In SEPTEMBER 5, Tim Fehlbaum (HELL, TIDES) tells the story of the hostage taking of 11 athletes from the Israeli team by members of the Palestinian terrorist organization Black September in the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich from the perspective of the US ABC TV team. The film almost never leaves the broadcasting center not far from the Olympic Village, but the events outside are constantly present through the images of the live coverage that ABC broadcasts around the world. Fehlbaum uses historical footage and the virtuosity with which he orchestrates the fictional scenes with the original material is impressive.

SEPTEMBER 5 begins in the evening before the hostage taking and shows the team in full concentration during the live transmission of a swimming competition. Camera one, camera two, the opponents once more, and lastly a close-up of the winner just as he begins to smile. Satisfied and exhausted, everyone says goodbye at the end of the work day. Then shots are fired, and the sport reporting, not only by ABC, becomes the first worldwide television broadcast of an attack, with 900 million people watching live as the police try to creep across the rooftops to the apartment in the Olympic Village where the terrorists are holed up, and finally watching the exchange of fire from afar in which all the hostages and attackers are killed.

SEPTEMBER 5 isn’t particularly interested in the political situation – in some explanatory dialogues, Leonie Bensch as the young German translator Marianne and Ben Chaplin as the Jewish sports reporter and team manager Marvin Bader outline the key points of the debate – or the catastrophic police failure, it’s primarily interested in the pull that live reporting draws in everyone involved, both press and viewers. There’s no time for moral or police tactical consideration when it’s about keeping the broadcasting slot, filling screens with the newest events, and reporting on every new development first.

On one hand, the theme of SEPTEMBER 5 is incredibly contemporary at a time in which every person has become a broadcasting center and the rapidness of reporting means everything, on the other hand, the film itself is also swept along in this maelstrom. With loving specificity, Fehlbaum reconstructs the work process of TV broadcasting: the heavy video cameras shoot pixelated live material, the 16 mm films are better and more flexible, but they have to first be developed. An assistant uses a matrix to build the lettering that will be superimposed on the image, and in the studio, Peter Jennings (Benjamin Walker) fills every gap, live and for hours. While junior boss Geoffrey Mason (a sure Oscar candidate: John Magaro) coordinates the team and contributions, producer Roone Arledge (Peter Sarsgaard) frees up airtime in the background.

The enthusiasm with which SEPTEMBER 5 takes these processes and uses them with the real historical material to build maximum tension is as fascinating as it is uncomfortable. The question of whether the film questions the voyeuristic thrill of live reporting or whether it replicates itself, or perhaps both at the same time, is something everyone will have to answer for themselves.

Hendrike Bake (INDIEKINO MAGAZIN)

Translation: Elinor Lewy