Who could have guessed the year’s hottest movie ticket would be a papal election drama?
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| Ralph Fiennes |
For those not Catholic or not religious a papal conclave is a secretive gathering of cardinals in the Roman Catholic Church to elect a new pope.
What it is:
The cardinals are locked in seclusion in the Sistine Chapel of the Vatican until a new pope is chosen. The term "conclave" comes from the Latin cum clave, which means "with a key". The cardinals cast ballots in a rectangular form, writing the name of their choice in a way that doesn't identify them. The ballots are then burned, and the smoke rising from the fire indicates when a new pope has been chosen.
The movie: After the Pope unexpectedly dies of cardiac failure, it falls to Cardinal-Dean Thomas Lawrence (Fiennes) to run a papal conclave in which the College of Cardinals meets in secret to select a new pontiff. And much like an American presidential election, the Cardinals have an array of completely imperfect options to choose from: There is Nigerian Cardinal Joshua Adeyemi who, much like Dennis Duffy in 30 Rock, is a “social conservative, fiscal liberal.” Joseph Tremblay (John Lithgow) is another conservative alternative, but rumors fly that his final meeting with the late Pope was heated. Traditionalist Cardinal Goffredo Tedesco wants to force everyone to do the liturgy in Latin and, more troublingly, is flagrantly racist and Islamophobe.
I will not give away the twist of an ending. Not since "The Crying Game" (1992) has there been such a twist.
The ending line: "I am the man that God intended me to be". We can relate.
However, how you get to this point in the movie is about all the big ornate details and flourishes of drama. From the wax seal on the sash sealing the dead Pope’s door to the canisters of smoke opened at the end of a hard day of voting you will enjoy the story and ending.
I saw this film the day it came out. Loved the intrigue. Yet, I can see where many Catholic loyalists would take issue with this film, as they don't want to believe that all large and old institutions would have factions jockeying for power.
ReplyDeleteLook at American politics today. Who'd have thought that the GOP would surrender its principles to put Trump in power? Even worse, he is the leader of a cult, and the political hacks don't understand the power of a cult leader.
With that being said, the machinations in Conclave seem realistic. And I'll bet that similar things happened during the selection of the last 3-4 Popes. If only those walls could talk!