UNITED STATES
Daily News Egypt
Rana Khaled
For centuries, investigative journalism is widely believed to have played an instrumental role in guarding the interests of society and giving a chance for the otherwise silenced victims of wars, natural crises, and sexual assaults.
The same can be said of the role of cinema in raising people’s awareness on divisive or underrepresented issues, and piquing the public’s attention to the major human stories that require public consideration. So what of a film that tells the story of one of the leading investigative reports that revealed scandalous facts about some of the biggest religious institutions in the world?
Spotlight’ “Spotlight”, based on the true story of the Boston Globe’s investigative team, achieved huge success, both critically and in box offices, despite its plot not necessarily adhering to a commercial formula. The film, starring Michael Keaton, Rachel MaAdams, and Mark Ruffalo, won the Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay at the Academy Awards, receiving a total of six nominations.
The film tackles the controversial issue of child sex abuse by a number of Catholic priests in Boston, inspired by the actual series of stories published by the team portrayed in the film.
On 6 January 2002, the Spotlight team, including reporters Matt Carroll, Sacha Pfeiffer, Michael Rezendes, and Editor Walter V. Robinson, published their first story, entitled “Church Allowed Abuse by Priest for Years”. The article shook not only for the Boston community, but thousands of readers around the world.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.