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There’s a sort of creepiness that I get whenever I’m visually reminded of life in parochial school, which I experienced for 6 years (2 of middle school and 4 of high school). Granted, that was from 1998 till 2004, whereas John Patrick Shanley’s play Doubt and his film adaptation of the same name are set a year after JFK’s assassination, but the atmosphere and set design featured in the film are so accurate that it makes for that familiar feeling of strain and confinement that I’ve happily been rid of for several years now. If anything, it’s a great credit to the filmmakers that they managed to capture the environment so perfectly.
One thing needs to be said right off the bat: Doubt could’ve easily been a disaster without its acting caliber. If the performances were even slightly off the mark, it would’ve been an exercise in ridiculous, over-the-top melodrama. Most importantly, if the final scene weren’t anchored by the relentlessly stunning Meryl Streep, it would’ve been a laughably bad conclusion. All of this is due to the fact that Doubt is a largely dialogue-based production that hardly shifts locations or has much in the way of “movement” per se, which means that the energy infused by the quartet of Streep, Amy Adams, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Viola Davis is basically the film’s driving force (though I think Adams and Streep are the most impressive of the group of four). One other great element of the film is that it ratchets up the tension during the heavy discussions by incorporating interruptions such as telephone calls and people knocking on doors at the most inopportune moment - not only is this great in adding to the stress we’re meant to undergo while watching the scenes, but it adds to the realism of the school setting.
Amy Adams’ Sister James is not only the most important character in the film in terms of the fact that the audience sees everything mostly through her eyes, but she’s also the character with the most fully-developed arc. I was concerned at first that we were gonna be dealing with this overly perky/innocent character who would end up being outraged by the things she witnessed, but instead, Shanley’s film takes the far more interesting path of having her acquire a fierceness that actually unfolds early on in the film when she argues with Sister Aloysius (Streep) over the use of “Frosty, the Snowman” as part of the school’s Christmas party. This happens to be a great example of Adams’ endless stream of talent: when she says “Well, I like Frosty the Snowman!” this could’ve easily elicited snorts from the audience, but she manages to give a compelling edge to laughable material. That fierceness slowly turns into quiet acceptance and resignation as the film goes on and her character loses control over a situation that she (arguably) started, by bringing it up in the first place. The only negative thing about that is that it makes Sister James sort of disappear during the film’s last third and not resurface until the final scene. Still, it’s hard to ignore the brilliance of Adams’ work, and this is her finest performance since Junebug.
Philip Seymour Hoffman undeniably has the toughest role in the film. His acting is far more difficult to judge than that of anyone else in the film, because Shanley has obviously directed him to make sure that Father Flynn exudes facial expressions that never fully give away whether he’s guilty or innocent. This is more of an issue with the plot than with the actor’s work: people will wonder why, if he’s innocent, he’s not more forceful in proving it, and why, if he’s guilty, he’s not trying harder to protect the misdeed from destroying him. But the film’s point is, precisely, to present two or more possible answers to every question, so all in all, it’s a good thing, and the ambiguity of Hoffman’s performance is probably exactly what was required of him to make this work. I’ll also add that he is fantastic during the three sermon scenes; as someone who’s sat through several of those, I thought that Hoffman looked as though he’d been at the pulpit for years.
As the mother of the “child in question” (who ends up being a “child in question” for more than just one or two reasons), Viola Davis is on screen for a very short amount of time, but she makes the six minutes unforgettable. Due to the fact that we don’t learn much directly from the child himself, this is the scene in which we truly learn a lot of the immensely painful, underlying things that are going on here, and it’s certainly one of the few scenes in the film in which we actually get answers to questions. Davis’ work is incredibly heart-breaking, and it’s a shame that there is something that is fundamentally wrong with this scene that keeps her great performance from having the impetus it could’ve had. Since most of the scenes in Doubt are set in small rooms in which people don’t have much space to move around, Shanley apparently wanted to vary things and elected to have this scene between the mother and Sister Aloysius take place outside, with them walking (the script uses the excuse that the mother needs to get to work, in order to have them walk outside of the office). First of all, there’s the fact that it just doesn’t seem too realistic that this conversation would be had in a public setting in which they could be heard by anyone associated with the school. But more importantly, it deprives the scene of that excellent sense of trapped helplessness that we get in all the other scenes that take place in Sister Aloysius’ office. It’s fine to want to vary things by having an exterior scene with people walking, but it was a mistake to pick this particular scene to do that. Davis would’ve been able to impress even more if she had been standing in front of Streep in a closed room, and if the two women had been able to raise their voice during the scene. Many are saying that Davis manages to accomplish the insurmountable task of outshining Streep in this scene, and my response to that is that it obviously looks that way, but that’s only because Davis has a lot more to do in the scene, but I don’t think it compares to the totality of what Streep does during the entire film.
Put simply, Streep is electrifying. If you thought she played a bitch in The Devil Wears Prada, wait till you see this. Shot from behind during her first few on-screen seconds, she perfectly captures the role of the strict figure who notices even the smallest detail (like an inconspicuous earplug that is not allowed at the school) and doesn’t flinch to punish where she feels punishment is due (a philosophy that clearly influences how her character approaches the film’s central conflict). Her portrayal of Sister Aloysius ranks among her best. The scene towards the end when she removes the cross has to be seen for its devilish intensity. As I mentioned, she pretty much saves the film’s final scene from giving Doubt a calamitous ending. Shanley’s script is at times a bit obvious and heavy-handed, and such is the case during this last scene, when the script attempts to accentuate the significance of the film’s one-word title, as if the events of the film itself hadn’t been enough for a viewer of average intelligence to understand the constant presence of doubt in all that has transpired. But Streep rescues the movie from this misstep by making us question just what exactly Sister Aloysius has doubts about: does she simply think she may have made a mistake in what she decided to do, or are her doubts of a larger scope? Is she having a crisis of faith? Streep takes a scripted line that tried to give an awfully simplistic ending to the film and opens it to interpretation. That’s the stuff of magnificent acting.
[color=black][font=Tahoma][color=black][font=Tahoma][color=black][font=Times New Roman]Is Doubt too theatrical? Many have argued that it is, but I feel like the problem surfaces only on a few select occasions, and I don’t think they’re enough to condemn the film, even if they keep it from reaching heavenly perfection. Shanley’s film often takes the road of symbolism to convey particular elements that affect the plot, and this is a wise choice in a film that, at its core, deals heavily with religious values. Yes, the face-off between Father Flynn and Sister Aloysius is propelled initially by the situation with the child, but especially towards the latter part of the film, it’s obvious that there’s a larger scope to their duel of words: Sister Aloysius turned to the service of God (?) after her husband was killed in battle in Italy, and she has a relentlessly strict and traditional approach, whereas the friendly (?) Father Flynn, who also coaches basketball to the boys and gives them advice on how to approach girls, is a more liberal-minded priest, so the dissent between both characters is inevitable, and this ultimately becomes the center of their bitter battle. This blesses the film with a wider thematic scope, and that, along with the excellent acting, leaves no room for any doubt that this is a very good motion picture.
7/10
