Image Courtesy Constantin Film
There are so many historic moments in journalism that more and more of them are getting film adaptations. These numerous films have begun to create a ‘slice of journalistic life’ or ‘dedicated journalist’ genre: Spotlight, All The President’s Men, Shattered Glass, Good Night and Good Luck, Network, and The Post.
Each of these also focus on the various sorts of technology used to break famous stories, the flawed journalistic systems that can be taken advantage of, and also defying authorities for the sake of publishing stories the public needs to hear. Fortunately, the genre has not gone the way of the dedicated teacher genre of film, which has devolved into unrealistic romanticism (Freedom Writers).
September 5 could be viewed as romanticizing journalism, but instead, it includes the journalist’s mistakes when terrorists took Israeli athletes hostage during the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich. The film refrains from painting any of the sports journalists, news directors, or translators in a heroic light. The potent 90 minutes of the film feels more like a piece of journalism that just presents what happened without much commentary.
Geoffrey Mason (John Magaro) is handed the reins of directing overnight news for ABC from the dayshift director, Marvin Bader (Ben Chaplin). Mason is working with French technician Jacques Lesgards (Zinedine Soualem), German translator Marianne (Leonie Benesch) and a group of American technicians, camera operators, etc. when the crises began.
Marianne and the other crew hear the initial gunshots while smoking outside the TV studio, which was extremely close to the Olympic Village. From here, the film steadily grows in intensity as more is learned about the terrorists, the hostages, and as the crew follows the story to its tragic end.
The film rarely leaves the studio or news offices, which is a creative storytelling constraint that keeps the focus on the crew and the tenseness of events unfolding in real time. Brief bits of humor help to balance the intensity, along with quick snippets of conversation that illustrate prejudices and tensions amongst the diverse crew.
One of the most fascinating aspects of the film is the 50-year-old technology used get stuff done. The simple act of making enlarged photos of the hostages was a laborious process that took a roll of film and time in the dark room. Grainy, archival footage from the actual broadcast and audio were used to blend in with the drama of the control room.
Peter Jennings, who was inside the Olympic Village after it was locked down, provides much of the audio commentary during the event. However, the process used to make his audio, coming in from a regular landline, available for live broadcast was also laborious. If the film has any sort of strong message, it could be to celebrate the resourcefulness and creativity of the crew in finding ways to make things work.
The live broadcast of the hostage crisis became historic due to both the dark nature of the events and to the record viewership. Though September 5 doesn’t add anything new to the ‘slice of life’ or ‘dedicated journalist’ genres, it makes for a tense, period piece that doesn’t pull punches with such a tragic event.
-Eric Beach