Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #192 in DVD
• Released on: 2009-07-06
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Format: PAL
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 100 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
It's always a risk when writers direct their own work, since some playwrights don't travel well from stage to screen. Aided by Roger Deakins, of No Country for Old Men fame, who vividly captures the look of a blustery Bronx winter, Moonstruck's John Patrick Shanley pulls it off. If Doubt makes for a dialogue-heavy experience, like The Crucible and 12 Angry Men, the words and ideas are never dull, and a consummate cast makes each one count. Set in 1964 and loosely inspired by actual events, Shanley focuses on St. Nicholas, a Catholic primary school that has accepted its first African-American student, Donald Miller (Joseph Foster), who serves as altar boy to the warm-hearted Father Flynn (Phillip Seymour Hoffman). Donald may not have any friends, but that doesn't worry his mother, Mrs. Miller (Viola Davis in a scene-stealing performance), since her sole concern is that her son gets a good education. When Sister James (Amy Adams) notices Flynn concentrating more of his attentions on Miller than the other boys, she mentions the matter to Sister Aloysius Beauvier (Meryl Streep), the school's hard-nosed principal. Looking for any excuse to push the progressive priest out of her tradition-minded institution, Sister Aloysius sets out to destroy him, and if that means ruining Donald's future in the process--so be it. Naturally, she's the least sympathetic combatant in this battle, but Streep invests her disciplinarian with wit and unexpected flashes of empathy. Of all the characters she's played, Sister Aloysius comes closest to caricature, but she never feels like a cartoon; just a sad woman willing to do anything to hold onto what little she has before the forces of change render her--and everything she represents--redundant. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

DVD Description
Written and directed by Academy Award-winner John Patrick Shanley (Moonstruck) and with an exceptional cast including Academy Award-winners Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman plus Academy Award-nominee Amy Adams, Doubt is a gripping story about the quest for truth, the forces of change and the devastating consequences of blind justice in an age defined by moral conviction.

It’s 1964, St. Nicholas in the Bronx. A vibrant, charismatic priest, Father Flynn (Philip Seymour Hoffman), is trying to upend the school’s strict customs, which have long been fiercely guarded by Sister Aloysius Beauvier (Meryl Streep), the iron-gloved Principal who believes in the power of fear and discipline. The winds of political change are sweeping through the community and indeed, the school has just accepted its first black student, Donald Miller. But when Sister James (Amy Adams), a hopeful innocent, shares with Sister Aloysius her guilt-inducing suspicion that Father Flynn is paying too much personal attention to Donald, Sister Aloysius sets off on a personal crusade to unearth the truth and to expunge Flynn from the school. Now, without a shard of proof besides her moral certainty, Sister Aloysius locks into a battle of wills with Father Flynn which threatens to tear apart the community with irrevocable consequence.

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Synopsis
A Catholic school principal, Sister Aloysius (Meryl Streep) tries to trick a confession out of a progressive priest (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) whom she suspects of being a paedophile in this terse drama, directed by John Patrick Shanley, based on his hit stage play, set in the mid 1960s in the wake of the Kennedy assassination. There's a feeling of dread and claustrophobia in the parochial school air: the kids can't sit still and they quake in terror of being called downstairs to face Sister Aloysius's wrath. Amy Adams is the sweet-natured sister in charge of eighth grade, who first suspects Father Flynn (Hoffman) may have seduced a withdrawn African-American boy in her class. Sister Aloysius becomes convinced of the priest's guilt, but it's hard to be certain if her judgment is obscured by the change he represents or is just the result of her hardened years of experience.

Director of photography Roger Deakins brings a lived-in bleakness to the cold wintry Bronx settings: paint peeling off the rectory walls, bare trees reflected in frosty windows, wrinkled white linen, and old, wizened faces in the gloom of the actual location photography. This all contrasts impressively with the hothouse nature of the performances; when Hoffman and Streep finally go toe-to-toe, you can feel the gods of acting rise to attention. The real scene stealer here however is Viola Davis, shattering as the possibly victimised boy's hard-working mother. She even leaves Streep at a standstill, and that's saying something.

Customer Reviews

Gripping and thought-provoking
I rarely review films and books, especially those I enjoyed, as it is usually a very personal experience, but when to my amazement I found such mixed reviews for what in my opinion is a masterpiece, I felt the need to speak out.

Everyone will have their own opinion in the end, but the negative reviews of this film to date appear particularly misleading (incidentally one of them actually contains spoilers--shouldn't Amazon.co.uk filter these out?), and I feel the need to clarify a few things.

You see, this is NOT a courtroom drama or a John Grisham action thriller. Some of the reviewers seem to have expected this to be the case, since the story revolves around whether a priest is guilty of a heinous crime. But what this film is actually about is what you learn in the process of his persecution by the mother superior.

In "Doubt", people reveal just how far they are willing to go in pursuit of a cause they believe in. Love of God is put to test as human, almost primal urges rear their head. Parents are shown to be willing to make unspeakable compromises. And a young and naive nun learns that little is certain, except eternal doubt.

HAVE NO DOUBT. THIS IS A GREAT FILM
John Patrick Stanley's film adaptation of his own Pulitzer Prize and Tony award winning play 'Doubt: a Parable' unfortunately did not come up with any Oscars Sunday night but still deserves accolades for it's multi-layered plot, excellent performances and thought-provoking denouement.

The setting of the film at a Catholic school in a largely Irish/American Catholic neighbourhood of the Bronx in 1964 - a year after the deaths of JFK and Pope John XXXIII and the convocation of the second Vatican Council, which boldly sought a rapprochement of the Catholic church with the modern world - emphasises the central conflict of the film between:- (A) The old certainties of the past, as embodied by Meryl Streep's arch-traditionalist, stern, foreboding, ball-point pen hating nun. (B) The ever-increasing uncertainties of the present represented by Patrick Seymour Hoffman's modernist, charming and openly liberal parish priest.

The story is ostensibly a sort of 'whodunnit'? (or rather 'did-he-do-it'?) in regards to allegations of innappropriate relations with children but on a deeper level probes further into the nature of faith in an ever-changing and increasingly secularised world. Is Phillip Seymour Hoffman's character a sexual predator or merely a misunderstood victim? is Meryl Streep's character an overzealous gossip or true believer? there is indeed doubt. The film does not underestimate the intelligence of the audience and allows for several interpretations. Thought-provoking, engrossing and well-acted by a strong cast. A film that is well worth a watch.

I have no Doubts......
.....that this film is incredible.

How Meryl Streep did not win the Oscar, I do not know. But apart from that dissapointment I cannot fault this film and its powerhouse acting, especially from the mighty Streep. Amy Adams shines in this role and Phillip Seymour Hoffman is great, although I got a bit confused as to why he felt the need to shout a lot.

Keep and eye out for Streep and Adams' second film Julie & Julia coming soon too.