I'm not sure why this movie won Best Picture. There was a lot I liked, but there was a lot I didn't. This movie, as well others that were nominated, was based off a true story. Therefore, this movie had two jobs: (1) to entertain and (2) to inform.
(1) How do you make a movie about priests raping young children entertaining?
Well, what the movie did was it made the priests, and ultimately the Church, the bad guys while the newspaper team known as “Spotlight” was the good guys. Did it do the best job at executing that? Unfortunately, no.
The Spotlight team was alleged to be this group that secretly and separately would uncover the facts that they needed to write their story, a story so strong that the Cardinal couldn't deny or poke holes in it. The way the movie was shot, it felt like everybody knew what they were doing, even the people in their office that weren't supposed to know. As the team began prying others for information, I wasn't even sure who those people were, but all were being very difficult about giving any information on first or second meeting. Then finally, by the third meeting, each source decided to help for seemingly no reason. The only part that really made sense and the part that was most entertaining was the unsealing of the documents and that process. The movie could have focused on that process and it would have been a better, probably more exciting movie.
(2) The movie needed to inform me on what is going on, and who the important players were. Here’s an example of dialogue VERY early on in the movie:
Marty Baron: Did everyone read Eileen McNamara's column this weekend?
Boston Globe Worker: That's the Geoghan case?
Marty Baron: Yeah, what's the follow on that?
Ben Bradlee Jr.: It-It's a column, what kind of follow are you thinking?
Marty Baron: Uh... well apparently this priest molested kids in 6 different parishes over the last 30 years and the attorney for the victims, a Mr...
Eileen McNamara: Garabedian
Marty Baron: Thanks Eileen, Mr Garabedian says Cardinal Law found out about it 15 years ago and did nothing.
Wait, so who's Eileen? She doesn’t work for Spotlight. Who's Geoghan? Who's Garabedian? Eventually, we find out who these people are, but then the movie starting shoving other characters down our throat. Who was the guy that Michael Keaton's character was meeting with and why his sudden change of heart at the very end? That came out of nowhere. And who exactly was the guy that Mark Ruffalo's character was talking to on the phone -- a former priest who married a nun. What? Oh hi, Rachel McAdams's characters husband. And here's her Nana. Everyone was in the film. I wouldn't have been surprised if Spider-man swung in for a scene.
Joking aside, this movie had a tough job and I think it stumbled on the execution. It wasn’t a bad movie, but I don’t think it was worthy of the Best Picture win.
The subject matter of this movie was very powerful and very disturbing. I believe it was handled well and I appreciate the “survivor” actors that were used to portray the pain and frustration. In a small way, I was almost reminded of Netflix's "Making a Murderer" and how the corrupt system was being put on trial, but the trial would be played out in the newspaper, a trial we would never see as the movie ended with the publishing of the story.
The acting was phenomenal by the main cast. Liev Schreiber appeared blasé, but I assumed that's how Marty Baron acted in real life. Maybe Schreiber should have been more of a Perry White for entertainment's sake.
In the end, I think the movie needed to highlight the good people of "Spotlight" more and made them a tight knit group. If they weren’t in real life then maybe they should have been for the movie and the truth could have slightly bended. What also didn’t help was since the beginning of the movie it was implied that the Boston Globe could have broken this story years ago, but it got missed and the person that missed it was the head of Spotlight, Michael Keaton’s character. The movie took that fact and went in the direction that it happens sometimes, stories get missed, but what was important is that the paper finally did the right thing by releasing the story and doing good investigative work, work that put a strain on their personal life, but it was only mentioned for one specific character and not a focus like I believe it should have been.
Final thought: The said folo a lot in the movie, but it sounded like follow. Is folo short for portfolio or something else? I didn’t understand the term and if it was explained I must have missed it.
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Best Pic noms in order of enjoyment:
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Big Short
The Martian
The Revenant
Spotlight
Bridge of Spies
To view:
Room
Brooklyn
