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In the film September 5thThe ABC Sports studio at the 1972 Munich Olympics seems like an uncomfortable place to work, let alone think. The control room is smoky, the air conditioning barely works, and every machine produces a frustrating amount of background noise. Nevertheless, the producers and reporters are more than able to concentrate on their work as they put together engaging live broadcasts of the games on a daily basis.

That changes when one morning a militant Palestinian group sneaks into the Olympic Village and takes members of the Israeli team hostage. But unlike other films that have explored the incident, such as Steven Spielberg’s Oscar-nominated film Munich, September 5th keeps the far-reaching political implications of the attack itself at arm’s length; It’s a tense thriller that focuses solely on how the ABC Sports team transitioned to crisis reporting. Given the demands of live television, journalists had few moments to grapple with ethical issues while trying to stay on the air. What happened in the crew’s cramped quarters on September 5, 1972, the film argues, blurred the line between providing journalism and creating spectacle – even as the team’s work made history by reaching 900 million viewers captivated by their televisions.

Director: Tim Fehlbaum, September 5thnow in the cinema, Through walks and lectures, heated phone conversations and even archive footage from the actual show, the audience is often brought into the middle of the action. The addition of such real-life clips – including that of host Jim McKay – results September 5th a documentary feel that cleverly immerses the viewer in the uncomfortable mood of those in the studio. The hostage taking takes place just 100 meters away from them, but most of the employees observe the events through the lens of a camera. Geoffrey Mason (played by John Magaro), the eager and worried young producer who ran the newsroom that day, is effectively trapped in the control room.

On the other hand, he can see the time there best; In other words, it’s the place he wants to be. Time, not the hostage-taking, determines the film’s plot: Verbal countdowns accompany the dialogue; Large, glowing analog clocks loom over the monitors in the control room; And in a pivotal scene, Roone Arledge (Peter Sarsgaard), the president of ABC Sports, aggressively negotiates with another network executive for more live satellite slots. Time – and the limited amount available – also tends to prevent the team from doing their best work. As Geoffrey, Roone and Marvin Bader (Ben Chaplin), a veteran producer, debate whether they should aim cameras at the location where the hostages might appear – what if one of them was killed on live television? – they are told by other employees that they only have two minutes to decide. When Geoffrey sees a German broadcaster nearby interviewing a released hostage, he sends staff to get the man to the ABC studio as quickly as possible. He cannot worry further about the subject’s well-being because he cannot waste the limited programming options available to them.

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This tension between empathy and urgency is key September 5thThe success. At a measly 94 minutes long, the film mostly moves at a brisk pace that does justice to its characters’ feelings of stress. However, Fehlbaum also slows down the momentum in some scenes to show how the station’s crew members operate the equipment: captions are written by hand. Developing a larger version of a photo takes several minutes in a darkroom. To play footage in slow motion, a technician carefully spins a reel of tape at a precise speed.

Such intimate moments highlight the contrast between the typical patience in the studio and the frenzy the team flies into when news breaks. The pressure to be one step ahead of other broadcasters – through more updates, more sound bites, more footage, more everything– takes over. Employees like the station’s German translator, Marianne Gebhardt (Leonie Benesch), and correspondent Peter Jennings (Benjamin Walker) resemble storm chasers when they rush to the front with camera teams in tow. The producers do not consider whether broadcasting the locations of the German police officers could affect any rescue attempts. As onlookers later swarm the militants and hostages as they finally exit the building, the footage seems surreal – those involved in the attack have become celebrities, surrounded by cameras, followed by crews looking for the most gripping story rather than the are the sharpest. The ABC team also gives in to these impulses and rushes to confirm a clue that ultimately turns out to be devastatingly inaccurate.

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September 5thThe storytelling can occasionally be plodding, with sluggish dialogue (“It’s not about politics, it’s about emotions,” Roone argues) and claustrophobic production design. But the unwavering focus on ABC’s small studio in Munich underscores how the journalists there tended toward sensationalist reporting. By any quantifiable measure – viewership, satellite time, other networks citing ABC coverage first – they did their job well.

It’s hard to watch the film’s depiction of that day without also thinking about how high the expectations of live reporting are for both its creators and its consumers – the preference for drama over facts, the frequent prioritization of the Practicality over quality. When the film’s characters repeatedly raise concerns about what to air, their criticism reflects long-standing questions in journalism, including how to balance the need for an audience with the actual meaning of a story. September 5th is effective because it doesn’t claim to have anything original to say about the dangers of reporting and consuming breaking news. It shows simply and bluntly how easily these well-known dangers can be overlooked.