The 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany were intended to be the antithesis of 1936 games in Berlin. The planners were determined to move beyond the shadow of Hitler’s pageant, instead presenting a new humane and cosmopolitan Germany with athletes coming from all over the world for a giant Euro-bash called Die Heiteren Spiele (The Cheerful Games). And where the ‘36 Olympics had the fascist filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl to document it, the Munich Olympiad’s coverage was dominated by ABC Sports, which by the early 70s had become an American institution with its Saturday afternoon mainstay, Wide World of Sports. With commentators like Jim McKay and Howard Cosell, ABC provided lavish coverage of the competition, making stars out of the American swimmer Mark Spitz and Soviet gymnast Olga Korbut. Unfortunately, larger events of the period caught up with the ‘72 games when Black September militants took 11 members of the Israeli team hostage. The German authorities were caught totally unprepared, and in the course of one very long day, their muddled attempts to resolve the crisis ended in the deaths of all the hostages.
In this film by Swiss director Tim Fehlbaum, the events of September 5, 1972 are seen mostly from the perspective of the ABC Sports team headed by Roone Arledge, who held off attempts by the network to bring in the ABC News division to cover the crisis. With dozens of cameras at their disposal, Arledge and his producers, directors, technicians and translator worked tirelessly from their claustrophobic control room—and made some dreadful mistakes.
BE ADVISED–This film is Rated R, with smoking, drinking, profanity, off-screen violence, terrorism, misguided professionalism, and numerous ethical quandaries.