Hollywood Road - Chapter 710

On November 7th, an ordinary Friday, “Spotlight” appeared in ten theaters in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, and Boston at the same time. Because the film had previously won huge prizes at the Venice Film Festival and Toronto Film Festival. The praise attracted a large number of viewers to watch.

Especially Murphy’s fans and some former victims of Catholicism have long been eagerly waiting for the film.

During the day on Friday, the attendance rate of all theaters showing “Focus” exceeded 90%. This is a statistic that excludes professional film critics and members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences who can watch for free.

For this film, professional film critics have been gearing up for a long time, ready to do something.

Like this kind of film related to current affairs hotspot, their comments will naturally attract more fans, not to mention that the main protagonist or villain of the film is still Catholic.

Like Hollywood before, professional film critics are also cautious when it comes to religious themes, for fear of causing unnecessary trouble, but now it’s different. From last winter to the present, Catholicism has been exposed by numerous scandals by the media. Attacking Catholicism can be said to be completely correct in value orientation and politically correct.

Probably many film critics couldn’t wait to watch the film at the beginning of the screening. By Friday afternoon, many well-known film critics had comments on “Focus” on the Internet or social platform columns.

“In “Focus”, Murphy Stanton expands from a scandal to a critique of the system, just like heavy documentary literature-powerful narrative, decoupling, layered advancement, subtleties, clear organization, rigorous and neat Sensational and neat editing, which perfectly restored a media person’s reporting journey. At the end, I answered the phone at the end of the office and said hello: “Focus.” This wonderful ending is extremely shocking, and Murphy will completely “from the top” The next institutional ugliness’ perfectly put on the screen, not only digs into the root of the Catholic scandal, but also directly points to the deep indifference of human nature, which is thought-provoking.”

–Kenneth Turan

“Murphy Stanton’s new film truly reproduces the focus of the report team’s investigation of a large number of Catholic priests’ child sexual abuse scandals. The real incident itself is attractive enough, not to mention a very neat and solid script and production, as well as control. With a speed rhythm similar to a thriller. The film also seems to deliberately dilute the characterization and drama, but with a calm and steady pace and subtle plot unfolding, it is fascinating. The soundtrack, photography and editing have played an excellent auxiliary role. The performance of the lead actor is just right, everyone has superb performance. And the most successful part of the film is to cut off child molestation and sexuality, pointing out that this is the church, the world’s most dirty organization from top to bottom. The system is ugly. After reading it, people will lose all respect for religion. Although the content is cruel, it is very comfortable to watch.”

-Todd McCarthy

Almost all film critics that appeared on the Internet were positive reviews.

In addition, the “Boston Globe”, which is closely related to the incident, also opened a column on the front page of the headline and published a comment on the film.

“Under the control of Murphy Stanton, who is also the screenwriter and director of the film, “Focus” has an extremely cold image style. On the one hand, the cold and dark tones of the film successfully created the pain and pain before the scandal was revealed. A depressing atmosphere; on the other hand, in order to highlight the authenticity and objectivity, most scenes in the film used spectator-style camera and relatively neutral mid-to-close shots.”

“At the same time, “Focus” also shows amazing maturity in narrative. Throughout the film, the film neither amplifies the suffering of the victims in order to win the sympathy of the audience, nor does it deliberately demonize the specific clergy in order to establish a villain. The news professionals in the “Focus” column are deliberately elevated. The film always focuses on the facts and truths of the case. When the report is completed and the case is revealed, the film comes to an abrupt end. It is truly memorable.”

“The technique used in “Focus” is very restrained and restrained. It neither deliberately made moral judgments, deliberately preaching, nor deliberately shaping the character of the characters, but after the film ended, its values, emotions and The characters are all extremely vivid, which reflects the skill of director Murphy Stanton.”

“During the advancement of the plot, the film’s character creation and the final presentation of the film motif are truly silent and natural. In other words, this is a serious film that resembles a documentary. Sensational tactics have achieved the most sensational effect.”

“In general, in the film “Focus”, the camera is calm and restrained, the editing is clean and tidy, the plot catches the people, the emotion catches the heart. I believe all audiences who have seen the end will have the same feeling, that is, it is in a seemingly peaceful way. Below the video, director Murphy Stanton has given the film the power to shock the soul!”

