The Pope is dead, and the Catholic College of Cardinals — all deeply pious men with nothing but God in their hearts, of course — start maneuvering to take his place before the Holy Father’s body has even been wheeled out of sight. For all of their eminence, the cardinals are no more immune to cattiness and ambition than anyone else.
In real life, such human foibles are likely veiled behind the solemnity of religious tradition and the sacred import of what’s at stake. In “Conclave,” however, which “All Quiet on the Western Front” director Edward Berger has adapted from the Robert Harris novel of the same name, the cardinals are played by a heavenly gaggle of character actors who’ve spent their careers praying for the chance to stand under the Sistine Chapel and shout “how dare you!” at the top of their lungs.
Needless to say, this isn’t a Wiseman-esque look at the inner workings of a historic institution, but rather a movie in which Stanley Tucci wears a mitre. As the cardinals get closer to electing a new pope, and in the process solving the mysteries left behind by the last one, it becomes increasingly obvious that Jesus Christ was much less of an influence on this story than Agatha Christie (turning water into wine has nothing on the hilariously ridiculous twist that Harris’ plot deploy in its final moments).
A very silly but wonderfully staged papal thriller that’s only made credible by the immaculate talents of Berger’s cast and crew (please ignore the movie’s absurd insinuation into above-the-line Oscar races, overdue as Fiennes might be), “Conclave” is far too entertaining to dismiss in a puff of white smoke, even if the film might be a bit too convinced of its own dramatic import. Of course, few actors are better than Ralph Fiennes at elevating silliness to the level of high art (see: “The Grand Budapest Hotel” and “A Bigger Splash”), and his performance as Cardinal Lawrence — the dean of the College of Cardinals, and the man entrusted by the Holy Father to manage the conclave in which they’ll elect a new one — keeps this soap opera from turning into suds.
The simple truth about Cardinal Lawrence is that he doesn’t want to be there. Unbeknownst to all but his closest ally in the Vatican, the progressive Cardinal Bellini (Tucci), Lawrence has been suffering from a crisis of faith — not in God, but in the manmade institution created to uphold His spirit. In fact, Lawrence secretly offered his resignation to the Holy Father before his death, only for the Holy Father to refuse it (perhaps because he knew his time was short, and that a reliable man would be needed to preside over the hell to come). While the rest of the cardinals are stroking their mustaches and rehearsing their pope waves, Lawrence is basically just sitting in the corner and sighing loud enough for all of Rome to hear.
If Lawrence is questioning his role in the church, and by extension the church’s role in the world, he’s unwaveringly certain in his belief that Bellini should be the next pope. In part, that’s because “Conclave” is an agreeably liberal fantasy masquerading as a spiritual fable about the beneficence of doubt, and in part that’s because all of the other candidates for pope are broadly cartoonish assholes.
There’s the imperious Cardinal Tremblay (a smug and quivering John Lithgow), who was the last person to see the Holy Father before his death, and seems to be hiding a gospel’s worth of alternate truths under his robes. There’s the proudly homophobic Cardinal Adeyemi (Lucian Msamati), who stands a good chance to become the first Black pope. There’s the larger than life Cardinal Tedesco (Italian actor Sergio Castellitto, stealing every scene he’s in), whose charismatic bellicosity makes him an easy stand-in for the world’s recent wave of neo-fascist strongmen. And finally there’s Cardinal Benitez (newcomer Carlos Diehz), a soft-spoken Latino who no one’s ever seen before, and claims to represent the ministry of Kabul.
The actual election process unfolds like a less suspenseful and historically significant version of the annual New York Critics Circle vote (choosing who to anoint as God’s emissary on Earth has nothing on choosing which acting category to nominate Lily Gladstone), but the galling predictability of the final outcome is mitigated by the fun of getting there. Berger delights in the drama of assembling a conclave, and the scenes of the cardinals preparing to be sequestered are dished out with the devious zeal of a great whodunnit. The cardinals are so cut off from the outside world that Lawrence won’t even tell them that Rome might be under attack, and we’re cloistered there along with them, as the audience never knows more than Lawrence does.
Much of the movie is confined to the red and gray marble corridors where the cardinals sleep at night, the nuclear bunker-like design of which helps deepen the impression that the fate of the outside world is at stake. The rest takes place in less oppressive spaces, where the various rounds of voting are interrupted by bombshell accusations worthy of US Weekly. Pushing against the unavoidable talkiness of Peter Straughan’s (piously faithful) script, Berger keeps the blood pumping with a forcefully gliding camera, a handful of static compositions so painterly they could be hung on the walls of the Vatican, and a Volker Bertelmann violin score so loud and oppressive that it sounds like it’s lobbying for a vote. When that doesn’t work, Isabella Rossellini is on hand to appear as the glowering Sister Agnes, who puts the fear of God back in any cardinals who might be worshiping at the altars of their own ambition.
No matter how didactic the movie’s writing might be (read: very), “Conclave” is never dull. And while the tension between idealism and realpolitik might be thin and superficial, the pettiness of it all is as much of a feature as a bug in a story about a group of old and/or aging holy men whose little red skullcaps can’t disguise the fact that they’re still bullying each other in the cafeteria.
For a film that doesn’t get much deeper than “power should only be entrusted to those who don’t covet it for themselves,” “Conclave” finds something kind of sweet and adorable in the idea that its wizened characters still don’t know themselves completely. Our elections would suggest that conviction is a virtue unto itself, but “Conclave” proposes in no uncertain terms that “certainty is the great enemy of unity, and the deadly enemy of tolerance.” Open your heart to doubt, and faith will come rushing in to fill the void. It’s all a bit too simple, and the whole thing is capped off with a coup de grâce that’s good for a laugh, but Fiennes and Tucci are so good at threading the needle between biblical sanctimony and Christmas ham that it’s a treat to watch, even if it fails to reward whatever faith you place in it.
Grade: B-
“Conclave” premiered at the 2024 Telluride Film Festival. Focus Features will release it in theaters on Friday, November 1.
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