Synopsis
Spotlight follows the true story of the Boston Globe’s investigative journalism team as they uncover a massive cover-up of child abuse within the Catholic Church. When reporter Michael Rezendes and his colleagues, led by editor Walter “Robby” Robinson, begin probing allegations against a local priest, they discover a pattern of systemic concealment reaching the highest levels of the Church and legal system. Their relentless pursuit of the truth not only exposes decades of abuse but also sparks a worldwide reckoning.
Directed by Tom McCarthy, the film is a gripping, understated drama about courage, accountability, and the power of journalism.
Reviews
“Spotlight doesn’t call attention to itself. Its screenplay is self-effacing, its accomplished direction is intentionally low key, and it encourages its fistful of top actors to blend into an eloquent ensemble.”
Los Angeles Times
As both a movie and a portrait of journalism, ‘Spotlight’ proves the value of rock-solid fundamentals… [its] understatement and methodical tone feel reassuring, like throwbacks to a bygone, more sophisticated age.”
The Washington Post
‘Spotlight is a great newspaper movie of the old-school model … There’s an image of the presses printing off the edition that carries the church abuse story … in ‘Spotlight’ it is a moment of intense emotion. The truth … will be a wound in the psyche of millions, but it must come out.”
Roger Ebert
“There’s no higher compliment to pay this steadily riveting, quietly devastating take on investigative journalism than to say Spotlight gets it right.”
Rolling Stone
“Rather than showing us a montage of the triumphant results … Spotlight returns to the cramped offices … and their phones begin to ring … revealing that the magnitude of the problem is even greater than the reporters had reckoned.”
The Washington Post
Tom McCarthy’s Spotlight is a superbly controlled and engrossingly detailed account of the Boston Globe’s Pulitzer Prize–winning investigation into the widespread pedophilia scandals and subsequent cover-ups within the Catholic Church.
Variety
“It has the sinew of a really good procedural, underpinned by genuine moral outrage.”
The Guardian
“It hums as a tense shoe-leather procedural and a heartbreaking morality play that handles personal stories respectfully without losing sight of the bigger, more damning picture.”
Entertainment Weekly
Spotlight is a gripping detective story and a superlative newsroom drama, a solid procedural that tries to confront evil without sensationalism.”
The New York Times