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8 hours ago
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Halfway through Spotlight, Tom McCarthy’s understated retelling of the Boston Globe’s investigation into child abuse in the Catholic church in Boston, is a moment that, even 30-plus rewatches later, still chills me. Spotlight editor Walter “Robby” Robinson (Michael Keaton) travels to Providence to interview a fellow Boston College high school alumnus, where he and the victim, Kevin (Anthony Paolucci), make pleasant small talk about bygone school days. When the subject turns to the school’s hockey coach, Father James Talbot, however, the tone abruptly shifts. Kevin’s face hollows, his eyes deaden, and we see his soul drain from his body. “How’d you find out?” he says in a level, diminished tone that rings with years of trauma.
It is a measure of how polished every aspect Spotlight is that, in a cast boasting Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams, world’s second-best Shrek Brian d’Arcy James, and criminally underappreciated performances from Liev Schreiber and Stanley Tucci, it’s a few moments from Paolucci (who has 12 credits on IMDb, all for small parts like this) that shows Spotlight at its most harrowing.
That is part of what makes feelgood movies comforting for me: a sense of being in good hands. It’s consoling, as I give up a few hours, to know that McCarthy and writing partner Josh Singer will usher me ably and without impediment through the story. After so many rewatches, it’s like having a trusted friend lead me blindfolded through my own home.
They don’t waste a single breath in retelling the real-life revelation of Boston’s culture of paedophilic abuse uncovered by Spotlight, covered up by the Catholic church, and abetted by a community that ignored the open secret that at least 87 priests had abused hundreds of children in the Boston archdiocese. Family dinners, drinks with friends, even a Red Sox game all exist solely to impress upon the audience more grisly details of the scandal. All while Spotlight’s reporters reckon with their own lapsed faith, their relationship with their city, and even their own complicity in maintaining the culture of silence that allowed the abuse to continue unabated for decades.
Oh yes, sounds like a mug of hot chocolate, doesn’t it?
I get it – on the face of things, Spotlight hardly screams feelgood vibes. Though don’t so many of us find horror movies an unusual comfort? There’s an argument to be made that Spotlight fits into that criteria, harking back to an older style of horror that is brooding in the background: a fear of the unknown that slowly creeps up on the viewer as it is carefully revealed. Though in this case, we see the monster everywhere we go.
This is aided by, and in many ways opposite to, the way Spotlight tickles the nostalgic part of our brains. Its washed-out palette of beige chinos and khaki hatchbacks plants us firmly in 2001, before the world became … all of this. For most of its runtime, it’s even pre-9/11. It grants Spotlight a sense of being the deep breath before the plunge; the last vestiges of an innocent world before the impact of incoming horrors, both local (the scandal) and global (the ghastly effects of the US’s war on terror that we continue to feel today).
The serenity that belies the horror at Spotlight’s core, however, makes it a primo Sunday afternoon movie. Never bombastic, it’s an engaging yet relaxing antidote to the threat of the post-Sunday dinner carbohydrate pass-out. If I’m exhausted, miserable or stressed, Spotlight is always something I can watch – that I will watch – even if I can’t imagine being able to concentrate on anything else. After breakups, I watch Spotlight; when my grandmother died, Spotlight; after a horrible day at work, it’s Spotlight. Maybe it’s the film’s stillness, or the latent horror, or both. Spotlight is nothing if not accessible, at least.
I only wish more films captured this stillness. They’ve tried – Boston Strangler and She Said immediately come to mind – but none have matched the efficient humanity that weaves around Spotlight’s tight, organised reminder that there remains, hard though it can be to believe, a little bit of justice left in the world. But for me specifically, it’s a curious balm – especially as a journalist. When I’m feeling uninspired, beaten down by the cycle of pitching to dying outlets, defeated by my career choices, I can stick on Spotlight and feel, at least for a couple of hours, a renewed sense of purpose.
