Spotlight Movie Analysis

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The movie Spotlight, recounts the true events that occurred in Boston and were brought to light back in 2002. The movie talks about the massive cover-up scheme by the catholic church to conceals the fact that several priests were abusing and had abused hundreds of kids without any action from the Archdiocese. In this paper I will summarize the movie, discuss the type of victims shown in the movie, asses the risk level of the victims, and lastly relate the different theories of victimization and how each relates to the movie. The movie follows a group of journalists working at the Boston Globe, who are known as the spotlight team. This team conducts thorough investigations of important news and events. The editor in chief was retiring and Marty …show more content…

One interesting primary victim shown was Father Ronald Paquin, who admitted to being raped himself, but also confessed to molesting several boys as his time as a priest at St. John the Baptist. Paquin did not seem fazed by his confession because he “never got any pleasure” from molesting his parishioners (Spotlight, 1:15:40). The families of those who were victimized were also interviewed by the spotlight team, one woman said that her family was pressured into settling the lawsuit, which required them to sign a nondisclosure agreement. The families are secondary victims because although they weren’t the ones victimized directly, the fact that a loved one was hurt affected them as well. The other parishioners even those who were not abused, are tertiary victims, because they feel betrayed that their priests abused so many of their other fellow church members, and the archdiocese did nothing about it. One scene that illustrates the far-reaching impact of the abuse was after the article was published, Pfeiffer’s grandmother was visibly disheartened after reading the article. Another example is Mike Rezendes, who has his faith shaken after discovering the horrors that were allowed to carry on and the sheer magnitude of the problem in his investigation for the