Doubt - Well...yeah

Sunday! Sunday! Sunday!

If you have ever seen the Upbright Citizens Brigade episode, where one character is bragging to a video store clerk that he had the 'titular line' in both Star Wars and Out of Africa, well you just may be completely ruined if you decide to indulge in one of the best acted movies, but ill-executed stories in Doubt. It is an Ali vs Frazier-esque type of movie where you get to see two actors at their best. In one corner you have Meryl "The Nun Heat" Streep and in the opposing corner you have Phillip "The Perv Priest" Seymour Hoffman two actors pretend to argue, one was in Mamma Mia.

"So What Kind Of Detergent Do You Use To Keep Your Blacks Blackest?"

It should be noted that out of all movies I was geared to go and see this weekend Doubt was on the list...it just was not very high up on said list.  Arriving at the theater at an awkward show time and the only options are Inkheart and the Underworld prequel, Doubt seemed like the right decision to make.  Upon the intro credits, the brain still conjures up the old UCB sketch, where the guy bets the clerk [a million dollars] that he had a titular line in Out of Africa a movie starring  The Streep.  "I'm so sick and tired of all this traffic. I just wish I could get...Out of Africa." The very first words uttered to the viewer in the movie is the titular line. A sermon delivered by Father Brendon Flynn [The Hoffman], which sets the stage for the hugest ham-fisting of foreshadowing this side of the Ohio River.

What should obviously be commended would be the casting. Amy Adams plays a sheepish Sister James, young school marm with haunting eyes, who always seem to be crying a great percentage of the film.  She is forced to step out of her shell when she witnesses Hoffman's interactions with the schools only African-American student.  Unfortunately, the story could stand to explore the tension a little more between the emotional decision(s) Sister James has to make prior to confronting Sister Aloysius Bevier [The Streep].  Instead we get a rush to [but plausible] decision that forces the attention to be shifted to the Principle and the Father.

Introducing: Viola Davis

If you are still interested to see this movie, a good suggestion would be to go for the acting and NOT the story.  There are so many powerful scenes in Doubt that can not be denied.  Viola Davis clearly, by a landslide, has one of the most moving and gut-wrenching scenes that I have seen out of the Visitor, The Wrestler and Milk combined! At the same time, when you see scenes like these in action you think of them just as they are...scenes.  There was no moment in Doubt where I was seeing the story transcend the players delivering said story.  There are these small moments of just utter brilliance, but they are so fleeting and worse, so indulgent to the actors and not so much the characters being played by the actors.

The movie feels short.  The director and screenwriter, John Patrick Shanley has constructed something that has worked better on paper. After all, this is a play, but unfortunately the movie actually looks like a play [in the worse sense]; when converted to cinema format.  There are little quirks and side characters that are there just for added color for the two or three main players the audience is looking/getting invested with [I thought the 'window thing' was cool].

How many Catholics just had a flashback?

Unfortunately, as of the writing of this, I have not seen: Notorius, My Bloody Valentine 3-D, Uninvited or even Gran Torino. I do not know if I could have done better, but I will say this easily, with movies like Paul Blart and New In Town being in the Top 10 this weekend; I will assume that I could have done a lot worse.  If you are not hard up for an intriguing drama then wait for Doubt to come to DVD.  You will be amazed by how the story leaves you hanging in the 'not-cool' way, so you may thank me for saving you the 10 dollars minus the purchase of tomatoes one thinks of hurling once the credits begin to roll.

I give this movie...

The Deliver Us From Evil documentary-award [its something you should watch instead]