The Sun’s Editor-In-Chief Tony Gallagher hosted a packed staff  screening of the movie ‘Spotlight’ at Cineworld at the O2 on Wednesday night.

The film, which is hotly tipped for Oscar glory, was followed by a fascinating Q&A with the director Tom McCarthy, Co-Writer Josh Singer and Boston Globe journalists Sacha Pfeiffer and Mike Rezendes, who are played by Rachel McAdams and Mark Ruffalo in the film.

Spotlight tells the story of how, in 2002, the Boston Globe’s special investigations unit ‘Spotlight’ uncovered widespread sexual abuse of children in the Roman Catholic Church. The investigation led to the conviction of hundreds of priests and earned the team journalism’s highest honest – a Pulitzer Prize.

Rezendes told the crowd that, in a city so closely tied to the church, the Spotlight team thought there would be a backlash from readers.

We thought when our story came out there would be picketers outside the Globe, to our surprise none of that happened. Our story was bulletproof because it showed there was a cover-up of 30 years of abuse. We thought that reaction showed we had really done our jobs properly.

Fellow Spotlight journalist Pfeiffer said during the 18 month investigation it was extremely difficult to hear the stories of the victims.

It was very heavy duty.  It involved speaking to a lot of grown men who would be crying on the telephone. We felt we were acting as grief counsellors when we were never trained to be.

Singer said he never thought he’d be involved in a movie about journalists, but that he’s extremely inspired by the profession.

I really relished the opportunity to show great journalism at work. There are very few people who can hold the powerful accountable and that is what journalists do.

Pfeiffer said her team were extremely lucky to have had support from Boston Globe Editor Marty Baron, (played by Liev Schreiber in the film), and the Head of the Spotlight team Walter ‘Robbie’ Robinson, (played by Michael Keaton), who gave them the time and resources to carry out such important work.

It’s important for journalists to be able to do this sort of work. The Boston Globe is committed to doing that, in fact the Spotlight team is actually a couple of people bigger now than it was in 2001. The Boston Globe will still invest in the stories they think are important.

In a final piece of advice to the journalists in the audience. Rezendes said:

Question authority, go deep and never give up until you think you have gotten to the bottom of the truth.

Spotlight is released in cinemas across the UK in January.