Spotlight - New Year Preview

by Helen Earnshaw | 2 January 2016

I love it when a group of super talented actors all come together to make up an impressive ensemble cast... and that is exactly what has happened with the upcoming Spotlight.

Spotlight

Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton, Rachel McAdams, Liev Schreiber, John Slattery, and Stanley Tucci are set to join forces for a movie that is already making waves and winning over critics.

Spotlight is set to be one of the most hard-hitting January movies as it is based on the true story of how the Boston Globe uncovered the scandal of child molestation and cover-up within the local Catholic Archdiocese - a scandal that was to shake the Catholic Church.

To say that Spotlight is winning rave reviews is a bit of an understatement and it is the January movie that I am looking forward to the most, It is promising to be a devastating and powerful movie with some great performances from some of film's finest actors.

Spotlight marks the return of Tom McCarthy to the director's chair. McCarthy has already brought us films such as The Visitor and Win Win and this would be his first feature since The Cobbler last year. As well as being in the director's chair, McCarthy has also teamed up with Josh Singer to pen the film's screenplay.

Spotlight has played at Venice International Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival and Toronto International Film Festival this year, where is has been met warmly by critics and audiences alike.

The Oscar nominations are now looming and Spotlight is being tipped as a potential contender - we all know how much the Academy loves these types of films. We could see it in the Best Picture mix, while some of the actors may pick up individual nominations for their work.

The category of 'potential Oscar contender' really is looking a little crowded as 2015 comes to a close and there are going to be a whole host of terrific movies that will by vying for a small number of nomination spots.

Spotlight tells the astonishing true story of the Boston Globe's Pulitzer Prize-winning 'Spotlight' team of investigative journalists, who in 2002 shock the city and the world by exposing a global cover-up by the Catholic Church of widespread child abuse perpetrated by more the seventy local priests.

When newly appointed Marty Baron (Schreiber) takes charge of the Globe in the summer of 2001, he directs the Spotlight team to follow up on a column about a local priest accused of abusing dozens of young parishioners. Aware that taking on the Catholic Church will have major ramifications, Spotlight editor Walter 'Robby' Robinson (Keaton), reporters Sacha Pfeiffer (McAdams), Michael Rezendes (Ruffalo) and researcher Matt Carroll (Brian D'Arcy James) begin delving more deeply into the case.

As they confer with victims' attorney Mitchell Garabedian (Tucci), interview survivors and pursue the release of sealed court records, it becomes clear that the Church's cover-up is far more wide-reaching that any of them ever imagined.

Spotlight is already one of the most talked about and anticipated films of 2016 and I cannot wait to see what McCarthy and his incredible cast delivers.