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Spotlight (2016)
Defence of the
Realm (1986)
Featuring an ensemble cast that includes Michael Keaton, Rachel McAdams
and Mark Ruffalo, the film follows the
investigation from its inception in 2001, to
its disclosure a year later.
Rather than using the film as an attack
on the Catholic Church, director Tom
McCarthy instead points the finger at the
whole community, who stood back and
watched as the abuse continued.
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This year’s winner of the Academy Award
for Best Picture is an impassioned statement about the power of investigative
journalism and the importance of the
newsroom.
Following the Spotlight team, one of the
oldest investigative journalist units in the
United States, the film follows its Pulitzer
winning investigation into widespread child
abuse cases by Catholic priests in Boston.
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The year is 1986, when the Greenham Common protests against American Cruise missiles were at their height. A prominent MP
known to be opposed to nuclear weapons,
is seen leaving the house of a woman who
could be a KGB agent. After being hounded
by the press, the MP resigns.
But the reporter played by Gabriel
Byrne, who exposed the MP, begins to
suspect he was being framed. He teams up
with the MP’s assistant (Greta Scacchi) and
begins to discover evidence of the cover-up
of a near nuclear accident and a dangerous
secret at a USAF base in Britain.
Truth (2015)
Though she was nominated for her
unquestionably powerful performance in
Carol, Cate Blanchett’s best work of 2015
was her performance as CBS news producer Mary Mapes in Truth.
This Newsroom drama centres on
the Killian documents controversy of
2004 when a CBS 60 Minutes report on
then-President George W. Bush’s military
service, sparked a firestorm of criticism
orchestrated by the White House.
The investigation cost the careers of
both Mapes and that of veteran news
anchor Dan Rather, played by Robert Redford (pictured left) in his best performance
of recent memory.
The whole film is a remarkably understated political drama set in the paranoia
of post-9/11 America, and this is perhaps
why it was outshone at this awards season.
Broadcast News
(1987)
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Directed by James L Brooks, best known
to audiences as co-creator of The Simpsons,
this farcical romantic comedy follows
three characters who work in the frenetic
atmosphere of nightly news, and the love
triangle that ends up engulfing the whole
studio.
Holly Hunter plays Jane Craig, an
ambitious and driven virtuoso TV news
producer working out of Washington DC.
Albert Brooks plays her best friend, and
aspiring news anchor Aaron Altman, and
William Hurt plays Tom Gunrick, a charismatic local sports anchor who is hired as
a national newsreader, despite his limited
experience of news.
Nightcrawler (2014)
Featuring a career best performance by
Jake Gyllenhaal, this neo-noir drama details
a former thief who becomes a videographer,
shooting footage crime scenes in downtown Los Angeles, and selling the footage
to a local news channel as a stringer.
His story takes a dark turn when he
begins altering crime scene evidence in
pursuit of exciting footage. This is a noholds-barred elegantly depicted look at the
lengths to which freelance videographers will
go to remain competitive and relevant. n
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