September 5

The way that breaking news was reported on television changed on September 5 1972 when Black September, a pro-Palestinian terrorist organisation, stormed the Israeli camp of the Olympic Games and took hostages. The Games were intended to announce the return of West Germany on the World Stage, only decades after the end of the war. And the ABC crew who were on the scene, and with equipment to show live film around the world, were sports reporters who now had to cover an event where news-gathering precedents could potentially be created.

This is a taut and impeccable thriller about the various people in the studio whose job it was to make this work. Looking back on it now the archive footage, especially at the beginning when the technology is heralded—there’s a shot of the World Trade Center which isn’t necessarily intended to make a point, but does.

And the Holocaust and German complicity haunts the film. Young studio manager Marianne (Leonie Benesch) fields questions about how much her parents claimed they knew, and responds “I’m not them.” She has to shoulder the responsibility of the young German who's all too aware of the horrific history but not in any way complicit—plus she has to be the woman in a massively male environment. The broad and narrow prejudices are on display as the story develops from a sports report until gunfire is (possibly?) Heard and the drama takes its turn. 

Peter Sarsgaard is excellent as Roone Aldredge, the man who has to run the production—working with no idea either what’s going to happen next, or whether it’s even right to show it. There’s even a discussion of what to call Black September until they alight on the word ‘terrorist’.

The film delights in the teamwork of producing live television, and it’s period detail is impeccable—a big Apollo 13 style appreciation of the process of making things happen—for example wiring up rotary phone handsets so they can pick up the audio from a walkie-talkie. It doesn’t ever escape the darkness and tension of the situation and the tragedy unfolding outside is reported and described, but we’re always looking at the crew’s point of view. There’s a very famous still of a terrorist on a balcony, clad in what looks like a stocking on his head—and this shot’s development is shown in video before it becomes a photograph.

This is an excellent historical drama: it has relevance not only because of its quaint look at how slowly news used to come together. It’s also covering themes which are relevant now, and will probably always be. Skarsgaard is terrific and Leonie Benesch even more so. Whether the event itself is known or not makes little difference as you’re hunkered down with a group of people trying to do their best work, and inadvertently doing the first modern style news reporting of a developing incident.