In politically incensed eras like we’re experiencing today, filmmakers enjoy reveling in issues that have no simple solutions, and with a usually stringent point of view. Films like Syriana and Paradise Now are recent examples. Another current film, Steven Spielberg’s Munich, is indeed a political thriller, but this legendary director is able to present to us points of views from two sides of an issue. The result has brought some acid criticism from both the pro-Israeli and pro-Palestinian camps that are the focus of the film. The trouble with films such as Munich is critics’ objectivity can be easily tainted by the desire to give them great reviews because the subject matter is so important and the directors so admired. This happened with Spielberg’s Empire of the Sun, which even with profound subject matter, in retrospect, wasn’t that good of a film. Luckily, Munich is such a finely crafted piece of cinema with a director at the top of his game that critics such as myself do not have to worry about false praise.

With Munich Spielberg illustrates a tenuous issue that was as much headline material back in the 1970s, when the film’s events take place, as it is today and has been for a thousand years. On the one hand, the film is an essay on the disagreements over homeland that have been at the center of the hate between these two groups for ages, but these issues are only marginally explored under the veil of a taught, gut-wrenching thriller that examines many levels of right and wrong and all the gray in between.

Spielberg, along with his long-time collaborator, cinematographer Janzusa Kaminksi (Schindler’s List, War of the Worlds), decided early on that they wanted to take on more than just the décor of the early 70s and give the film a look and feel similar to many of the celebrated political thrillers from that era, such as The French Connection, Z and The Day of the Jackal. Kaminski creates a look that’s gritty on the one hand and emotionally decisive on the other by using techniques such as skip bleach, which give the film a color-muted appearance, and by the use of the zoom lens, which was a new gadget back when and understandably overused. On working with Spielberg, Kaminski says, “He’s a very skillful director when it comes to the camera.” This is illustrated by the director’s subtle placement of the camera that helps build tension and create mood simply by giving us a certain perspective to watch vital action unfold.

Much of the credit for giving Munich its gravitas is the multi-layered script that not only recounts violent events in history but also humanizes those events by using characters to represent all the emotions emoted from all sides. Spielberg gives credit to both the source material — Canadian writer George Jonas’ book Vengeance, which the director says “has never been discredited” — and playwright Tony Kushner (Angels in America), who took a draft by Eric Roth and gave to it what is his first screenplay soul, depth, and relevance.

Choosing the right actors was also integral in making Munich shine, and with over 200 speaking roles, the casting team had their work cut out for them. They scoured the world to find not only the right looks and sounds but also the best actors. For instance, they hired Palestinians and Israelis to play those involved with the Black September massacre of the Israeli Olympic team at the 1972 games. Producers say that the tension on the set during the 10 days it took to shoot those scenes was not all acting. In one case, the son of one of the slain members of the Israeli team played his own father, who died when he was only an infant. He says acting in the film allowed him to gain an understanding of the terror his father experienced.  

To play the five significantly different covert assassins whose secret mission was to kill those responsible for the massacre, Spielberg and team purposely hired five significantly different actors. Leading the group is Australian Eric Bana (Black Hawk Down, Hulk) as Avner, the Israeli intelligence officer who must leave his pregnant wife behind in order to do his patriotic duty by leading the group. Bana creates an understated performance that underscores the hate that penetrated all who supported Israel after the athletes’ deaths but also the confusion over issues of morality and whether the mission was justified. His greatest strength as an actor was to give Avner the ability to feel some empathy for the Palestinian cause without losing his loyalty to his people. Avner is a character who acts as we all think we would in similar circumstances — willing to risk everything to correct a wrong but with an insight that doesn’t allow us to become a monster. The new James Bond, British actor Daniel Craig, plays the muscle of the group, who tries to keep their reasons for the mission clear and, by the fact that his character is South African, emphasizes their plight as a global one.  As the toy-maker turned bomb-maker, French filmmaker Mathieu Kassovitz perfectly plays the sensitive one, and they were lucky to get him because he had told his agent that he didn’t want to act anymore — unless on the remote chance that Spielberg came calling one day. Renowned German actor Hanns Zischler (Sunshine, Ripley’s Game) plays a Mossad agent who is undercover as an antiques dealer. He is the most distant of the five, but you can see by Zischler’s perfectly crafted performance that his character Hans has an inner rage that allows him to act in sometimes immoral ways. Rivaling Bana for the most complex character creation has to be Irish actor Ciarán Hinds (Road to Perdition, HBO’s Rome), whose Carl, the clean-up man, is the most meticulous member but also the one with the most wisdom and inner conflict over the moral implications of their actions. He knows they have to fulfill their mission, but he doesn’t have to like how they have to go about it. The rest of the cast is superb including Australian Geoffrey Rush (Shine, Pirates of the Caribbean) as Avner’s Mossad contact, Frenchman Michael Lonsdale (Day of the Jackal, Chariots of Fire) as Papa, and Israeli star Ayelet Zorer as Avner’s wife.  

For Avner, his struggle over the relevance of the definition of home is the key theme that resonates beyond the plot of the film.  It is the central question that many, especially emigrants and refugees, have pondered and dissected for hundreds of years. Early in the film Avner tells his wife that home isn’t Israel or any plot of land, but his family. As the film progresses this notion gets more and more muddled, and he becomes pulled from one side by the needs of his people, represented by a persecuted Jewish past, and from the other by his wife and child, whom represent what he hopes is a peaceful future. It is a question left unanswered on all levels.  At the end of Munich, when Avner is walking the streets of his new Brooklyn home with his infant daughter, he spots what he believes are men who want him dead. It is an important moment, for his past and future suddenly become in flux, and with Spielberg’s simple but effective staging and Bana’s exceptional performance, you cannot only witness a father’s worst fear — a threat to his child — but also the inner conflict between saving a whole race of people and saving his own family, which he knows will always be with him no matter where he calls home.  

Munich is playing nationwide and will probably be around through awards season. Rated R. 164 minutes. Released through Universal. Click here for listings in your hometown.

Rich Burlingham