Spotlight (2015)

Most people think so. 83% of audiences gave it a thumbs up, by Google's archived audience score. Critics gave it 95%.

The true story of how the Boston Globe uncovered the massive scandal of child molestation and cover-up within the local Catholic Archdiocese, shaking the entire Catholic Church to its core. Wikipedia ↗

Spotlight is a 2015 American biographical drama directed by Tom McCarthy, chronicling the Boston Globe's Spotlight investigative journalism team's uncovering of the systematic cover-up of child sexual abuse by Catholic priests in the Boston Archdiocese. The ensemble cast includes Michael Keaton as editor Walter "Robby" Robinson, Mark Ruffalo as reporter Michael Rezendes, Rachel McAdams as reporter Sacha Pfeiffer, Liev Schreiber as new editor Marty Baron, and Stanley Tucci as attorney Mitchell Garabedian. Tom McCarthy's direction was deliberately understated, avoiding dramatic embellishment in favor of depicting the methodical, frustrating, and psychologically devastating process of investigative journalism — the team pulling records, interviewing traumatized survivors, mapping patterns of clergy reassignment, and slowly realizing the abuse was not isolated incidents but a systemic, institutionally protected pattern affecting hundreds of children.

Mark Ruffalo's scene in which Rezendes breaks down in frustration — having discovered that the information needed to expose the abuse had been available in public records for years — was the film's most emotionally powerful moment. Spotlight won two Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay and earned $98 million worldwide on a $20 million budget. The film is widely considered one of the finest journalism dramas ever made and directly contributed to ongoing investigations into abuse within the Catholic Church worldwide.