Munich needs to be shorter
If you believe less is more when it comes to motion pictures, you’ll hate Munich – even though it is one of the most visually appealing films you’ll ever see.
Busy with my real job, I just got back to reviewing Spielberg and other movies, and only just managed to buy a copy of Munich for home viewing.
Although still very effective, Munich’s visual are less impressive on a small screen. But it is the pace of the film that struck me when I finally managed to sit down in my own living room and watch the film.
In buying the DVD in order to revisit the film and the impressions I got from it in theater viewings, I cam to understand why Munich fails as an action film, moral lesson and artistic statement.
It is just too damned SLOWWWWWW
Unlike War of the Worlds which made a much more significant statement by couching its meaning in metaphor, Munich grapples with reality and just misses its mark, due in a large part to the unbearably slow pace of its action sequences.
This is to say it drags!
While my wife hated Munich, her comments aren’t exactly fair since she hates all spy movies, including Graham Greene’s masterpiece, Third Man, which Munich strongly resembles.
For me, Munich has a great movie inside it, needing additional editing to bring it out, so that the important scenes flow rather than crawl.
One problem is a structural one that I have pointed out in previous essays. The events at the Munich games need to be presented in one solid piece at the beginning, doing away with unnecessary set up repetition used later when the film flashes back to unfamiliar scenes. Spielberg could still use the flashback to emphasize emotion, but viewers need to have seen it all before.
Except for the bar seduction scene that leads to the death of an agent later in the film, the love scenes are pointless. Even the bar scene could be trimmed without loss.
Spielberg used the framing love scenes to show the hero’s loss of innocence – love-making stained by the memory of the murders. But it only came across as stagy and should be cut.
With rare exceptions, however, nearly every scene drags a little, and the pace of the film could be much improved by some less significant cuts and no loss of meaning or artistic beauty.
This problem is particularly true in the killing scenes – the intersection of non-action scenes between them as well as the unnecessary melodramatic elements that drag them out.
Ideally, the first killing should receive the most attention and works well to show their nervousness. The café scene that follows is a necessary relief.
But the other killing scenes are loaded with dead wood. For instance, in each the technician tells us how the killing device will work -- (exaggerating it only slightly) I’m turning on the key now; see the light come on etc. You don’t need to show the dramatic build up to turning on the switch either except in the case with the bomb in the phone. Just turn on the switch, let the light go on, and let the bomb blow up.
This unnecessary deadwood spoils one of the wonderful twisted jokes in the film that I call the Goldilocks affect, the first bomb is too little, the second is too much, the third – which should be just right – doesn’t go off at all.
One key example of this dead wood comes during the phone bomb scene when the truck pulls in front of the building. The heroes run and stop the bomber from flicking the switch, spoiling the build up of tension. Cut this false start out and the needless explanation, and you have high drama.
Distinguishing between empty scenes and vital scenes is tricky business – especially when dealing with another man’s art.
The most important scenes other than those already mentioned include the recruitment scene – and could handle a lot more weight if you cut the earlier decision scene in which Golda meets with her generals. The recruitment scene says the same thing better.
The wife’s I’m good with this until I’m not scene becomes vital once you strip away the earlier sex scene. And by introducing the pregnant wife after the recruitment scene, you get more drama and understand how much the hero is sacrificing in the service of his country.
Because the bookkeeper scene sets up a later joke and provides essential information about how the operation is funded, I would keep it, then cut the later bank scene with the cash.
I would also keep the walking along the sea side scene for several reasons. Even though it seems slow, vital information is conveyed and we get a real sense of decision making and also get irony from such an operation being discussed in such a public space.
The last supper scene – as I call it – introduces the team and shows them bonding, very important. Although the later scene is a bit overweight, we need it to show the hero’s refusal to give up his contact with papa.
Contact with the underground need to be trimmed. We could do away with the pot-smoking scene and get right to the meeting in the café.
Meeting Papa’s son is also hugely important, though I would get to the Eiffel Tower scene more quickly.
Once contact is made, the rest of the contact scenes need to be trimmed to vital information—just quick visits and then move on.
One scene that is as vital to this film as the Sicily scenes are to The Godfather, is the hero’s visit to Papa. Perhaps the only thing I would cut is the supper scene conflict, but if all the other cuts are made, you can leave it.
Although also a little bloated, the Beirut scenes should be left because it provides the most sustained James Bond-like action sequences.
I would also leave the safe house scenes in tact and find the duel over the music as vital as the scene depicting the philosophy, and with the killing scene that follows trimmed of its melodramatic elements, would work as a solid piece of drama and one of the most moving sequences of the film.
While I would keep the scene with the hero relocating his wife to Brooklyn and the birth of his kid, I would get rid of mother. The scene intended to expand understanding of his character simply isn’t worth the loss in screen time.
I would also keep the enemy response scenes since they eventually explain the death of the team member and expand the motivations and frustrations of their mission. But finding who the woman killer should be shorter.
The CIA interference scene works well enough to leave it along, although the killing of the ring leader later needs to be trimmed, less affected emotions, and more to the jugular.
Later, you can keep the paranoid scenes, the hero imagining himself being followed and the eventual effective if obvious last scene with the twin towers in the distance. They all work.
Having written this, I might just edit down the film for my own viewing pleasure to see if it works.