Answer: Sun Spots could not find any evidence that “Doubt” was based on an older film. It is a film adaptation of a Pulitzer Prize winning play “Doubt: A Parable,” by John Patrick Shanley. This film was also written and directed by Shanley and produced by Scott Rudin. It stars Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams and Viola Davis.

Perhaps other readers will recognize the story. According to Mirimax Films, the movie takes place in 1964 at a Catholic school in the Bronx. Father Flynn is trying to upend the schools’ strict customs, which have long been fiercely guarded by Sister Aloysius Beauvier, the principal who believes in the power of fear and discipline. The school has just accepted its first black student, Donald Miller.

Sister James, a hopeful innocent, shares with Sister Aloysius her guilt-inducing suspicion that Father Flynn is paying too much personal attention to Donald, and Sister Aloysius sets off on a personal crusade to unearth the truth and to expunge Flynn from the school. Now, without a shard of proof besides her moral certainty, Sister Aloysius locks into a battle of wills with Father Flynn that threatens to tear apart the community with irrevocable consequence.

The film was released Jan. 8 and has been nominated for numerous awards, including five Golden Globes and five Screen Actors Guild.

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