PREMISE
During the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Germany, an American sports broadcasting team must adapt to live coverage of the Israeli athletes being held hostage by a terrorist group.
THE GOOD STUFF
MAGARO AND SARSGAARD- Simply put…there are not five supporting performances in 2024 that are more Oscar-worthy than this. These two men anchor the film in a truly admirable way. Sarsgaard plays Roone Arledge, the head of the ABC Sports team, battling with the network over air time and having these beautiful moments throughout the film where he’s justifiably suffering in silence. You feel the full weight of the escalating situation in every expression. Magaro is a real revelation here, the character that hears every development before everybody else in the room. There are not a lot of music cues to identify to the audience when s*** gets complicated or dark. What we have instead is the tightened close-up expressions of Magaro as things go on. Both are so very brilliant in this movie.
PACING- This is a tight hour-and-a-half film. In that, there is not a wasted moment or scene. This is executed in a bottle episode* kind of a way, taking place almost entirely in a very stuffy control room as things go along, and it’s all for the best. Masterfully edited, switching from monitors to telephones left on speaker, to vital conversations in the hallway, to archival footage of Jim McKay, everything moves really fast, yet it’s very easy to follow.
* An episode of a television show that is written so that it requires only one set or scene and a limited number of cast members.
THE (kinda) BAD STUFF
THE CLOSING MOMENTS- There are at least two instances in the last twenty minutes of this movie that deserved a bit more time to gestate. Really really critical things that could have provided a little bit more depth into the event itself. I do understand that this is a movie about the control room more than it is about the event itself. And I also know that the Steven Spielberg movie Munich covered the details in this film that we do not see (These movies are about the same event but from two different perspectives).
There’s justification for showing certain things in an abrupt manner, it just leads to a very abrupt ending that although satisfying, left a lot more on the plate than it should have.
THE UGLY STUFF
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Whether it be all the PRESIDENT’S men, good night and good luck, she said, or spotlight, the compelling films about journalism show the many angles in which excellent journalism is more often than not heroic. What makes September 5 special is that it shows a different angle. Though excellent journalism is heroic, a lot of the time, it doesn’t feel that way when the event that you’re covering is THAT catastrophic.
I’m so glad this film is pulled off in the way it is. A small film, a little-known cast, a big subject matter, the heaviest of stakes, leaves very little meat on the bone and doesn’t overstay its welcome.
Top 10 films of the Year easily. If nothing else.
SEPTEMBER 5 is in theaters now
