The Whispers about MUNICH

UNIVERSAL REMOTE

Steven Speilberg has announced that there will be premiere, no marketing junket and, biggest of all, no Oscar campaign for Munich. He is going to let the film speak for itself. This is a risky move for a film that is certainly one of the most anticipated critical/commercial releases of the fall. But the move has had past success. Spielberg used this same tactic on Schindler's List and that film went on to win seven Oscars including Best Picture and Best Director. This tactic automatically draws attention to itself with Academy voters who will undoubtably now look at it as something different (and perhaps more special) than the average Oscar hopeful carping its own brilliance. Or maybe they will see right through Spielberg's ploy and not fall for it. In the end, it's about the movie and no one has seen it yet.

There is also a rumor that he has bagged the cover of Time magazine for his film (though current events have a way of getting in the way of things like this). Spielberg has still said nothing publicly about his film (or the historical sources he used) other than the carefully parsed statement I ran in my Fall Countdown write-up so if there is a cover story, surely he will give details and those details are bound to be controversial in one circle or another.

Munich is going to be big.