This from the director that gave us 'Schindler's List'. How surprising and disappointing.

-S

Huh. I haven't seen it yet. Probably won't until it comes out on DVD. But I ran across this review a few days ago. Paints a bit of a different picture.

TO: Stephen Green
RE: Spielberg Gone Awry

He's definitely off the deep end in this one.

I think he was trying for 'appeasement', but what he got was a propaganda piece for the enemy.

Is he Jewish?

If so, talk about self-loathing. I wonder why they hate themselves so much.

Regards,

Chuck(le)

I had heard that this was going to be an apologetic for the barbarians. It is sad the Spielberg would stoop to this. In an interview he did a while back he said he wanted this piece to somehow be part of the peace process. Well, I think he screwed the pooch.

Barbarians are to be killed, not glorified or even humanized. I have several preferred methods to help the barbarians achieve room temperature. All which only cost time and a very small price for some hardware. The hardware isn't adversely effected during the extermination. ;)

I haven't & probably won't see Spielberg's film. But it reminded me of a made-for-TV flick about the massacre and subsequent manhunt, Sword of Gideon. It was a straightforward actioner, with no moral equivalence in it. It in turn was based on the book Vengeance, by George Jonas.

Imagine this movie being made, instead, by Michelle Malkin about Filipinos. We'd all be heartily sick of the phrase "self-hating race traitor" by now.

That Libertas review that Garrett links to above is the only positive, conservative review I've seen of Munich. And even they say the film's morality goes severely off the rails in its last act.

I was awestruck by Schindler's List and admired, with reservations, Saving Private Ryan, but when it comes to Munich, as a Hollywood mogul from a different era was fond of saying, include me out.

Spielberg has finally smothered in the insular Hollywood world view. Considering that he has been able to turn events such as WWII and the end of the world (and, for that matter, Schindler's List) into metaphors for his own neurotic daddy and abandonment issues, it's probably no surprise that he has come to this...

It's funny, watching the TV previews, they've been marketing it as a straight up revenge for Munich, no sign at all that they're going the moral relevance route, now I know trailers almost always give a misleading picture of the movie itself, but by not showing the moral relevance to the customers until AFTER they pay their tickets aren't they admitting that they're views are out of step with those of their customers? If so, why do they keep doing it? That kind of bait and switch only works for so long.

MarkD,

There was a fair amount of that going around Hollywood's promo efforts in 2005.

I have seen the film and I think that Spielberg left it ambiguous. I think that he paints a picture of continued struggle on both sides and that they are each fighting a losing battle. I don't know if I would say he glorified the Palestinians.

Neat blog.

Hmm, am I the only one who thinks this film and its creator haven't a clue about the workings of the Mossad? Haven't seen any mention of it in the reviews. In the beginning of the movie it said 'based on real events', I wonder how loosely. The 'assassins' were such amateurs, such bungling fools. I can't believe Mossad would send such people to do that job. I can't believe they would send a family man.
Was a Russian agent really killed? Did they really go get revenge on a freelance Dutch assassin and not even ask her who hired her?
My guess is Spielberg took lots of liberties, and his Hollywood roots wouldn't let him resist humanizing the terrorists and making the lead Mossad agent lose it in the end and decide 'it was wrong'.
All I can say is I look forward to Bruce Willis' movie, and hope I am not disappointed.

Barbarians are to be killed, not glorified or even humanized. I have several preferred methods to help the barbarians achieve room temperature. All which only cost time and a very small price for some hardware. The hardware isn't adversely effected during the extermination. ;)

Now that's what I call a barbarian mindset.

Ed Driscoll -- I had the same thought about Hollywood hiding the message in its trailers, but I thought of Million Dollar Baby. Did anyone just seeing the trailer think it was going to be a pro-euthenasia picture? No, it looks like a Girl Rocky, that's it.