Doubt and uncertainty have a life of their own. John Patrick Shanley’s film of his powerhouse play studies the cloud of suspicion over a priest in a church school who refuses to kowtow to unreasoning persecution … or are the schoolmaster’s instincts correct, and the priest’s gentle ways with his students evidence that he’s a predator?  Philip Seymour Hoffman and Meryl Streep’s battle of wills is witnessed by Amy Adams and Viola Davis. All four actors received Oscar nominations. Shanley presents something not often seen on movie screens — pulpit sermons that strike to the heart of an important issue.

Doubt
Blu-ray
Paramount / Miramax
2008 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 103 min. / Available at MovieZyng / Street Date August 20, 2024 / 19.99
Starring: Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, Viola Davis, Alice Drummond, Audrie J. Neenan, Susan Blommaert, Carrie Preston.
Cinematography: Roger Deakins
Production Designer: David Gropman
Film Editors: Dylan Tichenor
Original Music: Howard Shore
From the play by John Patrick Shanley
Produced by Scott Rudin, Mark Roybal
Written for the Screen and Directed by John Patrick Shanley

This new Blu-ray release appears to be a reissue from 15 years ago. We’re almost surprised to see the Miramax label on a new product, even if it’s distributed by Paramount. The 2008 movie Doubt is a noted success from John Patrick Shanley, the accomplished playwright and filmmaker whose screenplays grace  Five Corners and  Moonstruck.  Doubt is the only feature directed by Shanley that was well-received when new. Although it has since been redeemed by appreciative fans, his eccentric comedy  Joe Versus the Volcano suffered almost unanimous critical dismissal when new. His other directed picture, 2020’s Wild Mountain Thyme with Emily Blunt and Jamie Dornan, was all but destroyed by critics, whereas we thought it old-fashioned but charming. It’s currently OOP on disc.

Doubt garnered the respect denied the other two Shanley-directed pictures, performing decently at the box office and earning 5 Oscar nominations. Meryl Streep was the most-nominated actress working, and both Philip Seymour Hoffman and Viola Davis were given major career boosts. We’re even more impressed by the intensity of John Patrick Shanley’s writing and direction.

We couldn’t recall the last time that a film held our attention with scenes of a priest delivering a church sermon.   But we always pay attention to dramas that offer insights about human relationships … even if we favor the ones that reinforce our own values.

Adapted from John Patrick Shanley’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Doubt carries a powerful emotional kick. This story plays out within the walls of St. Nicholas, an aged Catholic grade school run by The Sisters of Charity, and administered by the stern principal, Sister Aloysius Beauvier (Meryl Streep). Sister Aloysius keeps a close watch on the nuns under her watch, and does not suffer fools lightly. She disapproves of the sermons of the easygoing Father Brendan Flynn (Philip Seymour Hoffman). Unlike Flynn, Sister Aloysius does not support the new openness of the Church in the 1960s. She doesn’t like his friendly, informal relationships with the students.

Trouble begins when the history teacher Sister James (Amy Adams) picks up hints of an inappropriate relationship between Father Flynn and St. Nicholas’s only black student, young Donald Miller (Joseph Foster). Sister Aloysius takes Father Flynn’s reluctance to discuss the matter as proof of guilt, and instructs him to resign. What follows is a battle of wills and a clash of philosophies. Sister Aloysius insists that Flynn tell her all, yet has already decided that he’s guilty. Flynn’s response is to deny that she has any moral or doctrinal right to challenge him. Flynn might be taking an ethical stand, but he could also just be shielding himself. Aloysius bores in mercilessly, certain of her mission even when she deceives and lies in her effort to force Flynn to confess.

Doubt is an incisive drama about important issues, and too responsible to offer an easy solution to its ethical tangle. A few reviews dismissed it as obvious, or compared it unfavorably with the stage presentation. But powerful acting and sharp characterizations made Doubt one of the best movie experiences of its year.

The characterizations are memorably sharp and distinct. The management methods employed by Sister Aloysius’s might cause her to be targeted by an ethics review. She readily admits that she runs St. Nicholas through fear. She whacks inattentive students with the back of her hand and terrorizes them with her steely gaze. The outwardly meek Sister James may lack inexperience, but her idealism gives her an inner strength that even Sister Aloysius admires.

