The last of my coverage from the Austin Film Festival (AFF) is with this review for the upcoming film, September 5.
September 5 was co-written and directed by Tim Fehlbaum, a Swiss film director in his first mainstream feature film. Moritz Binder and Alex David join Tim as co-writers.
The film chronicles the 1972 Munich Olympic hostage crisis, but what makes this movie more unique is that it’s all from the perspective of the ABC Sports crew that was managing one of the first ever live coverage broadcasts.
The cast that fills out that ABC Sports crew is an impressive one that includes Peter Sarsgaard (Jarhead, Batman 2022) and John Magaro (The Big Short). The supporting cast includes Ben Chaplin, Leonie Benesch, and Zinedine Soualem among others!
So, should you tune in to September 5 or change the channel?
My Thoughts
September 5 is a solid movie that did a lot of things right. First of all, I was completely unfamiliar with the 1972 Munich Olympic hostage crisis and if you don’t know much about that incident, I assume the movie is a bit more compelling overall to you. With that said, the strength of the movie isn’t really in the hostage crisis itself, but the ABC Sports team that is in Munich to cover the Olympics.
I really enjoyed this perspective as a way to make the movie feel a bit more unique than other movies like it. The added layer is that they were first a sports crew and not a news team, but also that this incident was a first of its kind with live footage being broadcast during the crisis itself. Something we’re all too familiar with in 2024.
While this offers an interesting perspective, it’s also a pretty big risk because almost all of the movie takes place in the building the ABC crew is broadcasting from and so you can’t place the audience anywhere in the crisis itself, except for what the live cameras can show us in the room.
I definitely think this risk pays off for the most part, especially towards the end of the movie. Without giving away any spoilers, as the hostage crisis concludes, the final location is completely dark both literally and in the sense that there are no cameras to really see what is happening. If, like me, you had no idea how the hostage crisis ends, you and the news team are left in the same position, wondering what is happening and struggling to balance reports about what actually occurred.
Regardless of the narrative, for a movie like this to succeed, the cast needs to be incredibly strong, and they certainly were. The biggest standout for me was definitely John Magaro, who was effectively running the live coverage from the control room. His character starts his shift with some questions floating around about his qualifications to even call the coverage for the Olympics, but then as the hostage crisis unfolds, he’s forced to make some major decisions that will be seen by millions around the world. He really does carry the bulk of the movie on his shoulders, but everyone around him (especially Peter Sarsgaard, Ben Chaplin, and Leonie Benesch) does a fantastic job as their characters challenge and support him throughout the crisis.
With all of that said though, the movie really struggled to elevate itself to something truly great for me. I did see this in the middle of a full day at AFF, but the movie ultimately struggled a bit with the pacing. I just felt a lack of momentum, especially as the ending built more to a confusing and unclear moment instead of something more concrete. This makes sense given that the ABC Sports crew was in the same boat as the audience is in terms of not knowing, but it just struggled a bit to build and maintain momentum for me. This is definitely part of the downside of the risk I mentioned earlier about keeping the focus so tightly on the ABC crew, when there were moments occuring that would have been more interesting to see outside the control room. To be clear, I’m not making a case of “Oh the movie would have been more interesting if it did something differently,”. Firstly, because I’m not sure that’s even true, but more importantly I don’t really believe in that kind of criticism. The idea that a movie is different than what you wanted or expected and is therefore not as good, is very hollow criticism to me. What I mean here is that I found my mind being more drawn to what’s actually happening in the crisis while the movie was trying to make me more compelled by what was happening in the control room. While I found the conflict in the control room interesting, it still wasn’t as interesting as the conflict they were covering.
One thing I also feel compelled to mention is the apparent controversy that is already brewing ahead of the film’s wide release. For those unaware, without spoiling the movie at all, the hostages that were taken were Israeli coaches and athletes and they were taken by Palestinian terrorists. When I went to log the film on Letterboxd (you can follow Adriana and I on there) the top review said “I’m sorry, but it felt like watching Israeli propaganda.” Further, there was speculation that the film was rejected from the Toronto International Film Festival because of the ongoing Israeli and Palestinian conflict.
For what it’s worth, I do disagree with the idea that this feels like Israeli propaganda, but it’s obviously hard to not think about the movie while ignoring the ongoing conflict. I think the movie itself is very focused on the time and the situation and it never felt preachy to me or anything like that either. It was very much about the ABC Sports crew and them having to pivot and cover the crisis. The text blurbs that appeared at the end focused on the outcomes of the 1972 crisis itself without adding more commentary about events that occurred afterwards as well.
Verdict
Ultimately, I thought the movie was fine. The performance from John Magaro was the highest point for me. While I appreciated the unique perspective the movie uses, there were times I felt I would’ve felt more engaged if I watched a documentary about the crisis instead. The drama in the control room was solid, but just can’t compete with the drama that’s occurring outside its walls. Still, it benefits from a lean runtime so the pacing issues don’t weigh down the viewing experience too much. If you do watch this movie, I don’t think you would walk away disappointed.
September 5 is set to hit theatres on November 29, 2024!
Adriana Wiszniewska