SEPTEMBER 5 Nominated for Best Screenplay Oscar

by Eric McClanahan

September 5 tells the story of the hostage crisis at the 1972 Munich Olympics, when terrorists from the PLO took the Israeli Olympic team hostage to demand release of political prisoners. While this isn’t the first time this story has been told on film, the filmmakers this time wanted to focus on the ABC sports journalists who suddenly found themselves pivoting into war correspondents as a matter of great geopolitical import broke out in front of them. Wrestling with the logistics of the developing situation as well as the ethical questions of what to say and show on television as the events unfolded, the film sheds light on the transparency of global media and the dark mirror it holds to humanity.

Written by Alex David, Moritz Binder, and Tim Fehlbaum, and directed by Fehlbaum, September 5 stars Peter Sarsgaard, John Magaro, Ben Chaplin, and Leonie Benesch. The film has garnered an Oscar nomination for its taut screenplay that puts the audience in the newscasters’ control room and right beside the characters that make these crucial decisions. The film is frenetic, lean, and incredibly tense. The acting is top-tier and the timing is kismet; Fehlbaum admits that the film was wrapped before the most recent flare up of Israeli-Palestinian conflicts on October 7th, 2023. The details dialed in by the writers and director help to place the audience right alongside the events and the people affected by it. The 1972 Munich Olympics were the first to be broadcast globally and they paint a damning portrait of what humanity does to itself when it knows everyone is watching.

Originally published at http://behindtherabbitproductions.wordpress.com on February 14, 2025.