“Spotlight” may become this generation’s “All the President’s Men,” a riveting movie based on real-life journalism that uncovered abuse of power.
The similarities, both in the journalistic stories and in the movies, are plentiful and probably not coincidental. The Washington Post’s investigation of the Watergate break-in and its cover-up has inspired investigative reporting ever since. The Globe editors and reporters who investigated the Catholic sexual abuse scandal walked in the footsteps of Bob Woodward, Carl Bernstein, Ben Bradlee and other Washington Post journalists of the Watergate era.
Parallels between the journalism stories and the movies abound (and I’m sure I’m forgetting a few):
- Both films depicted interviews with people scared to talk about what they knew.
- Both movies depicted successful working of powerful sources with inside information.
- Both depicted the value of teamwork, including conflict and different personalities, in successful reporting, both at the reporter and editor levels.
- Court records provided key information in both stories.
- Each film includes a riveting scene of a fearful reporter running in the dark.
- The two movies used similar cinematic techniques and scenes to depict the tedious use of directories and old newspaper stories to track down important details and make connections.
- Both films effectively portrayed the difficulty of persuading reluctant sources to talk and the painstaking task of tracking down sources and getting turned down by those who won’t talk.
- The movies both deal with the complicated personal connections that play into journalism, however much we strive for objectivity.
- Both stories included a Ben Bradlee as a key character: Senior as the executive editor of the Washington Post, portrayed by Jason Robards in an Oscar-winning performance and Junior as deputy managing editor of the Globe, portrayed by John Slattery.
- Both movies accurately portrayed the rumpled look of many journalists, the newsroom banter, the look of newsrooms of their times. (As much as we hate clichés in copy, we become easy clichés on the wide screen.)
- Both films accurately portrayed the tension between editors and reporters, each pushing from different perspectives to perfect the story.
The most important parallel between “All the President’s Men” and “Spotlight” is that each portrays one of its generation’s best journalism investigations, each shining a light on shameful cover-ups of criminal activity, each succeeding in bringing down powerful figures.
Companion post: In a separate post, I share advice from my own experience covering sexual abuse by priests.
#SpotlightMovie is now playing in more theaters. Give it a watch if you haven’t already? https://t.co/zIzpa3fgMH pic.twitter.com/xSizOtMGrA
— Mark Ruffalo (@MarkRuffalo) November 20, 2015
[…] « ‘Spotlight’: a generation-later echo of ‘All the President’s Men’ […]
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Yes! It is the All the President’s Men of our time. And I’m hoping it will inspire the absolute passion in our students that is needed to pursue great journalism. I’ve assigned the movie as extra credit in every one of my courses.
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There were many, many, many places where the writer and director of Spotlight could have sexed up the circumstances or the story but instead chose to be honest. And I thought that made for a better story, at least for people who care about and are interested in the realities of journalism. One example include what Steve makes clear in his other post – they weren’t the first to write about priest sex abuse and cover-ups, not even in their own city, and that was made clear. (Certainly more credit could have been given to the Phoenix’s reporting, but even the scene where that was mentioned was reflective of reality – the reporter from the big metro being dismissive and kind of condescending about the role of an alternative weekly competitor). Another example is being honest about the fact that often we see things and know things that should spur us to do some aggressive reporting, and we don’t, for whatever reasons. Until that “light bulb” goes off and a decision is made to make it a priority.
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I thought they made clear how their own growing awareness of their previous guilt — as the Globe and in one instance, personally — became a motivating factor in delivering this story and getting it right.
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Two other things Spotlight got definitely right:
1) The scene at the end when all the reporters are on the phone. Each has his/her own way of holding a telephone handset. Don’t know if that was planned, but it reminded me of my reporters.
2) When the scene shifts to the bosses, a character is walking up a staircase bathed in natural light. When the scene shifts to the reporters’ office, the characters descend a concrete stairwell with bad fluorescent lighting.
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