What is it? Drama, based on the Boston Globe's celebrated coverage of the Massachusetts Catholic sex abuse scandal. Why is it a major player? It's an All The President's Men for the 21st century, with the recently Oscar-nominated (and famously well-liked, so that won't hurt) Michael Keaton and Mark Ruffalo a couple of Bostonian Woodward and Bernsteins, supported by a solid line-up including Rachel McAdams, Stanley Tucci, Billy Crudup and Liev Schreiber. The script for the film was on the 2013 Black List - that basically means it's really, really good - and co-writer Thomas McCarthy is also back from an Adam Sandler-related disaster (he directed the as-yet-unreleased The Cobbler, which by most accounts is terrible) to direct. McCarthy is one of American cinema's great unsung contemporary auteurs, a skilled humanist that puts the focus on the actors and the story, and what he has here seems like the kind of thing that will finally propel him into the big leagues. With the director presumably keen to prove himself after his first directorial failure, and with a cast and true tale like that, Spotlight could be making its presence felt across the board at the 2016 Oscars
Lover of film, writer of words, pretentious beyond belief. Thinks Scorsese and Kubrick are the kings of cinema, but PT Anderson and David Fincher are the dashing young princes. Follow Brogan on twitter if you can take shameless self-promotion: @BroganMorris1
