Munich

Few contemporary film-makers manage to straddle the divide between multiplex and arthouse cinema quite so effortlessly as Steven Spielberg.

In 1993, he demonstrated his box office clout and an ability to prick consciences and arouse debate with the Oscar-winning double whammy of Jurassic Park and Schindler's List. Now, following the slam-bang pyrotechnics of War Of The Worlds, Spielberg recreates another harrowing episode in recent Jewish history.

Munich is a heart-rending account of the aftermath of the 1972 Summer Olympics, at which an extremist Palestinian group called Black September kidnapped nine Israeli athletes from the Olympic village, killing two more. In the events that followed, all nine of the hostages died.

Israel's subsequent mission of retribution to avenge the deaths, resulting in the deaths of the terrorists, would seem an emotionally-charged subject, fraught with moral ambiguity.

Yet Spielberg's film distances itself from the characters and their anguish, denying us any lasting emotional connection in this fraught human drama.

Moreover, screenwriter Tony Kushner, working from George Jonas's contentious book Vengeance: The True Story Of An Israeli Counter-Terrorist Team, sits uncomfortably on the political fence, casting sympathetic glances at both sides. Spielberg's technical virtuosity is never in doubt, however.

He orchestrates a series of unbearably tense set pieces, including the botched detonation of a bomb (concealed in a telephone) in Paris, which appears destined to kill innocent bystanders, as well as the intended target.

Janusz Kaminski's crisp, colour-bleached cinematography works in harmony with impeccable production design and the editing of Michael Kahn, whose only mis-step is to inter-cut a lovemaking scene with nightmarish flashbacks of the final doomed minutes in Munich.

Eric Bana delivers a muscular, brooding performance as intelligence officer Avner, who is recruited by Israeli prime minister Golda Meir. The secret mission requires Avner to disappear from sight and relinquish his identity, in order to travel across Europe assassinating the members of Black September.

A horrifying re-enactment of events in Germany bookends the film as a reminder - as if we needed one - of man's propensity for violence. The final image of the New York skyline, complete with digitally-recreated Twin Towers, draws an unnecessary parallel with modern-day terrorism.