Category: Action / Adventure - Drama - Feature Film-drama - Movie - Mystery
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
List Price: $19.98 Our Price: $14.88YOU SAVE $5.1!
Buy it
DVD Munich (Widescreen Edition)
At its core, Munich is a straightforward thriller. Based on the book Vengeance: The True Story of an Israeli Counter-Terrorist Team by George Jonas, it’s built on a relatively stock movie premise, the revenge plot: innocent people are killed, the bad guys got away with it, and someone has to make them pay. But director Steven Spielberg uses that as a starting point to delve into complex ethical questions about the cyclic nature of revenge and the moral price of violence. The movie starts with a rush. The opening portrays the kidnapping and murder of Israeli athletes by PLO terrorists at the 1972 Olympics with scenes as heart-stopping and terrifying as the best of any horror movie. After the tragic incident is over and several of the terrorists have gone free, the Israeli government of Golda Meir recruits Avner (Eric Bana) to lead a team of paid-off-the-book agents to hunt down those responsible throughout Europe, and eliminate them one-by-one (in reality, there were several teams). It’s physically and emotionally messy work, and conflicts between Avner and his team’s handler, Ephraim (Geoffrey Rush), over information Avner doesn’t want to provide only make things harder. Soon the work starts to take its toll on Avner, and the deeper moral questions of right and wrong come into play, especially as it becomes clear that Avner is being hunted in return, and that his family’s safety may be in jeopardy.
By all rights, Munich should be an unqualified success--it has gripping subject matter relevant to current events; it was co-written by one of America’s greatest living playwrights (Tony Kushner, Angels in America) and an accomplished screenwriter (Eric Roth); it stars an appealing and likeable actor in Eric Bana; and it was helmed by Steven Spielberg, of all people. While it certainly is a great movie, it falls just short of the immense heights such talent should propel it to. This is due more to some questionable plot devices than anything else (such as the contrived use of a family of French informants to locate the terrorists). But while certain aspects ring hollow, the movie as a whole is a profound accomplishment, despite being only "inspired by true events," and not factually based on them. From the ferocious beginning to the unforgettable closing shot, Munich works on a visceral level while making a poignant plea for peace, and issuing an unmistakable warning about the destructive cycle of terror and revenge. As one of the characters intones, "There is no peace at the end of this." --Daniel Vancini
"It all ends in shellshock and despair, as any honest film about war must do. Even though Spielberg loses his way at times in the existential labyrinth he's constructed, and a few of the later espionage episodes are not entirely convincing, he's made a brave attempt to wrestle with the impossible here. Unmissable." What makes Munich even more ambitious than films like List or even Empire of the Sun is that it's not as recognizable a film as those classically-structured epics. This film is part spy thriller and part meditation on violence but not completely either. The result comes out as somewhat scrambled by the end, with the pieces of about a half-dozen lesser movies mixed around inside, but there's rarely a moment when it's not grabbing you by the collar and demanding your undivided attention. We should have more of this kind of thing.
Too long and boring
This movie was a disappointment as a form of entertainment. Movies are supposed to be a form of entertainment. I have no idea how it occurred to Spielberg that it would be entertaining for the audience to watch the hatred and killing between two ethnic groups depicted monotonically. I can't empathize with either side. Too gross.
Excellent!
Having lived through the coverage of the slaughtered Israeli athletes during the 1972 Olympics, I felt like I was experiencing the actual events as they were occurring over again. Speilberg did an excellent job using stock news footage from the tragedy and overlaying actors into recreated scenes. Though these events are actually shown piecemeal throughout the film, the actual story is about what transpired afterwards. The Israeli government hired a hit squad to track down and eliminate 11 individuals that participated in the planning of the terrorist action at the Olympics.
This is based on an actual operation that the Mossaud carried out but obviously is Speilberg's fictionalized version of how it was done.
Eric Bana is a German/Jewish Israeli Mossaud operative who is chosen to lead the group of 5 mercenaries as they hunt down the perpetrators throughout Europe. It is interesting how this Australian actor is able to change his accent at will to fit the roles that he is playing.
