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January 10, 2006
MUNICH, BY SEQUENCE
Act 1 | Act 2 | Act 3 | Munich In Sequence
ACT THREE1:25:35 - The Athens Safehouse Sequence
They arrive. The safehouse is a hovel.
Someone shows up at safehouse… it turns out to be P.L.O. members, also sent by Louis. There is a face-off of guns, which Avner ends by being the first to lower his weapon. A show of force by Steve (Daniel Craig) powers the final Palestinian to lower his gun.
They stay together in peace.
The music showdown - one Palestinian changes the radio to Arabian music. Steve switches it to American music. They face off… and settle on Al Green's "Let's Stay Together."
The talk between Avner & Ali, The Palestinian… the two sides of the argument.
"You don't know what it is not to have a home…. home is everything"
1:32:55 - The Athens Killing (Non-Target turner Target #7)
The group arrives. They bribe the manager for access to the target's room. A TV bomb is set-up.
The target… the most faceless yet… arrives. His bodyguards hang around.
Steve, Carl & Hans wait in one car. In the other, Avner tells Robert to detonate the bomb. Robert wonders if the target is alone… Avner doesn't care.
But the detonator doesn't work.
Hans, the Document Guy, decides to take matters into his own hands and to go in with a grenade. Avner sees him go in and follows him.
A moment later, Ali - from the night before - arrives on the scene.
Hans breaks down the door and throws in the grenade. It explodes.
Hans ends up under the door, just as the target had in the Beirut raid.
Shots are fired to keep Hans from being shot. Ali and Avner face off. Carl shoots Ali so he won't shoot them as they drive away. Robert makes it to the car in the firefight.
In the rage about the faulty bomb, Robert admits that he was not really a bomb expert, but a dismantler.
They escape.
1:40:25 - Louis Offers Ali Hassan Salameh
But it is more complicated than that… Salameh is in bed with the CIA as a shield to prevent terrorism against the US.
"Europe hasn't been this interesting since Napoleon marched to Moscow."
1:41: 57 - London To Kill Salameh
They follow Salameh.
"Why didn't you shoot him?"
"There were bodyguards. Civilians."
"We're they armed?"
"Yes."
"Then they weren't civilians. I'd have done it.""Do you have any idea how many laws we've broken."
"It's time to stop you agonizing. It's counterproductive.""Unless we learn to act like them, we will never defeat them."
"We act like them all the time. Do you think The Palestinians invented bloodshed? How do you think we got control of the land? By being nice?"
"Somebody pull down this man's pants and see if he's circumcised. I think we have a double agent in our midst."
"Don't you dare accuse me of that! My son died in '67, you foul mouthed son of a bitch! Anything you can ask I've done for Israel."
"As for a reassignment if this is so distasteful."
"It is not distasteful to you?"
"No. Because the only blood that matters to me is Jewish blood."
"Nice job, A… nice job of leading."
"If the bodyguards are armed, we kill them."
"They're armed."
"Then we kill them."1:43:55 - Running into the CIA
In the rain, the team triangulates on Ali Hassan Salameh and his bodyguards to kill them all. Just as they are ready to bounce, an American drunk jumps into Avner, acting like he knows him. Ali Hassan Salameh looks right as Avner as he walks by. The drunk starts a fight.
But he's no drunk. As soon as Salameh is safely in a cab, the fight stops. The assassination has been thwarted.
The car of Americans drives by, giving the team the finger.
1:46:42 - The Hooker SequenceAvner drinks at the hotel bar. A beauty, Jeanette, also nurses a drink. He approaches.
She immediately insinuates that she needs to get to bed soon.
He compliments her perfume. She rubs her wrist on his arm. "It cuts right through the smoke… does it?"
She invites him to her bed.
"I just can't."
Avner exits. He sees Carl on the way out and warns him about "the local honey trap" at he bar. "You can't miss her… you don't want to."
1:51:40 Avner Calls Home
His wife is fine. The baby says, "da da," which breaks Avner down from the pain of his disconnection from his family.
Avner starts daydreaming again about the Munich massacre. We see for the first time what happened at the airport… whether it is 100% factual or somewhat skewed by Avner's view of it.
This sends Avner back down to the bar
1:55:27 - Carl Is Dead
Avner smells the perfume from the girl at the bar… tracks it to Carl's door… but realizes the door is slightly ajar.
He goes in. Carl has been killed… cleanly… quietly.
The local honey trap was an assassin, who had first targeted Avner and only his loyalty to his wife has kept him alive.
Avner cleans up after the Clean Up Man.
1:57:55 - Avner Gets Targeting Info On "The Honey Trap"
Louis and Papa are both in town, giving him and Robert the information… for free, for the first time.
Jeanette is not political. She is all business. But who hired her?
" We inhabit a world of intersecting secrecies. We live and die at the places where those secrecies meet. That is what we accept… hmm? We buy information for you from your enemies. They sell it. You are not the only people looking for names."
