Here's One Not to Miss

One of my favorite classic TV shows was "Lou Grant" and it doesn't get any recognition today for how good it was.   Showing us the inner workings of a daily newspaper and how the reporters do their jobs.

Unfortunately, newspapers are disappearing to the right and to the left and, frankly, the reporting and journalistic standards left behind are a little...well...suspect.  There's always an agenda.

"Spotlight" reminded me very much of "Lou Grant," but I think it won't go unnoticed.   As a matter of fact, it's my odds-on-favorite right now to win the Best Picture Oscar this coming February.

Oh, yes, it's that good.

Unlike the newspaper staff in "Lou Grant" who felt real, the reporters working on the Boston Globe's Spotlight investigative team are real.   And it all happened likely as presented in this film, which is as even-handed and unbiased as it can get.  

Set in 2001, the Spotlight team which is anchored by editor Michael Keaton and reporters Mark Ruffalo and Rachel McAdams are encouraged by new boss Liev Schreiber to investigate an almost-40-year-old story about a Boston priest molesting a young boy.   Previously, this news had been buried.   But, as the reporting team gets into the weeds, they discover that this incident may not have been isolated or singular in nature.   One priest becomes 13 priests and becomes 87 priests and, as the postscript tells us, over 200 members of the clergy with over 1,000 victims in the Boston area alone.

Naturally, given the predominantly Roman Catholic population of Boston, this is not news that is swallowed easily.   There are cover-ups and denials and other mysterious goings-on that prevent this information from ever getting out.   Much of the diversion is provided by the local Cardinal Law, an apt last name for what was going on.  Indeed, most victims for years never came forward.  You didn't go against your own priest.  As a matter, there is the story of one molesting priest who was invited over to the family house by Mom who served him freshly baked cookies.

Okay, a lot of this has been in the news and I learned just how widespread this was when I made a business trip to Boston about five years ago.   As I drove around town with my colleague who lived in the city, I noted all these beautiful old buildings that were being turned into condos.  

"They're all churches that had to be sold off by the Catholic Church to pay for the legal fines and penalties."

Oh.

As I watched "Spotlight," I remembered that conversation and got to watch first-hand how that all started.  And how some tenacious reporters worked hard to get the story out, which resulted in hundreds of other silent victims to come forward.  And I'm sure that's a tough pill for a lot of devout Catholic Bostonians to swallow.   There's already plenty of fact checking and nitpicking going on.   Still, it is something that needs to be seen.

Director Tom McCarthy has crafted a marvelous detective story and it unfolds beautifully piece-by-piece, but never allowing us once to form an opinion on what was going on.  This is a non-judgmental movie and that is the reason why it works so well.  The pacing is sheer brilliance and you don't get that in cinemas today.

Of course, the acting is superlative.   I sense that Keaton and Ruffalo will be fighting for a single acting award and it will be interesting to see if the producers break the dilemma by putting one in the Best Actor category and the other in Supporting.  Nevertheless, I predict that "Spotlight" will vacuum up a whole bunch of Oscars regardless.

If I have one small quibble about "Spotlight," it's with the written postscript. You learn what happened to all the priests and the victims, but I would have liked to know what happened to that Spotlight team.   I wound up doing my own research on-line.   Most of them have moved onto other areas, but it was heartening to know that the Mark Ruffalo character is still there...with a Pulitzer Prize or two in tow.  You'll also note that one of the Globe editors in the movie, as played by John Slattery, is Ben Bradlee Jr..   An interesting footnote as Jason Robards Jr.'s Ben Bradlee Sr. was depicted in that other terrific newspaper movie "All the President's Men."

But that one minor complaint should not be reason for you to see "Spotlight." It is clearly the best movie I have seen in 2015.

And it made me miss "Lou Grant" all over again.

Dinner last night:  Penne with broccoli, garlic, and olive oil.