[yasr_overall_rating]
A team of secret agents set out to track down the Nazi officer who masterminded the Holocaust.
Going into “Operation Finale,” I couldn’t but help anticipate another “Schindler’s List.” Instead, what I got was a combination of James Bond and “Catch Me If You Can,” complete with a catchy soundtrack that while very memorable, was completely incongruous, at least for this type of feature. While I give kudos to the filmmakers for setting out to tell the story of Adolf Eichmann, a Nazi SS lieutenant colonel in the German Army and one of the major organizers of the Holocaust who managed to escape to Argentina after World War II, the finished product feels more like a 1960s James Bond outing than that of a historical drama. With a top-notch cast, the film at least looks and sounds authentic, it is in its overall presentation where it flounders.
After the end of World War II, many German soldiers fled to different parts of the globe. Some were caught, others were not. Adolf Eichmann (Ben Kingsley) was captured by the Americans and utilized forged papers to present himself under the name Otto Eckmann but when he realized that his true identity had been discovered, he managed to escape and eventually made his way to Argentina, where his family eventually followed him. Living in Buenos Aires and keeping a very low profile, and now under the assumed name Ricardo Klement, when his son Klaus (Joe Alwyn), brings home a new girlfriend, Sylvia Hermann (Haley Lu Richardson), a German Jew, she recognizes his father and when she arrives back home, she informs her father, Lothar (Peter Strauss), who, in turn, informs Israeli authorities. From there, they put together a team of operatives who eventually make their way to Buenos Aires along with a plan to capture Eichmann and take him back to Israel to stand trial for crimes against humanity.
While the overall story stays faithful to the accounts of those who were part of the mission and who helped capture Eichmann, it is in the film’s execution that it stumbles. Resembling a story more akin to James Bond, the stereotypical moments of trepidation are not convincing and most of them feel like they were added just for the sake of visual dramatics. In one scene, while Nazi sympathizers are out looking for Eichmann, they just happen to come across the very house where the operatives are holding him captive. One of them makes his way up to the house, peeks inside, where naturally everyone is hidden behind the curtains just out of view, and just as he is about to make his way inside, a colleague calls out to him and they flee. There are too many “close calls” and sub-plots are introduced early on with many of them having no resolution. We discover that the main character, Peter Malkin, played by Oscar Isaac, was romantically involved with one of his team members, Hanna Elian, played by Mélanie Laurent, and that they broke up long ago. Throughout the mission, however, they appear to get close again and they talk about getting back together when it is all over and done with but by the end of the movie, when they have captured Eichmann and brought him back to Israel, we suddenly see her at his trial, pregnant, sitting with another man, and Peter barely gives her a second glance. This entire sub-plot was continuously referenced throughout but in the end, there is no explanation as to what happened between them or why they separated.
Ben Kingsley can be utterly captivating when he wants to be, see “Gandhi,” “Schindler’s List,” and “Sexy Beast” for proof of that but here, instead of actually emoting, he appears to be going through the motions. He occasionally snarls and in a few flashbacks, we see his true colors as he orders the extermination of thousands of Jews and while these scenes are chillingly brutal, the rest of his performance is underwhelming. In the end, “Operation Finale” is a good historical piece for those who might be unfamiliar with Eichmann and his life but as a movie, it fails to generate any real interest. Seek out instead “The Man Who Captured Eichmann,” starring Robert Duvall in the titular role, while it may be a TV movie, it has more bravado than “Operation Finale.”
Now playing in theaters
