Spotlight

Tom McCarthy's Spotlight, which he authored with Josh Singer, is an involving, surgical, non-flashy, and thoughtful treatment of the Boston Globe's 2001 Pulitzer Prize winning investigation into the Catholic Church's cover-up of its sweeping sexual abuse scandal. Told in the tradition of the best newspaper movies (All the President's Men, His Girl Friday, Zodiac, etc.) where the innerworkings of the paper reinforce other elements of the film, McCarthy and Singer do an excellent job of presenting a complex case with many names, intricacies, and angles (even if it does seem to overreach at parts). What is most striking about the production is the performances, possibly the best large cast in memory, all contributing powerful deeply felt performances: Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams, and Brian d'Arcy James as the covert investigating team leading the inquest, John Slattery and Liev Schreiber as their Globe superiors, and Stanley Tucci and Billy Crudup as attorneys on opposite sides of the same moral coin. *** 1/2 out of ****