People who hate this film or its implications that Paterno was complicit to the child abuse are wrong. He clearly was part of the narrative. He maybe never witnessed the abuse himself. But he never reported what happened when he heard about such incidents. I understand that plenty of people are sympathetic to Paterno even if they aren't Penn State or football fans. The film to me seems to clearly display Paterno as a figure who probably would have stayed obsessed with winning football games even if 99% of the people who care about him and football, didn't care about football. And he didn't do anything to deserve someone like Sandusky being hired. Paterno with luck could have never had such an incident and be revered today. And plenty of people revered today might have made the same mistakes as Paterno if they had to deal with Paterno's issues. That doesn't mean that Paterno and others had no responsibility to do the right thing and report Sandusky as soon as possible. It's remarkable how quickly Paterno's fall happens after his 409th win. I forgot that he went from the winningest couch that almost everyone loved, to fired in less than week. I give this a 7 because the story wasn't that interesting, even though there seemed to be good execution. I think what bothers people is that the real enemy of this film isn't so much Joe Paterno or Jerry Sandusky. Instead the main enemy is America's priority of putting football and other interests over our more basic human responsibility of protecting children and bringing likely sex abuse criminals to justice as quickly as possible. After Paterno is fired and he addressed his supporters in front of his yard, be almost forgets about the victims in his address. He just throws in a call to support the victims at the very end. The victims should have been brought up initially or not at all. The error in this response really displayed his faulty priorities again. The reactions of many of many reviewers is similar to the students protesting in the film following Peterno being fired. This story really highlights our power of denying the errors of people we grow to respect. OJ and Mafia defenders have similar blind spots. People say "Sure they made a mistake on this matter, but they weren't bad about everything. Who hasn't made a mistake?" As if the scope of the crime doesn't matter.It's remarkably easy for some people to shield acknowledging that someone like Joe Paterno, who might be mostly good 99% of the time, can be complicit to a seriously crime the other 1% of the time. And that 1% was a 1% mattered a lot. Another common response is, "Paterno wants to be known as a legendary football coach. Not a football coach who also had to deal with child sex abuse by one of his couches." Well the media rather than the university addressing this issue from the start let Sandusky fester and abuse dozens more of decades. I can't help but wonder how it ever felt ok for people to know someone was molesting children and not report them. If someone witnesses a murder, A) I don't think the witness would report the incident to their boss or couch. But B) if they did, they'd be sure law enforcement was in the loop too. Especially if the witness notices that the murderer walking around where he committed his crime years later. Child molesters are extremely likely to repeat their crimes. Much more so than almost any other type of criminal. This is something people should know and care about. It seems that a lot of people are unprepared to deal with such an incident and think it'd never happen to them or someone they know. This film gets a 7 largely for bringing this issue more-so into the spotlight. Based on the perceptions of other reviewers I get the feeling that people don't want other films based on true stories like Paterno, or Spotlight. They don't want to think about the faults of people who seemed mostly fine. My response: Put an end to such incidents happening, and more importantly festering, and there will be no extraordinarily awful true story to make a movie about down the line about our supposed heroes. Instead we can just have real heroes. The fact that, for now, such things still happen, only reinforces the need to make movies like Paterno. Until we go decades with nothing like this happening, I'll find it relevant to be aware of stories like Paterno. In the last year or two we learned of a similar case of child abuse with the US gymnastics team. Maybe someday we'll learn.

I'm not a Penn State football fan nor have I ever been. I never even bought a ticket in the four years I went to school here and found the sports culture annoying. I still do. The fans can be really obnoxious and Penn State can be a really horrible corporation at times. Do not dismiss me as an apologist or a crazy fan. I am not. The fact that Sandusky lived in a house with a back porch overlooking my childrens' school playground still makes my skin crawl. I know a lot of people who knew Sandusky and Paterno. I know boys who went on trips with Sandusky and highly-educated parents who sent their kids with him on multiple trips. Ask yourself, if "everyone knew" or if Paterno, who everyone here knew to have a high level of integrity, knew anything, why would any parent in their right mind send their child with Sandusky? This film hints at things that simply weren't true. Everyone wants to find a scapegoat. So go ahead. Think the worst of people without any facts to back it up.

Maybe a few facts presented, but this film was not at all enjoyable.Agonizingly slow. Overall theme was dark, and Coach Paterno himself is presented at times, as a bumbling clueless idiot. No background on his achievements was preswnted, and football is just a very small part of this story. Sandusky himself is rarely ever seen, and we do not get an accurate representation of his motivations. I thought this movie would be interesting, but it is bleak and no fun. My time was wasted

Two roles really will defy Al Pacino: Scarface and Paterno. Polar opposite, vaste age gap, yet perfect timing for both. In this one, I cannot express how good both him and director Barry Levinson come together and create a sensation that is like nothing short of diving into the slippery mind of an old man, passionate about football so much so that he is willing to sacrifice even his own principles for it, nevertherless entitled and arrogant till the end. At times, with the help of a great editing, and the fresh acting of Riley Keought, you almost want to feel a hint of pity for Paterno, but then the amazing acting of Pacino brings you back to reality with perfect placed "bullets" in the screenplay that remind you he knew all along and he just "justified it for the greater good: Penn State and his name".