Superbly Executed Film: A New Gold Standard for Films About Investigative Journalists

Rating: 10/10 (26 June 2016)

Spotlight is the best film of its kind I have ever seen. All the President's Men was the gold standard for this kind of film about investigative journalism, along with Absence of Malice, but this film was better in several respects:
First, it did a superior job talking about the multiple levels at which the story could be presented by the journalists: about the victims, the priest/pedophiles, Cardinal Law, or the Catholic Church cover-up;
Second, it laid out the conflict among the journalists about when to run with the story and why better than any film of its kind.
Third, it presented the notion that the story could have a very different effect if it ran in one part of the paper than another. The idea that a story could be "buried," even though it was published, because it was presented in the Metropolitan section, instead of the front page was well presented.
Fourth, the conflict among the journalists seemed real, not staged, as far as how to proceed with the story.
Fifth, the reasons people chose not to cooperate were well presented. People who had genuinely positive feelings about the Catholic Church were well-rounded characters, and the tension about threatening a Catholic high school with allegations about one of its faculty members was great. Stories like this have unintended consequences, and this film did a superb job laying them out.
Finally, the visuals were superb. The juxtaposition of the horrific events being presented and the ordinary working and middle class neighborhoods in which they were happening was presented without being overemphasized.
All in all, a wonderful movie, which, I predict, will be a classic like All the President's Men for people who want to watch intelligent films.