Late Breaking News

I'm a television reporter/anchor and I've never before seen this story told.

No television station keeps an overnight crew so who covers the news? You'll meet them in this documentary. Their office is their car which is equipped with police and fire radio monitors, a ton of camera equipment and even dubbing equipment so they can distribute their stories to several stations at once. They were on the scene of some of the biggest stories in Chicago over the past several years and you'll see them close up.

I'm in the business and I was fascinated. This is a side of television no viewer has ever seen before told in a way that keeps your interest from start to finish.

I went into this film not expecting much, but was engrossed from the very beginning. On the surface you might think, "yeah, who cares", but the concept that TV stations are not always responsible for the content of some of the biggest stories they cover was surprising.

Late Breaknig News follows a "stringer" named Ken Herzlich on his nightly rounds in the city of Chicago. He sits in his used cop car decked out with police and fire department radio scanners waiting for the next big story, then races to the scene with his mobile video production studio, shoots the story, interviews witnesses, and then races the clock to deliver the tape to the TV stations before they go on the air each morning.

Fires, murders, auto accidents, cows on the loose... I always took for granted how these stories ended up on the air.

Late Breaking News mixes the behind the scenes footage, Ken's amazing video, and clips of how it looks once it's broadcast by the Chicago stations to weave a very interesting story.

This is a great documentary, much of the video is stuff they don't show on the morning news, some real intense moments. We're shown the dark side of Chicago figuratively and literally. When I watch film reports on the morning news I now have a better understanding of how they're made. By the end of the movie you really like Mr. Bartley and really feel that you know what his job is like. One thing I would like to know is how is car can handle all the machines whirring around on the inside, it was absolutely fascinating to see all this stuff shot, and packaged on the fly while cruising the streets of Chicago. I wish it would get a DVD release.

I saw this film while in Chicago at the Gene Siskel film center downtown. Good venue, and this film, shot in digital video, looked very nice on the big screen. The film's subject, Ken, ranges around Chicago to capture video of news events while the station crews are sleeping. The process of the business is fascinating, and Ken is not a sleazy ambulance chaser. He shows the world what can happen to anyone, and it's not always a grisly mess, he does touch on the fun stories occasionally, too. He knows the city, he knows the cops, and helps out a little when he can. Nice, tight editing by filmmaker Jon Knoll, with a good original soundtrack. Worth seeing, definitely.