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 enlarge | Director: Steven Spielberg
Actors: Eric Bana, Daniel Craig, Marie-josée Croze, Ciaran Hinds, Mathieu Kassovitz
Studio: Universal Studios
Category: DVD
List Price: $12.98
Buy Used: $1.34
You Save: $11.64 (90%)
New (74) Used (131) from $1.34
Rating:  303 reviews
Sales Rank: 5222
Format: Ac-3, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, Dvd-video, Subtitled, Widescreen, Ntsc
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), French (Subtitled), French (Dubbed)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Number Of Items: 1
Running Time: 164
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.3 x 0.6
MPN: MCAD21823D
UPC: 025192182327
EAN: 0025192182327
ASIN: B000F1IQN2
Theatrical Release Date: January 6, 2006
Release Date: May 9, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 Gritty, Violent, and True. August 8, 2008
I love Spielbergs film style in this, it reminds me of Schindler's List. Very well done and acted out.
Few movies are this good. June 1, 2008
I work at one of the largests theater chains in the US, and this is one of the best movies I've ever seen. The history, acting and story keep the viewer so interested in the movie that you won't want to miss a second of it. If only most movies were this good.
 What About Justice? February 24, 2008
7 out of 11 found this review helpful
Many people vote on reviews based on whether they liked or disliked a certain movie or book, and not based on whether the review itself imparts any valuable information. With that said, I don't expect that my thoughts on this film to be popular and that is likely a good thing. But if you have not watched this film yet, I suggest that you read them through.
In this film, Steven Spielberg takes us many steps closer to a world where "justice" is non-existent and "revenge" is the replacement term. We are all the worse for it.
It is clear from the contradictory and unbelievable opening comments from the "Golda Meir" character that we are going to be watching a "fantasy" of what Hollywood would like us to believe could have possibly taken place in the aftermath of these terrorist attacks.
Israelis and particularly Israeli war veterans, intelligence officers, politicians and military are not often the sort of impotent, confused, unprofessional characters portrayed in this film. Are they human? Do they question what they're doing and why? Surely. But not in the fanciful, public, and almost ludicrous manner showcased here. In addition to this, the idea that Mossad agents would forget all their training and run around Europe practically looking to get killed is idealistic stupidity and a totally deceitful presentation of the facts. The whole film sadly attempts to make a point about revenge and peace while sacrificing truth and sanity in the process.
From the Arabs, to the Israelis, to the Europeans, everyone seems unsure and confused about who they are and what they're doing. But the reality is something much different.
How could Spielberg have saved this film? Simply put, he needed to be rational and honest about the individuals involved, their motivations, principals and ideology. The revised "ideology" that is injected into these characters has them instead reciting quotes from both the Bush's administration post 9-11 party line as well as the media's talking-points as regards peace, morality, law, etc.
This breaks the audience's sense of what Hitchcock called the "suspension of disbelief" and reminds us that this is just more Hollywood fluff, albeit with a serious, somewhat artsy tone.
What is relevant here is that a number of terrorists carried out a horrifically unjust act of murder at the Munich Olympics, and that they needed to be punished for what they did as well as prevented from doing it again - upholding the virtues of justice, freedom and rationality. The idea that this is somehow an unjust response because it may lead to more violence is not just irrational, but monstrous. Whether or not 10,000 more people would need to die, we must never relinquish our right as individuals to defend the principals of justice and more importantly - our lives.
Novelist Ayn Rand said of justice:
"It is not justice or equal treatment that you grant to men when you abstain equally from praising men's virtues and from condemning men's vices. When your impartial attitude declares, in effect, that neither the good nor the evil may expect anything from you--whom do you betray and whom do you encourage?"
 Cinematically, historically & philosophically unbalanced February 14, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I thought the movie was mediocre at best. Spielberg failed to make any case, relative to terrorism, response to terrorism and their costs to those that fight or engage in either.
Based on any number of books, including "Vengeance" by George Jonas, Spielberg's story misrepresented history for what purpose I am not willing to conceive. It is important to relate history accurately in some fashion, and his changing of the facts certainly makes the Israelis appear similarly cruel and randomly violent if not worse that the terrorists. Munich was only one of an extraordinarily large number of terrorist atrocities perpetrated against Israel and its supporters. The Munich terrorist attack was just the catalyst for the Israeli response, hardly an unmeasured response as depicted in the movie.
To his credit, I think Spielberg tried to keep the Munich horror alive through the movie with the continued flashbacks, but those short bursts of terrorism failed to overcome the constant and violent portrayal of the Israelis as they tracked and assassinated the planners and financiers of the terrorism. I wish there were a better way to bring terrorists to justice; I'm not at all certain there is a more effective method, certainly when they are protected democratic and totalitarian governments alike.
I suspect the movie accurately projects what we will continue to see as harsh measures necessary to combat terrorism, and for that I agree with the movie.
Not the First February 12, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
If no one noticed, Spielberg's movie is NOT the first filmed version of the Jonas book (and before that headlines in a series of articles by Jack Anderson). That honor belongs to director Michael Anderson's (AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS, LOGAN'S RUN) THE SWORD OF GIDEON. It ran on HBO about 20 years earlier. The cast included Steven Bauer, Michael York, Collen Dewhearst (as Golda Meair) and Rod Steiger in the role of the Mossad chief. Search this one out and you won't be disappointed.
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