2015 is the year of Tom McCarthy. In about a month’s time, when year-end lists begin popping up, no other name is likelier to appear – on both best and worst lists. Back in March, the acclaimed director—known for casting underutilized character actors in small independent films—gave us The Cobbler, an outrageously ill-conceived comedic fantasy starring Adam Sandler. The film was as crude, offensive and just plain moronic as anything Sandler had done with his friends at Happy Madison Productions. How did McCarthy, who’s written career-best roles for Peter Dinklage (The Station Agent) and Richard Jenkins (The Visitor), end up making something so wretched, so utterly devoid of the low-key charm of his previous work? The fact that he continues to defend the film is bewildering.
Fortunately Spotlight, while not a return to form, is at least a return to not-horrific filmmaking. Based on a true story, the film meticulously documents the efforts of a four-person investigative team at The Boston Globe, known as Spotlight, as they uncover the ugly history of sexual abuse of minors in the Roman Catholic Church. These four reporters usually spend months on a single story as they follow leads and collect research; their current subject has its roots in the Boston Archdiocese, but soon reveals itself as a distressingly widespread problem.
As usual, McCarthy fills the film’s key roles with great actors we’d all like to see more of. Spotlight’s team leader, Robby Robinson, is played by Michael Keaton (fresh off Birdman), and Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams and Brian d’Arcy James play the rest of the crew. John Slattery as Ben Bradlee Jr. and Liev Schreiber as new editor Marty Baron round out the cast.
The performances are all solid, but the character development is a bit thin. McCarthy’s interests lie elsewhere, in the nitty-gritty of the investigation and the obstacles—both individual and institutional—in their path on the way to truth. But there’s a difference between presenting characters who are defined by their job, who spend every waking moment doing it, and characters who are simply never seen doing anything else. McCarthy and co-writer Josh Singer are careful not to over-valorize this group of reporters, as we’re told repeatedly that they had a chance to break this story years ago when a victim sent them a list of names. While this is a revealing detail about the nature of journalism, it doesn’t add much shading to the characters.
Still, the film is effective in its primary aim, which is to get your blood to boil—not just over the terrible crimes of certain Catholic priests, which we’ve all read about, but over the far-reaching mechanisms in place to cover them up. Even putting aside the cover-ups within the church itself, which go all the way to the top, the Globe is under pressure from outside forces as they prepare to break the story. Repeated references are made to Boston as a small (highly Catholic) town, and to the Globe as a “local paper.” Then 9/11 happens, which the film somewhat crassly treats as an inconvenience, a major news event that will distract from the shocking revelations at hand. Ultimately, Spotlight’s dogged commitment to detail makes it an effective procedural, but a weak character piece. And character used to be what McCarthy did best.