Spotlight

Scott Hardie: “It ruled.”

This drama is good but not great; its Best Picture win is more of a reflection of a weak field of candidates than anything else. It's actually more of a newspaper procedural; perhaps 20% of its focus is on the Catholic sex-abuse scandal and 80% is on the daily workings of a newspaper's investigative unit, just showing the ins and outs of them doing their jobs. There are maybe three scenes with showy, overt emotional content; the rest is subtle and bottled-up and part of the very low-grade tension running through the entire piece. Still, it's neat enough to see the reporters at work (I believe that a documentary simply showing anyone working can theoretically be interesting), and their revulsion at the obvious, phony lies that prop up the corruption in this case is a reflection of our own. The movie is also as witty as you'd expect one about professional writers to be, and the cast is aggressive about trying to top one another in a way that really brings out the best in all of them.

What I found strangest about the movie was the lack of stakes. This was an explosive investigation that was bound to rock the city, and the reporters knew going in that the corrupt insiders & allies of Boston's archdiocese were going to fight back tooth and nail. Over and over, the characters warn each other about how this investigation could result in them being fired, or driven out of their careers, or smeared, or publicly protested, or threatened, or hated, or abandoned by their families, or whatever else. And yet... nothing ever materializes. The only consequences that seem to happen are one character fretting about his kids being groomed by a priest down the street and another not being able to accompany her grandmother to church any more. That's pretty much it. Imagine The Lord of the Rings threatening the Hobbits will all sorts of mortal perils on their critical journey, but they bravely accept the risk, and then they simply walk into Mordor (meme be damned) and destroy the ring, and then they go home satisfied. What an odd choice for this movie's writers.This review contains spoilers. Reveal it.

− September 10, 2023 • more by Scott • log in or create an account to reply