Last night, Margie and I went to see a preview of Doubt. It was an early preview for the movie that is supposed to come out on December 12th. The preview was only for people between the ages of 25 and 57, and we got in ahead of a number of people because the 25-34 year old age bracket must have been underrepresented in the line. It was the first time that I’d ever seen a preview where they screened that heavily for demographics.
The movie is about a nun who is a headmistress of a Catholic school (Meryl Streep) who is convinced that the parish priest (Philip Seymour Hoffman) is abusing the first black student at the school. One of the teachers, Sister James (Amy Adams), is the first to notice some of the signs, but is less convinced of the priest’s guilt. The movie is a powerful exploration of the crisis of faith for Sister Aloysius (Streep) and Sister James that results from the search for evidence to have the priest removed.
The movie was incredibly well acted, and will doubtless draw some Oscar buzz for all three of the main characters. It was truly a deep and powerful exploration of the crisis of faith resulting from the sexual abuse scandals in the Catholic Church in the late 1960’s or early 1970’s. While definitely not an easy movie to watch, I also would definitely recommend it when it comes out.
