Fifteen years after the end of World War II, a team of top-secret Israeli agents travels to Argentina to track down Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi officer who orchestrated the transportation logistics that brought millions of innocent Jews to their deaths in concentration camps. Hoping to sneak him out of the country to stand trial, agent Peter Malkin soon finds himself playing a deadly game of cat and mouse with the notorious war criminal.
Based on a true story, Operation Finale is a historical drama directed by Chris Weitz which features a script penned by first-time feature screenwriter Matthew Orton. As a history buff and fan of both Oscar Isaac and Sir Ben Kingsley's work, I was surprised that Operation Finale flew under my radar until a few weeks before its release. While that could spell trouble for some, I chose to see the film nonetheless. Anyways, while Operation Finale is well-crafted in regards to its cinematography and production design, the film was ultimately too dull and drawn-out for its own good.
However, on account of the story's fascinating central conflict, that shouldn't be the case. Due to personal woes, Malkin's torn between letting Eichmann live to stand trial or killing him as penance for his crimes. It's an understandable dilemma considering Eichmann was the architect of the Final Solution, but I wish Orton had expanded on this. Though, Isaac and Kingsley compensate for the writer's shortcomings thanks to an electric interplay. After all, the film's at its best when these two actors are alone in a room together. Unfortunately, Operation Finale's saving grace is also its undoing. Whenever the focus is shifted away from Eichmann, the film falls into the trappings of a conventional biopic.
Oftentimes, the characters' circumstances feel overdramatized for the sake of intensifying the situation and making it more cinematic. This technique effectively bloats the runtime and tests the viewer's patience in the meantime. I understand that the mission carried an element of danger, but the emphasis on tension only served to undercut the filmmakers' intentions. It's not too bad at first but it grew repetitive and wearisome as it went on. Clocking in at two hours and two minutes, Operation Finale seemed to drag on with plenty of superfluous material. You could probably shave off twenty-thirty minutes and wind up with something special. Alas, the end result's overstuffed.
Before I conclude this review, I'd like to briefly touch on Alexandre Desplat's score though. Desplat's a two-time Academy Award-winning composer, so it would be foolish to expect anything short of greatness from him. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that Desplat's themes would be so lively and energetic. The percussive nature of the score really worked in the film's favor and the frequent use of xylophone was interesting, to say the least. It's an instrument that 's not utilized very often in film scores so it was refreshing to hear in a weird way. One other interesting tidbit I found while perusing IMDB was learning that he had a daughter named Antonia Desplat who was cast in the film.
While you could just as easily scroll through a wiki-page and get the gist of the entire affair, history buffs will consider Operation Finale well worth the watch for its depiction of these harrowing events. A leaner version of this film which focused on the team's dilemma to protect Eichmann probably would have been more interesting though.