"You're telling me I'm being hunted now?"
"He's telling you it's time for you to quit."
"The race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong. But time and chance happens to them all. (pause) Evil falls suddenly. Who can say when it falls?"1:59:13 - Going To Kill "The Honey Trap"
The four surviving members of the team walk into the train station. It is the first time they walk in unison, like an army division. Yet, for the first time, they are going to kill someone out of personal retribution.
Robert has second thoughts.
"All this blood comes back to us."
"Even if it takes years, we'll beat them."
"We're Jews, Avner. Jews don't do wrong because our enemies do wrong."
"We can't afford to be that decent anymore."
"I don't know that we ever were that decent. Thousands of years of hatred doesn't make you decent. But we were supposed to be righteous. It's a beautiful thing. That's Jewish. That's what I knew. That's what I was taught. And now I'm losing that… and I lose that and… that's… that's everything. That's my soul."
"You need to go rest somewhere. You don't have to do this one. When I need you again, I'll find you."Robert leaves.
2:00:44 - Killing The Honey Trap
Avner and Hans on their bikes, go to an idyllic houseboat. Steve is just behind. He rides into a close up on his bike and takes off the bike pump.
Inside the houseboat, Jeanette listens to what sounds like a newsy station and reads on her bed.
They walk in. She sees Avner.
"Do you know why we're here?"
She tries to delay them. "Maybe you want to hire me. You know how good I am."
Avner and Steve step forward, seemingly unscrewing their bike pumps.
Jeanette watches…. She exposes her breast, hoping to distract… get more time… anything…
"No. Don't. Such a fucking waste of talent."
The first blow-gun shot, from Steve, penetrates her sternum. The second, from Avner, just below the neck.
She wanders towards her living room, dazed… she says goodbye to her cat… sits in a comfortable chair, her breasts still exposed. She starts wheezing as blood starts to flow from her neck wound.
Hans steps between Avner and Steve and delivers the final shot to her brain.
Jeanette falls back and her short dressing gown opens completely, leaving her nude but for the sleeves. Avner goes to cover her up. Hans stops him.
"Leave it."
And he uncovers her again.
2:03:00 -
Avner chops vegetables with an intensity that feels greater than just that of a chef. He is cooking for more people than are there. He is feeding the family he has sublimated.
Hans, in voice over, tallies up the team's history.
"In seven months, we've killed six of the eleven names. We've killed one replacement. One of our targets is in prison and four, including Ali Hassan Salameh, is at large. One of our own has fallen. Since we began, the other side has sent letter bombs to eleven embassies, hijacked three planes, killed 130 passengers in Athens, and wounded scores more… and killed out military attaché in Washington. Some of it was done by a Venezuelan called Carlos "The Jackal," who replaced Zaid Muchassi, who replaced Hussein Al-Chir. Black September's original leadership has been decimated. But new leaders are emerging for whom Black September wasn't violent enough. And to dispatch our six dispatched targets, we must have spent something close to $2 million. Mrs. Meir says to the Knesset, 'The World will see that killing Jews will from now on be an expensive proposition.' But killing Palestinians isn't exactly cheap. If all eleven were dead, you'd stop?"
"Yes."
"You're lying. What about their replacements? With each child we kill, we create six more."
"Then we'll have to keep killing them then."
"Forever?"
"Five targets are still alive. That's five men that need to be killed. Eventually you forget that in the beginning, you hated doing it. For me, personally, I feel less every day. One day I am going to wake up, I'm going to kill them, and to go to bed, and I'm not going to feel anything at all. ""I keep seeing the Dutch woman, you know, sprawled out like that. It's not that I wish we hadn't killed her. I wish I had let you close up her housecoat."
"Yeah… but you weren't yourself."2:05:37 - Where Is Hans?
Steve wakes Avner, who has a gun under his pillow.
Hans is missing from his flat. They go looking for him.
Hans is on a park bench. Dead. They "clean" him of identifying information.
The three men (one dead) sit on a bench, watching the river pass.
2:07:00 - Avner Melts Down
Avner searches his room. Clearly, they have been being watched.
We cut to Robert's house… filled with toys… he is working on various devices.
Back to Avner. He sits in his bed. He checks his bed for the kind of bomb used in the first killing.
Back to Robert… he packs up some plastique.
Aver cuts into the mattress, looking for dangers. He checks the phone… the tool of their second killing.
Robert is working on defusing a mattress bomb with a hand grenade in it.
Avner checks his TV… tool of their third killing.
Avner sits on the edge of his bed, gun in hand.
Robert works.
Avner heads into the closet… the only "safe" place… lies on the floor.
Cutting back and forth between Robert working, apparently putting away his tools of destruction and Avner worried in the closet.
Close up on one of Robert's toys, a merry-go-round. There is one metal "passenger." It comes around to touch a detonation device on the table. A pause. An explosion. The bomb maker is dead. Even watching it over and over, it is unclear whether it was an accident.
