September 5th Movie Review

Director Tim Fehlbaum masterfully brings you into the ABC news crew point of view in 1972 along with terrific performances from the ensemble cast.

During the 1972 Munich Olympics, an American sports broadcasting crew finds itself thrust into covering the hostage crisis involving Israeli athletes. September 5th is a brilliant taught thriller from the perspective of the ABC news team covering the 72 Olympics that make you feel the unexpected crisis this news team finds themselves facing. The cast across the board are fantastic each filling their roles beautifully to a tee each having their own internal journey reacting to this crisis along with having distinct personalities and relationships that feel fully formed even though you don’t get a lot of backstory or exposition.

Director Tim Fehlbaums direction in this film is phenomenal along with his writing he co-wrote this film with other writers the first choice of having this film be from point of view of the ABC news team at the news station the whole movie is genius because it makes you feel like them you are experiencing what they are that makes you ask yourself what you would do or react if you were in their shoes. His choice to use the monitors to be what we see is great it makes you feel like this is real that it is happening and show what they must have felt uncertainty, fear for the hostage’s life’s, the moral quandary of whether they should be covering this at all if that is what the terrorists wanted them to be watching. Tim does a great job with the pacing of the film once it starts it never lets up, drags, or veers off he knows exactly the story he wants to tell that asks about the moral responsibility of journalism when faced with an unprecedented crisis especially when today there are to many news places that are just interested in stoking division regardless of facts or consequences just so they can make money.

The acting in the film is stellar each of them have distinct personalities like Peter Sarsgaard as Roone Arledge who is the boss being a no nonsense but caring guy who wants to do the right thing but is navigating in real time what to do in a situation that has never happened in the history of television news. John Magaro as Geoffrey Mason is a great foil to bounce off Sarsgaard he wants to do what’s right to but is a little to eager to act but his heart is in the right place that makes great back and fourths as the hostage crisis is unfolding that put you on the edge of your seat. Leonie Benesch as Marianne Gebhardt who can translate what the terrorists are saying is great you feel her anxiety of making sure she does not mistranslate but also see her determination to do her part to help get the hostages home alive in just her face. The rest of cast is great they make you feel like this is who was working at the ABC news station in 1972 from their faces, their clothes, along with how they react to the situation make the film come to life.

I love that the script of the film makes you question what the moral responsibility of news is when today everyone has a phone, they carry around in their pockets that allows them to record on the spot. This makes you question if you should do so at all or if It might do good to record an incident to get people aware of what’s happening or it might make a horrible situation into a circus like you see so often today that a lot of news outlets just see them as a way to make money off of rather than do the right thing it is hard to think about. Final thoughts is I loved this film and if you haven’t seen it yet please go buy it on Blu-ray it has the digital code that’s how we will get more films like this streaming it does not help going to see them in theater or buying them on Blu-ray and VOD is how we ensure we continue to get more movies like this I will give September 5th a 4 and a half out of 5.