The various praises of the media are like no money, and they are desperately thrown on “Focus” and Murphy. It seems that this film is the best Hollywood movie this year.

On the one hand, Murphy and the film are so influential that they are also masterpieces; on the other hand, this is also a continuation of the Catholic scandal exposed by the media last year.

Of course, most people still prefer to beat the dog in the water.

After the first day of screening, 55 film reviews about “Focus” were collected on the Rotten Tomatoes website, with a positive rate of 97% and an average score of 8.8; the authoritative media comprehensive evaluation MetaCritic included 45 media scores with an average score Up to 8.6 points!

If only the media and film critics praised it, it would be fine, but the film’s fans’ reputation also exploded.

CinemaScore theater audiences scored “A+” on site, IMDB included 6876 user ratings, and “Focus” scored an average of 9.1 points.

Ordinary fan users of fan websites and social platforms like IMDB have received an endless stream of praise for “Focus”.

“Focusing on the sexual assault itself is not the focus of the film “Focus”, because it is easy to fall into the gimmick of negative energy overload and trafficking topics. Murphy put most of his pen and ink in the process of exposing the scandal. The most rare thing is this. The film does not deliberately’focus’ to create gods. And each character is full and true, making the audience feel empathetic and can’t help but self-examine. Maybe the larger the screen, the more the front row, the more you can feel the charm of the performance and the drama. This is also a shocking power that is not available in front of a small screen. The final list of blockbuster movies with subtitles is quite shocking, so after the end subtitles, the audience is silent, and after a long time, the applause of the audience is also fresh enough!”

Although it is impossible for the film to be loved by ordinary fans like “Dark City” because of the subject matter, a considerable number of people still give “Focus” a very good score!

“After watching “Focus” in Toronto, I watched it twice today. Every time I walked out of the cinema, I felt very touched. On the one hand, I was moved by the journalists’ pursuit of the truth and the spirit of self-restraint in front of the truth. On the other hand, I was moved by seeing that the ugliness under the protection of power will eventually expose the excitement brought by the world.”

In today’s Internet age, although professional film critics still exist and still have a certain degree of influence, various social platforms also provide channels for some professional film fans to express their opinions.

“Director Murphy Stanton did not show off any suspense or gimmicks in the film, nor did he use any scars and privacy of the victims in this scandal to attract attention. On the contrary, he had a confident, low-key and simple narrative. The technique, fierce and seamless, superb editing in one go has won respect and unique energy for this film; the clear backbone close to the documentary literature carries the entire story, and controls the balance between the performances of multiple characters, and multiple factors interact with each other. Intertwining and subtle connections lead the audience step by step, tirelessly towards the end.”

“This film has a tight rhythm and a calm and complete narrative. What is commendable is that even though Murphy Stanton advocated the simplicity and efficiency of storytelling this time, he still succeeded in putting the detailed description of each character and the emotional capture into it. In every detail and every line, it shows the highest assurance of using film language and camera hints.”

Others focused their eyes on the entire incident reflected in the film.

“Faith is not actually the worship of a **** or a doctrine, but a belief in people and the world; trusting us can overcome our own limitations, can transcend selfish desires, and can save ourselves and others. Quotes from the inner spirit of the Catholic Church in the movie The words of Richard Sepp, one of the pathologists and witnesses: The church is established by people, and it will eventually pass by with time; and my faith will always be in my heart.”

No matter in the eyes of the audience, “Focus” does not reach the height of “Dark City”, but the reputation is also very good. Such a reputation is enough for a film to be shown.

On the second weekend of this November, after three days of screenings over the weekend, “Focus” got a box office of more than 700,000 U.S. dollars from North American theaters, and the box office of the single library reached 70,000 U.S. dollars!

This kind of film performance and word-of-mouth reputation gave Twentieth Century Fox great confidence. They decided to change their strategy slightly. Starting from next weekend, they will expand the theaters of “Focus” on a large scale, and quickly reached an agreement with the North American Theater Alliance. Agreement.

Theater companies in North America are also happy to show Murphy’s films. Countless facts in the past have proved that Murphy’s films can bring them huge profits.

In addition to cooperating with Twentieth Century Fox and CAA’s public relations, Murphy has also been paying close attention to the latest data of the film, but what he did not expect is that Bill-Rossis just started the new week. A somewhat unexpected news came.