Do you watch the news?

Rating: 4/10 (2 March 2016)

Look,
This isn't an attempt to downplay the events, this isn't a cheap shot at the "Best Picture winner". This is just a technical look at the medium used to tell this story.
But first a little bit of background, this story has made headlines all over the world, year-in-year-out, since this full extent of these atrocities were uncovered. Everyone who watches the six o'clock news, buys a paper or scrolls through Facebook knows roughly what happened.
It makes it all the more confusing then, when a story like this is thrown onto the big screen, and told in an agonisingly straight style. By this I mean, there isn't anything new here, the production isn't groundbreaking or cutting edge, there are no boundaries being pushed to help cinema float into the future. They didn't bring anything to the table, attempts at building suspense are short lived - with bottoms hardly having enough time to get to the edge of the seats.
The performances are passionate, but let down by a textbook (not in a good way) approach to the cinematography, it leaves it feeling distinctly flat. If they were dealing with a more unknown story, it could have been effective. There are some examples of this, letting the camera on, being calm in the face of evil that work. Joshua Oppenheimer's 2012 documentary "The Act of Killing" - exploits this flat style to further sicken the audience. Jumping back to "Spotlight", a story this big needing some more sting in its tail? Just to make people wonder about the things our species are capable of? It's pretty worrying.
I know what you're thinking, "it's supposed to be black and white, hype and tension would only look like fear mongering..." You're right. But! Film is still just a medium for storytelling, and there is an art to it. Poor retelling numbs the story, and this one cannot be overlooked.
Take it back to post-production Tom McCarthy...