ellen_datlow (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ellen_datlow) wrote2008-12-28 07:50 pm
ellen_datlow) wrote2008-12-28 07:50 pm
Entry tags:
Doubt
Loved it. The acting was great with Meryl Street superb as ever, and Philip Seymour Hoffman and Amy Adams and Viola Davis also very fine.
I really wanted to see it as a play (it won the Pulitzer)with Brían F. O'Byrne and Cherry Jones but never got around to it.
Some Spoilers below:
It takes place in 1964 in Boston and there is a culture clash a-coming between the strict, by the book disciplinarian Principal of a Catholic middle school--Sister Aloysius and the more compassionate Father Flynn.
As Streep plays her, the woman is insufferable but believable and does (very) occasionally show signs of compassion--most notably toward an elderly nun who is going blind. But generally she is a monster--the kind of nun everyone I know who was schooled in Catholic schools seems to have been terrorized by.
She despises Father Flynn and seeks to rid the school of him any way she can. There is one negro student in the school and Father Flynn protects him from the bullies. The question is what is Flynn's motivation? Is he "preying" on the boy or not? Has he made advances toward the boy or not? There is a brilliant scene between the boy's mother and Sister Aloysius during which the stakes are made quite clear.
A young nun plays an innocent who tries to do what is right.
"Doubt" is the perfect title for the play/movie.
I really wanted to see it as a play (it won the Pulitzer)with Brían F. O'Byrne and Cherry Jones but never got around to it.
Some Spoilers below:
It takes place in 1964 in Boston and there is a culture clash a-coming between the strict, by the book disciplinarian Principal of a Catholic middle school--Sister Aloysius and the more compassionate Father Flynn.
As Streep plays her, the woman is insufferable but believable and does (very) occasionally show signs of compassion--most notably toward an elderly nun who is going blind. But generally she is a monster--the kind of nun everyone I know who was schooled in Catholic schools seems to have been terrorized by.
She despises Father Flynn and seeks to rid the school of him any way she can. There is one negro student in the school and Father Flynn protects him from the bullies. The question is what is Flynn's motivation? Is he "preying" on the boy or not? Has he made advances toward the boy or not? There is a brilliant scene between the boy's mother and Sister Aloysius during which the stakes are made quite clear.
A young nun plays an innocent who tries to do what is right.
"Doubt" is the perfect title for the play/movie.
no subject
no subject
Wow...
Re: Wow...
Yes
His take on it was that it was all about "did he or didn't he" w/ the movie being rather manipulative in giving out info to keep the tension working. He felt the racial tensions of the time were seriously downplayed, & the view of sexuality was a little too sophisticated for the period, but those are all issues to which we're pretty sensitive. I dunno, maybe it's my own perceptions of how you each described it that are really. In any case, he thought the performances were uniformly excellent, w/ serious kudos going to the "innocent" nun.
Re: Yes
I've heard that Amy Adams got some bad reviews for her performance (but I haven't read any of the reviews so don't know for sure).
no subject
(Anonymous) 2008-12-31 05:06 am (UTC)(link)I agree that the Mother Superior's knowledge of sexuality seemed quite accute. It made me wonder what her marriage with her late husband had been like. But I thought the mother's understanding of her son and his situation was dead on.
Rick Bowes
no subject
Well, as you point out, she HAD been married so no surprise there.
no subject
(Anonymous) 2008-12-31 05:14 am (UTC)(link)I believe the neighborhood was supposed to be Fordham Road, though the streets look a bit like Washington Heights.
Rick
no subject
y mother took me shopping to Alexanders on Fordham Road probably around that time.