This is a superbly played film. I think that the Academy Award nominations are fully deserved, especially by Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman.
It's a bit strange to see Meryl in this serious role after seeing her last year in Mamma Mia -- I'm more convinced than ever that she can play anything.
As for Philip -- I don't like his roles generally, but I must admit he's a very good actor.
Now for the film itself -- well, all this set-in-stone moral certainty is a bit scary in the sense that it can go to extremes and adversely affect people's lives. It hasn't been definitively proven that Father Flynn (Hoffman's character) was guilty of anything. And as it turns out, even the most certain people have doubts and there's some truth in that doubts brings us together, as Father Flynn says in one of his sermons. But so do joys and misfortunes.
What I like about this film is that in a comparatively short time (less than 2 hours), a truly complex story unfolds -- we see the strict discipline of a church school in the late 60s in Bronx, we see the complications arising from the first black student there; we see the family problems this boy has, we see the inner squables, the tensions between the priesthood and the nunnery, etc. It's quite a multi-layered snapshot.
Worth seeing.
Not for cheering oneself up, though.
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