Don't miss it.

| Original Score: A | Sep 12, 2017

The moral grey area of the title perhaps worked better in the stage play; exposed on screen it's not "doubt" being expressed, it's the sound of Streep's headmistressy voice demanding, "That Oscar - on my desk, NOW."

| Original Score: 2/5 | Feb 10, 2009

Doubt looks like some sort of upscale horror film, complete with crows and swirling leaves like The Omen. It's actually a terminally muddled piece of star-studded Oscar-bait.

| Original Score: 1/5 | Feb 6, 2009

There are times when Doubt feels like a sermon. Shanley highlights key themes as if the audience was a particularly dim-witted congregation. His direction, too, when it's not dolloping on the symbolism, can be stilted.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 6, 2009

What possessed the once credible Meryl Streep to take on the caricatured role of crusading Sister Aloysius? And why is her performance so uniformly unconvincing?

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Feb 6, 2009

The drama is tense and claustrophobic, and the acting exceptional, although the hollow finale leaves you doubting it's about anything much at all.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 6, 2009

The film fails to convince dramatically, not because of the performances -- the cast are all excellent -- but because the air has been sucked out of the characters.

| Original Score: 2.25/5 | Feb 5, 2009

A mighty actor, a smart play, a clunky adaptation.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 5, 2009

Empathy is one of the dramatist's slyest weapons and Shanley uses it wisely.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 5, 2009

There is just one key element that grates, and that is Meryl Streep's monstrously over-the-top central performance.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 5, 2009

The dialogue is vitamin-rich. "Where's your compassion, Sister?" appeals Hoffman. "Nowhere you can reach it," ripostes Streep. The actress shows so much culinary art in her line-readings that an Oscar nomination seems less appropriate than a Michelin star

| Feb 5, 2009

It does not make the most of what ought to be rather frightening and ultimately moving material.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 5, 2009

It's more heavily staged than a fourth judge walk-out in the second week of a Simon Cowell talent show.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 5, 2009

It's a film that allows you to do your own thinking while enjoying some of the most inspired acting to be found in movies today.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jan 15, 2009

John Patrick Shanley's Doubt left me less moved than querulously dissatisfied despite the impressive performances of Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, and Viola Davis in all the key roles.

Full Review | Dec 31, 2008

A collection of acting styles from the broad to the contained and the exacting to the unrestrained create an unevenness of tone and interpretation.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Dec 25, 2008

John Patrick Shanley the writer should never again hire John Patrick Shanley the director.

| Original Score: C | Dec 24, 2008

[The play is] a shallow work easily interpreted, and Shanley's own film version is no different in the low bar it aims for and ultimately attains.

| Dec 21, 2008

Doubt asks hard questions, and we dutifully squirm in reply.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Dec 19, 2008

While the Streep-Hoffman death match is the film's dramatic high point, its success lies in its defiant refusal to trot out even a slightly satisfying answer to the question: Did he or didn't he?

| Original Score: 3/4 | Dec 19, 2008