The truth about Father Flynn remains an open question. We can’t be sure if the priest has something to hide, or if he chooses his uncooperative stance out of principle. When Flynn demands that Sister Aloysius drop her investigation, Doubt spins into a gray moral area where faith, trust and intuition clash. Sister Aloysius is undeterred by the absence of hard evidence — she’s convinced of Flynn’s culpability and won’t believe anything he says short of a confession. Is there any real substance to her charges, or have tempers heated up over what may be nothing at all:

Viola Davis’s Mrs. Miller is present for only one scene and part of another, yet is so effective that she joined the other main actors in receiving Oscar nominations. Mrs. Miller is a working mother with few resources, who only wants her son to have a chance to get ahead in the world. Her response to Sister Aloysius’s suspicions may seem a disturbing compromise to some, but it’s still the act of a mother who chooses her son’s overall welfare over an unyielding moral code.

Shanley’s characters invite scrutiny, to say the least. We find ourselves searching their faces for the truth behind their words. Sister James despairs of her role in the controversy, and worries that she no longer sleeps nights. Sister Aloysius believes in enforcing the rules no matter who might be hurt. But she also believes she can cheat those rules in a crisis. She says that to do Good, one must sometimes step away from God — and adds that there is a personal price to be paid.

John Patrick Shanley offers little vignettes with the students of St. Nicholas school, adorable, impressionable kids who are sometimes less than cherubic. Father Flynn befriends the children and encourages their emotions, while Sister Aloysius only seems to see the devil in them. By contrast, Sister James is a potential pushover. She can’t believe that a delinquent boy would give himself a nosebleed as an excuse to cut class.

Director Shanley punctuates his film with symbolic visual effects. A light in Sister Aloysius’s office keeps blowing out during tense meetings, the kind of phenomena that in an earlier age might be associated with sorcery. She greets a visitor while holding a pole used to change light bulbs, momentarily giving her the appearance of a devil with a trident.

Some critics objected to Shanley’s use of such symbolic (theatrical?) gestures. The most arresting visual harmonizes with the movie’s main theme, illustrating the point of Father Flynn sermon. His pointed parable on the topic of gossip ends with a vision, a blizzard of pillow feathers. Too obvious?  The shower of feathers doesn’t just represent gossip — it’s an excellent visualization of the moral storm raised by the conflict between accuser and accused.

The package text for the Paramount / Miramax Blu-ray of Doubt may repeat the original copy from 2009, which simply says it is in Blu-ray High Definition, without reference to a new transfer or mention of a 2K or 4K scan. Even if this reissue disc is not remastered, it’s still an excellent encoding.

The film has a dark, brooding look. Storm clouds contribute to a general feeling of apprehension, as does Howard Shore’s sparse, ominous music score. Writer-director Shanley ‘opens up’ stage play in ways that enhance the experience. He enlarges the canvas with scenes in the street and in a park, but his choice of viewpoints adds another level of comment to what began as a stage presentation. We wonder — was the feather blizzard invented for the movie, or did the play use some kind of effect as well?

The disc extras are also identical. The feature commentary offers John Patrick Shanley’s thoughts on the development of his play, and the contributions of his remarkable actors. Four featurettes include a making-of piece and others covering the music, the cast and the film’s relationship to the real The Sisters of Charity. We learn that Shanley succeeded in filming his movie at the very same Brooklyn school that he attended as a child. The Sister James character is based on an idealistic nun who was his teacher, and who served as a technical consultant. Elderly nuns appear on camera to talk openly about the changes to the Church begun by the Second Vatican Council in 1962. The Sisters of Charity abandoned the habit their order had worn for almost 150 years.

The film now reminds us of the passing of Philip Seymour Hoffman, who has been gone ten years now. In the twenty years we watched him, he never disappointed on screen. He was a stage star as well, and had the kind of presence that carried leading parts and supporting roles that interested him. We remember going to see  A Most Wanted Man the summer after he died; everyone had to be thinking, ‘what a loss.’

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Doubt
Blu-ray rates:
Movie: Excellent
Video: Excellent
Sound: Excellent English, French, Portuguese
Supplements:
Commentary with John Patrick Shanley
Featurettes:
From Stage to Screen
Scoring
The Cast of
The Sisters of Charity.
Deaf and Hearing-impaired Friendly? YES; Subtitles: English, Portuguese, Spanish (feature only)
Packaging: One Blu-ray in Keep case
Reviewed: August, 2024
(7186doub)

Final product for this review was provided free by The Warner Archive Collection.

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