Bana is torn to do the mission because his wife is expecting the birth of their first child and the secret mission means that he must risk his life and possibly not see his wife till the mission is complete which could take years.
As the movie goes along Bana's personality starts to change from a gung-ho good government employee to someone who questions what he is doing and is constantly looking under his bed and phone for hidden bombs.
The movie moves along at a fast pace and you keep thinking you are seeing real events as they happen. Sometimes it is a little complicated to understand what is going on (that is the value of having the DVD to be able to understand what you may have missed the first time).
Look for the actor who plays the new Bond in the main supporting role. There is also an interesting sequence shot on the Queens side of New York City (supposedly taking place in 1973) where I was looking to see buildings that did not exist at the time and you do see the World Trade Center (I am assuming the scene was shot after 2001).
Syriana is an oil-based soap opera set against the world of global oil cartels. It is to the oil industry as Traffic was to the drug trade (no surprise, since writer/director Stephen Gaghan wrote the screenplay to Traffic): a sprawling attempt to portray the vast political, business, social, and personal implications of a societal addiction, in this case, oil. A major merger between two of the world’s largest oil companies reveals ethical dilemmas for the lawyer charged with making the deal (Jeffrey Wright), and major global implications beyond the obvious; a CIA operative (George Clooney) discovers the truth about his work, and the people he works for; a young oil broker (Matt Damon) encounters personal tragedy, then partners with an idealistic Gulf prince... More Info about this DVD Director(s): Stephen Gaghan DVD Release Date: Released the 20 June 2006 Usually ships in 24 hours
List Price: $19.98 Your Price: $13.97YOU SAVE $6.01!
Buy it
The passion of mad love and the cold calculations of social climbing collide in Woody Allen's Match Point. Former tennis pro Chris Wilton (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Velvet Goldmine) stumbles into good fortune when Chloe Hewett (Emily Mortimer, Lovely & Amazing), the daughter of a wealthy businessman, falls in love with him. But when Chris meets Nola Rice (Scarlett Johansson, Lost in Translation), a much deeper passion is stirred--and his desire isn't deterred when he discovers that Nola is already dating Chloe's brother. But when their affair threatens Chris's increasingly cozy lifestyle, Chris begins to consider a drastic solution. Match Point starts deftly and ends with cunning; though the middle bogs down in banal plot mechanics, Woody Allen fans have... More Info about this DVD Director(s): Woody Allen DVD Release Date: Released the 25 April 2006 Usually ships in 24 hours
List Price: $19.99 Your Price: $17.99YOU SAVE $2!
Buy it
Without force-feeding its timely message, Good Night, and Good Luck illuminates history to enlighten our present, when the need for a free and independent press is more important than ever. In 90 breathtaking minutes of efficient and intricate storytelling, writer-director George Clooney and cowriter Grant Heslov pay honorable tribute to the journalistic integrity of legendary CBS newscaster Edward R. Murrow,
Director George Clooney
who confronted the virulent and overzealous anti-Communist witch-hunting of Wisconsin Sen. Joseph McCarthy in 1953-54, and emerged as a... More Info about this DVD DVD Release Date: Released the 14 March 2006 Usually ships in 24 hours
List Price: $19.98 Your Price: $13.49YOU SAVE $6.49!
Buy it
The Constant Gardener is the kind of thriller that hasn't been seen since the 1970s: Smart, politically complex, cinematically adventurous, genuinely thrilling and even heartbreaking. Mild diplomat Justin Quayle (Ralph Fiennes, The English Patient, Schindler's List) has a loose cannon of a wife named Tessa (Rachel Weisz, The Shape of Things, The Mummy), who's digging into the dirty doings of a major pharmaceutical company in Kenya. Her brutal murder forces Justin to continue her investigation down some deadly avenues. This simple plot description doesn't capture the rich texture and slippery, sinuous movement of The Constant Gardener, superbly directed by Fernando Meirelles (Oscar-nominated for his first film, City of God). Shifting back... More Info about this DVD Director(s): Fernando Meirelles DVD Release Date: Released the 10 January 2006 Usually ships in 24 hours
List Price: $19.98 Your Price: $13.88YOU SAVE $6.1!
Buy it
