Spotlight (film)

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Movie
German title Spotlight
Original title Spotlight
Logo Film Spotlight.svg
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 2015
length 128 minutes
Age rating FSK 0
JMK 6
Rod
Director Tom McCarthy
script Tom McCarthy,
Josh Singer
production Blye Pagon Faust ,
Steve Golin ,
Nicole Rocklin ,
Michael Sugar
music Howard Shore
camera Masanobu Takayanagi
cut Tom McArdle
occupation

Spotlight is a 2015 American drama film . It was directed by Tom McCarthy , who co- wrote the script with Josh Singer . Based on real events, the film is about a team of journalists from The Boston Globe who exposes sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church in Boston . The leading roles are played by Mark Ruffalo , Michael Keaton , Rachel McAdams , John Slattery , Stanley Tucci and Liev Schreiber .

The film premiered on September 3, 2015 at the 72nd Venice International Film Festival (out of competition) and opened in Germany on February 25, 2016. Spotlight won several international film awards, including the Oscar for Best Picture in February 2016 .

action

The film begins in 1976 at a Boston police station. A priest abused a single mother's children and is being held. A high-ranking church member quickly turns up and persuades the mother, with reference to the community of the church and the promise to transfer the perpetrator to not filing a complaint. The assistant prosecutor assists by instructing the police to send reporters away and keep the matter under wraps.

In 2001 the daily newspaper The Boston Globe got a new editor-in-chief with the journalist Marty Baron from Miami. He reads in a small section of the newspaper about the pedophile priest John Geoghan and Cardinal Bernard Law , the Archbishop of Boston , who knew about Geoghan's sexual abuse of children but did nothing about it. Suspecting that this single case could indicate a whole system of abuse, he urges his in-house investigative team, Spotlight , to investigate further.

The Spotlight team of just four begins to gradually expose sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church in Boston . It learns that the archbishopric knew about the crimes and regularly covered them up by transferring the perpetrators, bought the victims' lifelong silence with money and thus avoided a court case and finally had the judicial files pertaining to this removed from the court archive. The team learns from ex-priest Richard Sipe that around 6% of priests molest children, which results in around 90 priests in Boston. After a few days of extensive research, a list of 87 priests has been compiled who had been transferred to a different congregation several times in succession after only a few years at a time. The team is now trying to verify the suspicion by contacting the victims. Victims attorney Mitchell Garabedian obtained the Church's objection to require journalist Michael Rezendes from the Spotlight team to be provided with documents from an earlier trial. These confirm that Cardinal Law was personally aware of the abuse and knowingly ignored it.

The long-established Boston establishment is trying in a number of ways to dissuade the head of the team, Walter Robinson, from doing this research. Shortly before the end of the research, it becomes clear that he himself is jointly responsible for the long delay in the discovery. Long before he had been sent a list of 20 pedophile priests, which, apart from a note in the local section, did not seem worth researching.

The article by the Spotlight team will be printed in early 2002 and, in addition to clarifying the sexual abuse and its cover-up by the Roman Catholic Church, includes a telephone number that readers can contact. The next morning, the Spotlight team was flooded with calls from other abuse victims.

The film ends with brief information about the worldwide aftermath of the Boston scandal and the note that the Boston Globe was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 2003 for publishing its research .

backgrounds

lili rere
Screenwriter Josh Singer and director Tom McCarthy

The script for the film was completed by McCarthy and Singer in June 2013. In the same year it was listed on the American Black List , which includes the most popular unused scripts.

Filming began on September 24, 2014 in Boston . The film was shot in Fenway Park , in the offices of the daily newspaper The Boston Globe in the Dorchester district and in the Boston Public Library . In addition, some scenes were recorded at McMaster University in Hamilton , Canada.

The film used in the end credits and intertitles the font Miller , who used the Boston Globe for his headlines and texts.

Spotlight premiered at the 72nd Venice Film Festival on September 3, 2015 , where it received sustained audience applause. It was released in select theaters in the United States on November 6, 2015, and nationwide on November 25, 2015. The German theatrical release was on February 25, 2016.

In August 2016, the unnamed in the film, relevantly previously convicted priest committed Bonifacio Buzzi in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais in his cell suicide , after he had been detained on suspicion of re-abuse case.

criticism

The film received mostly positive reviews. Currently (as of March 2018) Spotlight has a 97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes , based on 334 reviews and an average rating of 9/10. On Metacritic , the film received a Metascore of 93/100 based on 44 ratings.

