Sometimes, years after the event, there
is nothing better than a Hollywood film to summarise a real-life narrative that
we are all painfully aware of. Films
that take a scandal or a public crisis and tell the story from the inside or
from another angle, if done well, can really do a public service in canonizing
important moments in history. Or they
can just make us feel bad…
Spotlight – headed by Walter ‘Robby’
Robinson (Michael Keaton) and
consisting of Sacha Pfeiffer (Rachael
McAdams), Mike Rezendes (Mark
Ruffalo) and Matt Carroll (Brian
d’Arcy James) – is the quasi-independent investigative journalist
department inside of the Boston Globe.
Usually left to their own intuitions
about stories, the arrival of new Florida editor Marty Baron (Liev Schriber) points them in the
direction of a recent claim by a lawyer who says that the Archbishop of Boston
was aware of accusations of pedophilia amongst Catholic priests and did nothing
to stop them. Initially working on the
premise that they are following one bad priest, it quickly descends into an
all-out investigation of the whole diocese (only stopping briefly for the
inconvenience of 9/11).
Spotlight owes its entire existence to Robert
Redford’s All The President’s Men. Both films have a small group of
outsider/renegade reporters following revelatory tidbits of information that
eventually exposes a systemic conspiracy of corruption of a major
institution. The major difference
however is that Spotlight is four
decades older than President’s and
the investigative journalist narrative has been refined almost to the state of
self parody.
All clue-hunting journalist films (Zodiac, Shattered Glass, Frost/Nixon
and even The Da Vinci Code) all
follow the same formula: outsider reluctantly discovers unstoppable passion for
the case; montage sequences of investigators reading boxes of documents
throughout the night; male journalists drinking heavily to relieve the burden
of Knowing The Truth…
The film is clearly a fairly principled
presentation of the facts of the unraveling scandal, with most of the action
set in law offices, courtroom libraries and newspaper editorial meetings. Yet, as gripping as this is as subject
matter, the film loses some of its potential tension by not depicting any
retaliation by the all-powerful church of which Spotlight are
investigating. A lot of talk is spent
explaining how the omnipotent church has used its mighty power to silence
dissenters and viciously challenge survivors who try to speak out. Yet when The Boston Globe starts to root
around, they just… find the information.
The power of Spotlight comes from its moral twist halfway through as it begins
to focus the blame not just on the repugnant priests, but also on the
surrounding culture that turned a blind eye.
At one point a character suggests that, “If it takes a village to raise
a child, it takes a village to abuse one…”, which is itself a peculiarly
Catholic expression of universal guilt to arise from such an objectively
anti-Catholic (church) narrative.
The journalists at times use their
exposés to reflect on their own faith (most are from Boston, and are lapsed
Catholics), yet these scenes don’t inherently blame Catholicism for the genesis
of the scandal, but the corruptibility of institutions. This humility is clearly tailored to an
American audience, as from a European point-of-view it is telling that every
time an Islamist does something horrific around the world there are universal
calls for all Muslims to denounce their actions – yet the Catholic church seems
to live in its own bubble and rarely shows admissions of guilt or apology.
Despite some of its flaws, Spotlight is an admirable attempt to
tell a long-overdue important story that has fallen from prominence. And for that reason it should be widely seen
and discussed so that the moral failings it portrays are consigned to another
chapter of America’s dark history…*
*Although
saying that, the final title-card punch in the gut explains how similar abuses
were happening in almost all parts of the world.
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