2:10:48 -
The ripped up phone rings. Avner is called to meet Louis outside of the kitchen store.
Avner can't even look at the kitchen anymore. He sees Robert in his head. "It will be beautiful."
Louis offers the target Avner has wanted from the start. Again, says why he and his father would not have been responsible for killing Robert. One of the men they had killed in Athens was KGB. "Many people must want to kill you."
"Eliminate him and they'll let you go home, don't you think?"
"Yes, Louis, I do."
"You could have a kitchen like that someday. (Avner still can't look) It costs dearly, but…. but home always does."Avner finally looks at the kitchen… home…
2:12:51 - The Ali Hassan Salameh Raid
It's a house party. The two survivors, Avner and Steve, watch with telescopic rifles.
They are found by a young man, reminiscent of the one whose life Avner spared in Beirut. Avner shoots him in the head.
A hail of automatic weapon fire comes their way… Avner and Steve run for their lives.
2:14:50 - Back To Israel
Everyone seems to know what Avner has done, even though it was supposed to be secret.
Ephraim tries to debrief him. He tries to get Avner to give up Louis and Papa. He won't.
A general comes and thanks Avner, in the name of Prime Minister Meir, for his work. He has lost that part of his family.
"Go ahead… tell me what you learned." What he wants are details on sources. Avner refuses.
Avner is leaving… Ephraim offers him future work. "No."
2:21:08 - Brooklyn
Avner is running. He sees his wife on the stoop in front of their home. He is so focused, he doesn't bother to notice a car as he crosses the street. He hugs his wife… he sees his child… he is home.
Avner sits on the edge of the marital bed with a gun. He's used a chair to barricade the door. "Nightmares."
He walks down the street with his daughter and sees men in a car, decides they are watching him… as he starts to run, to protect himself and his daughter, the back window opens ominously… but they pass… the passenger was just throwing out a cigarette.
Avner calls Papa.
"Am I being hunted?"
"How is your father? Is he well? Your family's well?"
"I don't know. How is my family? Are they well? Are they going to be okay."
"I am sending you a parcel of sausage and cheese… it's a real pleasure to hear your voice again. I think about you with concern. Do you believe me? (silence) You believe me? You believe me, Avner?"
"You know my name."
"Of course I do. Now listen to me, it's important. No harm will come to you from me."Papa hangs up.
Avner goes to the Israeli Embassy and forces his way in. "If you are Mossad, you know who I am. If not, tell Ephraim Avner cane to see you. I won't hesitate to kill other people's children if you hurt my child, do you understand? I'll go to the newspapers…"
2:26:25 - The Second Sex Scene
Avner can't sleep. His wife watches him. She wipes away his tear. She slowly, gently, moves toward him, connecting as carefully as she can to whatever he is not sharing…
A steady beat starts pulsing through the orchestration.
Avner daydreams about the final moments of the Munich massacre. Two Palestinians, one in greased face, as Avner was when he and Steve went to try to get Ali Hassan Salameh walk towards the plane.
He is on top of his wife. He is inside of her. But he is still thinking about Munich. The plane has no pilots. The two men run back to alert their co-terrorists. Shooting begins. Gunfire from the tower and back from the tarmac.
A grenade is thrown in into one helicopter of hostages… A terrorist shoots down the other hostages in the other helicopter.
Avner's wife, Daphna, watches him fighting through this daydream. She reaches up to his face, while he still isn't looking at her. "I love you."
He finally allows himself to be on top of her. We see both of their wedding ringed hands in the same shot. They cry, quietly, together… now, he is home.
End of ACT THREE
EPILOGUE
2:31:13 -
Avner is in the garden, tilling the soil, preparing the ground for new life. There is a call for him. Ephraim.
"You think we'd hurt your family?"
"I think anyone is capable of anything."
"I think you're losing your mind."
"Did I commit murder? I want to give me proof that everyone we killed had a hand in Munich."
"I don't discuss such thing with people who don't exist. You want to discuss, come back to existence. You want your daughter to grow up in exile?"
"I want evidence."Ephraim gets into some non-Munich info on the men who were killed.
"We should have arrested them…. Like Eichmann."
"If these guys lived, Israelis die. Whatever doubts you have Avner, you know this is true.""Did we accomplish anything at all. Each one we killed were replaced by worse."
"Why cut my fingernails? They'll grow back.""You killed them for Munich… for the future…for peace."
"There is no peace at the end of this, no matter what you believe. You know this is true."Avner invites Ephraim for dinner. "Break bread with me, Ephraim." "No."
Ephraim walks away. Avner turns for him. The World Trade Center is in the background.
END OF FILM
Act 1 | Act 2 | Act 3 | Munich In Sequence
December 28, 2004 - Movies You Should Have Seen, But Didn't
December 29, 2004 - The Ten Worst
December 30, 2004 - The Ten Best
January 3, 2006 - Reflections On A New Year
January 6, 2006 - Sundance Preview
January 5, 2006 - The Business Of 2001, Pt 1
