Spotlight is pervaded by incredulity, pain, and anger, laced with sadness and guilt. Working with a script co-written by Josh Singer, director Tom McCarthy brings precision and persuasive detail to a portrait of a specific time, place, and perspective: Boston, seen through the eyes of The Globe‘s Spotlight Team around the turn of the millennium, at a time when reporters and editors were long familiar with cases of “pedophile priests,” but couldn’t yet imagine the extent of the cover-up culture in the Catholic Church.
The film’s polemic is not entirely directed at the Church; lawyers, law enforcement, and, notably, the press itself, and specifically The Globe, are all implicated. Still, it is the Church’s betrayal, a betrayal of a sacred trust and a form of spiritual abuse, that is the most deeply felt.
Spotlight makes painful viewing, but Christians tempted to circle the wagons and nit-pick the film to oblivion—a possible tactic with any two-hour dramatization of such a story—should resist the temptation: This defensive response is precisely what made the scandal possible in the first place. The Church is called to be the light of the world. We must not fear to turn a spotlight on ourselves.—Steven D. Greydanus (2015)
Arts & Faith Lists:
2015 Arts and Faith Ecumenical Jury — #4
2024 Top 25 Crime and Punishment Films — #4