I’ve also railed on numerous occasions against the concept of films “based on a true story”. The Revenant, Dallas Buyers Club, and Lovelace amongst others were all biopics that had some positive elements but suffered from the usual biopic drawbacks of cherry picking extreme events, over acting and over reliance on caricatures.
Spotlight differs from all these films because as opposed to being “based on a true story”, it is the true story. Indeed so good was Michael Keaton at portraying Walter Robinson, the manager of the team of investigative journalists known as Spotlight, that Robinson described Keaton’s portrayal as like looking in a mirror but one that didn’t copy what he did.
Spotlight reeks of credibility. Like the classic All the President’s Men (1976) where Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein cover the details of the Watergate scandal, Spotlight’s relevance as an historical piece also resonates just as strongly today.
The only surprise is that while Spotlight won the Academy Award for Best Picture, All the President’s Men was only nominated for Best Picture in 1977, the year Rocky won. Suspenseful, quality, non-fiction drama may make for gripping viewing but will never be more popular than the ultimate sweaty and bleeding underdog.