Verena Lueken explained in her film review research instead of revenge in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung on February 24, 2016: “A true story. Played by a great cast of actors. A celebration of journalistic ethics and journalistic professionalism. Those who find that old-fashioned are right on the one hand. The newspaper hit is a genre that dates back to the thirties. Even the pictures of the printing presses from which the freshly printed newspapers fall out and are driven by truck through the still dark morning to the mailboxes and kiosks will not be understood by many generations. But what it's about should stay. The fourth estate and the responsibility it bears. "

Kai Mihm praised epd Film in February 2016: “Some films impress not only because of what they are, but also because of what they are not. Tom McCarthy's new film 'Spotlight' is one such case. A drama about a major journalistic investigation, but not a cocky investigative drama; a reflection on ethical integrity but not a moral sermon; a story about perverted religious loyalty and the bad power of the Catholic Church, but not a pamphlet against belief and spirituality. [...] The researchers themselves are portrayed as journalistic archetypes, as the embodiment of essential professional qualities. Mark Ruffalo stands for unyielding doggedness; Brian d'Arcy James for level-headed professionalism; Rachel McAdams for the ability to listen to people. They are all clearly marked by the script and at the same time so finely chiseled by the actors that they become lively characters. [...] Despite their fearlessness [the reporters] are not stylized as folk heroes. McCarthy's position is clear. These journalists have achieved something groundbreaking, but there is no reason to triumph over a story like this. "

Josephine Woll, professor at Howard University , emphasizes in her criticism that it is "a big plus" that the film "does not artificially dramatize the story". Thus, the film draws “its strength from restraint”, the film is exciting and moving even without “internal or external conflicts”. Precisely because the film observes people who do their job competently, the film is close. She notices that the film doesn't show the moment the team receives the Pulitzer Prize . Therefore, the focus would remain “where it belongs: on the job that needs to be done.” She emphasizes the portrayal of “very unglamorous activities that films tend to ignore” such as B. Find sources, browse phone books and request court minutes. For the critic, Spotlight shows "deep sympathy for the well over 1,000 victims of abuse, but [the film] is above all a song of praise to investigative journalism and the decent, perfectly normal people who have dedicated themselves to it."

Reaction of the Catholic Church

Cardinal Seán Patrick O'Malley of the Archdiocese of Boston said Spotlight showed how the newspapers led the Church to face shameful things. A spokesman for Vatican Radio , the official radio broadcaster of the Holy See , said that the film was "honest" and "urgent" and said that Spotlight was helping the Catholic Church in the United States to admit its sins and face the consequences.

Awards

Oscars 2016

Golden Globe Awards 2016

Critics' Choice Movie Awards Jan. 2016

American Film Institute

  • Top 10 Movies 2015

Austin Film Critics Association Awards 2015

  • Top 10 Movies 2015
  • Nominated for best film
  • Nominated for Best Director (Tom McCarthy)
  • Nominated for Best Original Screenplay (Tom McCarthy & Josh Singer )

Boston Society of Film Critics Awards 2015

Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards 2015

New York Film Critics Circle Awards 2015

AACTA International Awards 2016

  • Best Screenplay (Tom McCarthy & Josh Singer)
  • Nominated for best film

Satellite Awards 2015

Screen Actors Guild Awards 2016

British Academy Film Awards 2016

Independent Spirit Awards 2016

  • Robert Altman Award
  • Best movie
  • Best Director (Tom McCarthy)
  • Best Screenplay (Tom McCarthy & Josh Singer)
  • Best Editing (Tom McArdle)

In 2016, Spotlight ranked 88th in a BBC poll of the 100 most important films of the 21st century .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Release certificate for Spotlight . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry (PDF). Template: FSK / maintenance / type set and Par. 1 longer than 4 characters
  2. ↑ Age rating for Spotlight . Youth Media Commission .
  3. ^ Pulitzer Prize for Writer Eugenides FAZ.net, April 8, 2003, accessed February 29, 2016.
  4. ↑ Mark Shanahan, Meredith Goldstein: 'Spotlight' script tells the story of the Globe series . The Boston Globe . August 19, 2014. Retrieved September 27, 2014.
  5. ^ Black List 2013: Full Screenplay List . Deadline.com. December 16, 2013. Retrieved January 6, 2015.
  6. ↑ Matt Juul: Globe 'Spotlight' Movie Holding Open Casting Call ( English ) The Boston Globe . September 24, 2014. Retrieved September 25, 2014.
  7. ↑ Ruffalo, Tucci in Hamilton for Spotlight shoot ( English ) CHCH News. October 7, 2014. Retrieved October 7, 2014.
  8. ↑ a b Josephine Woll: Spotlight (2015) . In: Steven Jay Schneider, Ian Haydn Smith (Eds.): 1001 Movies You Should See Before Life Is Over . Selected and presented by 77 international film critics. Twelfth, updated edition. Edition Olms, Oetwil am See 2017, ISBN 978-3-283-01243-4 , p. 931 (American English: 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die . New York 2015. Translated by Ueberle-Pfaff, Maja).
  9. ↑ Suspected abuse: priest commits suicide in prison cell. kath.net from August 12, 2016
  10. ↑ Spotlight at Rotten Tomatoes (English)
  11. ↑ Spotlight at Metacritic (English)
  12. ↑ Verena Lueken : Research instead of revenge , in: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung of February 24, 2016, p. 11.
  13. ↑ Kai Mihm: Review “Spotlight” , in: epd Film , Issue No. 2, February 2016
  14. ↑ Lisa Wangsness: 'Spotlight' shows how church was impelled to act, O'Malley says (English) . In: Boston Globe , October 29, 2015. Retrieved November 3, 2015. 
  15. ↑ John Allen Jr .: Vatican Radio praises movie on Boston Globe coverage of clergy abuse (English) . In: Crux , October 23, 2015. Retrieved November 3, 2015.