In the words of, Gentile, Marty McFly, “This is heavy, Doc!” That’s Munich in a (Kosher) nutshell: HEAVY.
It was appropriate, then, that I had my heavy buddies with me. Well, Kevin Grose, Greg Lawler and I could lose a few. Matt Steele “The Skinny One” came too. Hopefully he made us look cooler. Who knows, it was dark most the time. I didn’t know much about the Munich situation prior to seeing this film. Like most of the incidents surrounding the Palestine/Israel conflict, there are dissenting views as to what really happened following the assassinations in Munich. All I know is that it was a freakshow then and it’s a freakshow now. Come to think of it, it’s been a freakshow ever since Abraham and Sarah decided to “help” God make good on his promise they’d get the old “unleavened bun in the oven.” Seriously, how is making a baby with your servant the same thing? I know Abraham is held high by God, but it wasn’t for going along with his wife’s craptastically insane idea. What follows is the most wicked case of sibling rivalry in history. OK, history lesson over. Or, if you hate God, mythical fantasy tale over. Spielberg does a tremendous job showing us what a tough business killing can be. There wasn’t one shooting where I was like “Yeah! Take that, you bad guy! Kick his face and nards, Chuck Norris!” like I normally do. Instead, I was always thinking stuff like, “oh crap!”, “That would be awful.”, “Sucks to be that guy.” and “Yipes, remind me to never piss off a Jew.” It wasn’t pretty. Well, it was pretty looking. I mean , the cinematography, not the killing. The film had an authentic 1970′s feel. No, nobody rollerskated backwards with a boombox. It just looked like a film made back then. Our brains see certain colors or camera work on screen and we just go there. Smart move to use the language of cinema like that. The story follows a group of Israeli assassins as they go down their naughty list of folks that had to do with the Munich killings. Kinda like Santa leaving coal in their stockings. Only, instead of Santa, it’s Jews and instead of coal, it’s you get shot or blowed up. And instead of stockings, it’s… um, socks that… are Arab guys socks? Crap. I lost that analogy or simile. I really should have gone to college. Eric Bana plays the team leader, Avnir. This guy is great! Very convincing. He was The Hulk, but don’t hold it against him. Geoffrey Rush played Avnir’s handler, Ephraim, masterfully as always. That guy could be in 3 different Pirate movies and I’d still like him. Daniel Craig plays Steve,a South African Jew on Avnir’s team. It was nice having my favorite South African, Greg Lawler, with me to point out the guy’s convincing accent and mannerisms. It’s like when I saw The Interpreter with former UN Interpreter, Roger Durling. Quite helpful. I think I will ask Frank to join me when I see “BIG IDIOT JERK-FACE WHO CAN’T REMEMBER TO MEET HIS BEST FRIEND AT THE YMCA” when it hits theater’s this summer. To get an expert opinion, I asked my Jewish friend, Justin, what he thought of Munich. He said “I haven’t seen it.” BAM! Jewish! OK, he didn’t say it. He emailed it. But it was typed very Jewishly. I did NOT hate this movie!
Don’t judge me, I saw Memoirs of a Geisha, the tale of Nitta Sayuri and how she transcended her fishing-village roots and became one of Japan’s most celebrated Geisha.