Doubt

In a Bronx parish school in 1964, the strict principal Sister Aloysius Beauvier clashes with Father Brendan Flynn, a popular young priest whose progressive manner and warmth she distrusts. She believes the school's traditions are under threat, and she takes particular interest in the attention Flynn shows to Donald Miller, the school's first Black student. When the inexperienced Sister James reports an incident involving the priest and the boy, Aloysius decides her suspicions are confirmed and begins a campaign to remove Flynn from the school. Lacking proof, she pursues the matter largely on the strength of her own conviction, while Flynn tries to defend himself, leaving the community divided and the truth unresolved.

John Patrick Shanley wrote and directed the film, adapting his own Pulitzer Prize-winning play. It was his second feature as director, arriving eighteen years after Joe Versus the Volcano and followed much later by Wild Mountain Thyme. Meryl Streep plays Aloysius opposite Philip Seymour Hoffman as Flynn, with Amy Adams as Sister James and Viola Davis as the boy's mother, Mrs. Miller, among a credited cast of forty-three.

The film was made for about twenty million dollars and took roughly fifty-one million worldwide, a modest return for a period drama built around its performances. On IMDb it holds 7.5 from around 146,000 votes, while on TMDB it stands at 7.2 from about 1,985 votes. A critics' rating of 7.4 from 220 reviews places it close to the audience scores, suggesting broad agreement rather than sharp division over the film's merits.