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"Spotlight" Methodical, Moving, Worthy of Best-picture Conversation

By Lisa Kennedy
Denver Post
November 13, 2015

http://www.denverpost.com/movies/ci_29109232/spotlight-methodical-moving-worthy-best-picture-conversation

[with video]

It was a Sunday morning after the holidays, and the Boston Globe's Jan. 6, 2002, article on Page 1 didn't mince words: "Since the mid-1990s, more than 130 people have come forward with horrific childhood tales about how former priest John J. Geoghan allegedly fondled or raped them during a three-decade spree through a half-dozen Greater Boston parishes."

That was just the half of it. And, in many ways (though difficult to fathom), not the worst of it. The article — the first of roughly 600 published over the next year — went on to lay out the breadth and depth of a criminal and moral outrage both individual and institutional. As many as 1,000 children and adolescents had been molested or sexually assaulted and the Catholic Archdiocese's most senior officials often knew about the frocked perpetrators. Priests, the newspaper uncovered, were shunted to fresh parishes where congregants were unaware of the priests' pasts. This often led to the predators having further contact with children and teens. Under then-Cardinal Bernard F. Law, the archdiocese sought to keep the abuse a secret.

In 2003, the Globe's dedicated investigative team, Spotlight, earned the Pulitzer Prize for public service for its tenacious inquiry into the archdiocese's handling of decades of abuse.

Just the facts

Director Tom McCarthy and co-writer Josh Singer were nearly as dogged in their pursuit of the story for "Spotlight," in theaters now. The no-frills, smart-thrills drama features an ace ensemble that includes Michael Keaton as team editor Walter "Robby" Robinson and Mark Ruffalo and Rachel McAdams as reporters Michael Rezendes and Sacha Pfeiffer. As researcher Matt Carroll, Tony-winning actor Brian d'Arcy connects dots and crunches crucial data without the help of algorithms. Stanley Tucci portrays Mitchell Garabedian, the prickly attorney who represents a number of victims and their families. And Liev Schreiber plays Boston outsider Marty Baron, who, upon arriving in the burg from the warmer climes of Miami to assume editorship of the newspaper, encourages the team to deliver something meaty and meaningful to the readers.

"They knew they had to approach it very methodically, patiently, very thoroughly and get this story right," McCarthy said. "And I think Josh and I, maybe just from spending time with them, started to develop that as our style: Let's not conflate characters. Let's not overdramatize moments."

"Spotlight" is nearly as disturbing and compelling as the 22 pieces that make up the Globe's winning Pulitzer entry. It's also entertaining — not a comfortable word to apply to a movie with sexual abuse at its core. Nevertheless, deeply entertaining. After a film festival sojourn that began in Venice with stops in Telluride and Toronto, the drama has the goods to enter the Academy Award's best-picture scramble: pace, vigor and finely tuned acting.

Tribute to journalism

For loyalists of journalism's finer attributes, it may be heartening to see print journalists hard at work, given the ongoing tribulations of the profession.

Michael Keaton, left, as Walter "Robby" Robinson, and Mark Ruffalo, as Michael Rezendes, star as part of the Boston Globe team that wrote roughly 600 articles uncovering sex abuse in the local Catholic Church in "Spotlight." (Photo by Kerry Haye, Open Road Films)

"This work is essential to our democracy, to our nation, to our better selves," McCarthy said. "All big words and thoughts, but it's so true, so fundamental. I do think people appreciate it when they see it in practice."

McCarthy has a well-grounded romantic streak about us humans. He burst gently onto the scene in 2003 when his charmer "The Station Agent" introduced indie audiences to the marvel that is Peter Dinklage long before "Game of Thrones" and also promised rich, palpable characters from the writer-director, who is also an actor. It has been a promise borne out in the films he has written, co-written, or written and directed — from Pixar's "Up" to "The Visitor" to "Win Win."

"We bring slightly different things to the table," says "Spotlight" co-writer Singer. "Tom's character work is the best in the business and I like to think I picked up some of that watching him."

Finding the structure

The Los Angeles-based screenwriter got his start on television's "The West Wing" thanks to film director and TV show runner John Wells. For a spell, he also wrote for "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit." The Harvard Law School grad, who did a stint as a business analyst for McKinsey & Company, isn't a newbie to the demands of researching vast topics. His debut screenplay was "Fifth Estate," about Julian Assange and WikiLeaks. "I approach things from structure. 'What's the big picture?' It's all about inhaling a ton of information."

"Spotlight" has loads of information, much of it heavy.

The filmmakers tread a fine line in telling the story of journalists in pursuit of a big story while never manhandling the sexual abuse crimes at its core. It is chilling but also invigorating. The pain and outrage are never lost on the Spotlight team — or us.

When "Spotlight" screened at the Toronto Film Festival, the six journalists and their big-screen avatars were together. "That was really special," says McCarthy. First, the director brought the actors on stage. As exciting as that is for audiences, that also tends to be business as usual at the Toronto fest, which is thick with talent running the media gauntlet ahead of fall releases. Then he called the reporters on stage. They were met with a prolonged standing ovation.

"The reaction to them was as if I brought out astronauts," McCarthy recalls. "I've never seen six more awkward people on stage in my life. If you've ever been on that side of things, it's great, but there's really nowhere to put that energy. You gotta kind of sit there and take it. These reporters were not used to that. It was really, really lovely."

Why the heroes' welcome? McCarthy has his theories. "I feel there's a real disconnect between people's understanding of the state of journalism today. Not only how essential it is to our society but where it's at, how it's functioning, how it should be functioning," he says. "Right now it's not the healthiest institution. And our democracy depends on it being a very healthy institution.

"I think we need to collectively acknowledge that. I think, that night, the audience did acknowledge the sort of blue-collar, dedicated, relentless, for the most part anonymous work. How do we strengthen that right now? How do we re-create that in the 21st century?"

"Spotlight" leaves us with that problem to address, as well as another, more wounding one.

From the very beginning, the filmmakers were interested in the question of deference. After all, the Catholic Church's structure encourages, if not demands, it from its priests, its parishioners — but maybe the rest of us, too.

"People know the church is not the greatest actor here," Singer said. "But few people think of how this was the collective failure of a community. How everyone is looking the wrong way or looking the other way. 'Did I miss this too?' That's the question we should all be asking."

Director Tom McCarthy and actor Michael Keaton attend a special screening of Open Road Films' "Spotlight" at The DGA Theater in Los Angeles. (Alberto E. Rodriguez, Getty Images)

 

 

 

 

 




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