Monthly Archives: December 2015

My dad was a big Al Jolson fan. I’m not sure why. Maybe because Al Jolson was in the first ‘talkie’ movie and my dad was brought up in the 20s and 30s and loved going to the movies. He instilled in me a love for movies, too and a lot of time we spent together was in front of the TV or a theater screen watching Errol Flynn, Tyrone Power, Paul Newman and Steve McQueen. One of his favorite movies was The Al Jolson Story from 1946 with Larry Parks playing Jolson. I must have watched it 20 times growing up. In high school I did a paper about the Hollywood Blacklist and Communist scare of the 40’s and 50’s and discovered that Larry Parks had been blacklisted. He only made 2 movies in the 10 years after his name was smeared and died in 1975 of a heart attack at the age of 60.

The more I found out about what happened during that time the more I was shocked. The country was gripped in a state of panic after World War II and some factions were able to ratchet up such a level of fear that just the innuendo that someone might be a ‘communist’ could ruin not just someone’s career but their lives and the lives of their families.

Trumbo is based on what happened to writer Dalton Trumbo when he was blacklisted as part of the Hollywood Ten that refused to testify to the House Of Un-American Activities (HUAC) committee in Congress in 1947. They were convicted of contempt of court and went to prison. Then they were blacklisted from working anywhere as were many others, not just those who worked in Hollywood and the movies. Was Dalton Trumbo a communist? Yes. Was that a crime? No. But it was treated as a crime.

Even though Trumbo deals with a heavy subject it keeps it light. There are many moments of humor sprinkled in and it feels like a beginner’s course in the subject, preparing you for a more intense follow up (perhaps Good Night and Good Luck?), but that being said, it is a very entertaining film and that is largely do to the performances. Bryan Cranston can do no wrong these days. He is wonderful as the eccentric and witty Trumbo, sitting in a bath tub with a board laying across it holding his typewriter, working as he sits naked in the water. He was one of the most sought after writers in Hollywood and he knew he was good. Cranston sparkles with intelligence and determination as he struggles to keep supporting his family by continuing to write films under pseudonyms and fronts. His drive to keep working and to find work for the other blacklisted writers puts an enormous strain on his family. Diane Lane plays his wife, Cleo, who manages to keep it all together as Trumbo uses his children as hired help without the pay to answer phones and deliver scripts. Louis CK turns in a funny and touching performance as blacklisted writer Alan Hird. John Goodman does gruff and loveable like no one else and plays a C picture producer who knowingly uses Trumbo’s scripts on the cheap. Helen Mirren gets to play Hedda Hopper whose gossip columns regularly outed celebrities as ‘commies’. Michael Stuhlbarg plays Edward G. Robinson who is sympathetic to Trumbo and the others but whose own career gets caught up in it and he has to make a choice that haunts both men for the rest of their lives.

Towards the end of the 50’s two bigger than life Hollywood players will step up and challenge the Blacklist and by the time the 60’s began it had been broken with a single frame of film.

Trumbo is a good movie not a great one. But it should be seen because we all need to be reminded of how dangerous it is to forget what came before. How easy it is to succumb to fear and forget ourselves.

Other notable films on the topic:
The Front 1976 Dir. Martin Ritt
The Majestic 2001 Dir. Frank Darabont
Good Night and Good Luck 2005 Dir. George Clooney

I was raised Catholic. I went to Catholic school from 1st to 8th grade. I was a lector at mass, a leader of the Youth group and actually taught Catechism briefly. I grew to be disillusioned with the church mostly due to the personal experiences with certain priests and the growing realization that the Catholic Church had become more of a business organization rather than a spiritual one. When I was in 5th grade a new priest came to out parish. I was immediately wary of Father Tony. He was always lingering on the playground, kids hanging off of him like he was a ‘Jungle Jim’. He especially spent quite a bit of time with the 8th grade boys, often taking them on camping trips. It was soon revealed that father Tony had been sexually molesting the boys not only during camping trips but in the rectory. It was furthered discovered that this was not the first time that Father Tony had been caught. He had been in several other communities molesting boys and the Church continued to move him from one parish to another, covering up for him and themselves at every turn. This was in the Seventies.

Spotlight takes place in 2001 and tells the true story about the Boston Globe investigative team that broke the story about the widespread molestation of children by catholic priests in the Boston Archdiocese and the Catholic Church cover up that spanned decades.

This is what I would call an ‘old fashioned’ Hollywood movie reminiscent of All The President’s Men (1976) told with great clarity and purpose and with an amazingly good cast that includes Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams, Brian D’Arcy James, Liev Shrieber (Ray Donavan), Stanley Tucci, Billy Crudup, Jamey Sheridan (Law and Order Criminal Intent) and John Slattery (Mad Men). The film fully engages you and manages to tell a complicated story while never losing the audience. A lot of credit should go to Director and Co-Writer Tom McCarthy. McCarthy started his career as a working actor in such shows as The Wire, Boston Public and films like Good Night and Good Luck and 2012. But he’s also become a very good and successful writer-director. His film The Visitor (2008) garnered an Oscar nomination for Richard Jenkins who lends his voice to an important unseen character in Spotlight.

The case of Father John Geoghan had already been reported on in The Boston Globe. He was charged with grabbing the buttocks of a 10 year old boy by a swimming pool. When the new editor of the Globe arrives, Marty Baron (Shrieber), he suggests that there is more to the story than anyone is seeing and he wants the Spotlight team led by Walter ‘Robby’ Robinson (Keaton) to begin investigating further. The more Robby and his squad, Mike Rezendes (Ruffalo), Sasha Pfieffer (McAdams) and Matt Caroll (D’Arcy James) seem to uncover only leads them further and further down the rabbit hole of the Catholic Church and the numerous church and public officials that took part in the cover up. Though not revealed in the course of the film, Geoghan was later revealed to have molested at least 130 boys over his 30 years as a priest in 6 different parishes.

The team of investigators have a hard time getting information or even finding any documentation that any of these crimes had occurred even though attorneys had admitted they worked on such cases and made settlements with the church on behalf of some of the victims. Eventually, through their tireless persistence, they manage to garner the evidence that broke the story for good in 2002.

Michael Keaton continues his career rejuvenation with another solid performance as the head of the Spotlight investigative team. But the big takeaway for me was the performance of Mark Ruffalo who just disappears into his part. Ruffalo has been very good for a long time but he continues to amaze and should pick up his third Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination.

The subject matter is tough but the film is really about a team of journalists after a story and the demands it makes on their psyches. It’s a wonderful character study with a surprisingly emotional payoff. There is no big victory at the end here, just the satisfaction of getting the story right. The characters and the rest of us are left with the lingering thought of how long this went on for, not just in the United States but all over the world, and how many lives were damaged.