Mossad agent, sort of. In a recent article, He claimed the receipt thing was false in the movie, but then went on to say agents also could have recited expenditures by memory.

Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 01-15-2006, 08:45 PM:

Today, 1:55PM, Cinemark 17 in Springfield, House #15, SR•D. Attendance probably close to 100. No significant presentation problems, looked and sounded good.

This was the first time I've seen a digital pre-show there (or anywhere for that matter). The slides, MovieTunes, and 35mm ads are gone. This will sound like heresy, but I liked it better than static slides and 35mm rolling stock. I might start a thread on another forum to discuss my impressions on this significant change.

The movie kicks ass. I liked it a lot. Very thought-provoking. Fascinating and sad at the same time. The business with the receipts seemed out of place, like it was thrown in for humor. I, like many Americans, am fairly ignorant on many of the political issues raised by this film, so I have to appreciate it as a taut, well-made thriller, and leave the historical analysis to others more knowledgable than myself.

"Munich" gets 4 out of 5 stars from me.

Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 01-17-2006, 11:48 AM:

quote: Will Kutler
Cut the sarcasm. No, I am not an experienced "agent". However, many Mossad missions are things of legends. And legendary Mossadnicks like Malkin, Harrrel and others have written about their exploits and what they did to overcome various obsticals.

Once again, cut the sarcasm and personal attacking and go do some legitimate research on your own.

That has nothing to do with personal attacking. You are comparing completely different historical situations with each other. But that is not even the point here. Any account of historical events, especially movies which generally need to condense the actual events into a fairly short time and into a the frame of a dramatic medium, will have some elements which are maybe not accurate in all details.
The point of the movie is not to retell "things of legends". I guess that's what you expected and that's why you are disappointed. But the point of the movie is that it's about the human drama behind the action. It's not about "legends" and "heroic exploits", it's about the people in that historical situation. For instance, I don't know if the scene in which they get booked into the same safehouse as the Arab team is historical. I rather doubt it. But it works very well in the movie to compress a number of important elements. The scene shows that they have much more in common than they usually realize. But they happen to have been placed by the situation on different sides of the fence. This could have been a very shallow "why can't we all get along" scene. But it isn't. It simply lays out the conflict the two men find each other in. The next time they meet, they only hesitate for a very brief moment and then shoot at each other.
The achievement of the movie is that it manages to show how complex and twisted the situation is without taking sides - even though we see the entire story from one side. At the same time, it also explores the human dimensions of the conflict.
But I guess that's what some expected - easy to understand action with shining heros and easily identifiable bad guys.