Bernardo Barranco V.: Conclave, the film

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more than a Thriller suspense, the movie Conclave , It shows the drama of power within the highest levels of the Catholic Church. The death of a Pope is not anything. Shock more than one billion Catholics in the world. Conclave means locally, it is an institution through which cardinals around the world meet in an environment of total isolation and secret to choose the new Pope.

Conclave It is a film directed by the German Edward Berger and written by Peter Straughan, based on the homonymous novel by Robert Harris, published in 2016. I must tell him that I have passed through seven pontiffs and I have followed closely the last four conclaves. The stories, intrigues and applicants I know them well. Therefore, Berger’s film represents an intelligent metaphor staging, a suspense that goes in crescendo to the extent that cardinals pointers take positions.

The work reflects the assembly of the conclave effectively as a political, legal act and a sacred moment. In the plot, after the Pope dies of a heart attack, Cardinal Dean Thomas Lawrence, starring Ralph Fiennes, who lives at that time a crisis of faith, organizes the conclave to choose the successor. Convene all cardinals around the world. The four main candidates are Aldo Bellini (Stanley Tucci), Secretary of State and former archbishop of Milan, considered an intellectual and ideological successor of the late Pope; Joshua Adeyemi (Lucian Msamati), from Nigeria, a social conservative; Joseph Tremblay (John Lithgow) Canadian, pragmatic and ambitious conservative; Goffredo Tedesco (Sergio Castellitto), from Italy, a reactionary traditionalist, because he wants to return to the Mass in Latin, fight against the harassment of Islam, host the anti LGTB+ and Antimujeres fight. Finally, a mysterious figure arises that occurs when the conclave began, it is a cardinal in pertore, that is, appointed by the Pope in secret to safeguard the work of Mexican purple Vicente Benítez (Carlos Diehz), Archbishop of Kabul. Given the danger that his life runs, the Pope names him under reserve.

The film premiered in the United States in October 2024. He received praise comments from critics, both for performances, direction, script and cinematography. He raised more than $ 100 million at a cost of 20 million. It has eight nominations, including best film, for Oscar 2025.

The film shows us that, after the death of the progressive Pope, each cardinal is not there by chance. Purpurados candidates are not white pigeons. The film says: We will never find a candidate whose history is completely impeccable. The candidates are cunning and sagacious, they have different weapons. For me, the work is an analogy of power in the church. Conclave It shows that each candidate has ambitions and determination. Each keeps a dark side that aims to mask. Cardinal Bellini, the progressive, wants to prevent the conservative Tedesco from becoming Pope, but the Secretary of State is left over. Canadian cardinal, Joseph Tremblay, buys votes and plays dirty. His simony unmasked, exhibited by the Dean, falling out of favor. Joshua Adeyemi, from Nigeria, lacks mandatory celibacy. There they show him that he had relations with a religious who had an unrecognized child. The Dean or Camarlengo, Thomas Lawrence, despite his crisis of faith, doubts the temptation to be elected pontiff. The deceased Pope himself still believed in God, but doubted the holiness of the Catholic Church.

The school chooses Nuevo Pope to Vincent Benítez, the Mexican missionary, who had been secretly appointed by the Pope. The Dean Lawrence discovers that Benítez’s canceled medical visit was for a laparoscopic hysterectomy. The Mexican chooses the name of Innocent, acknowledges having female and male organs, resigned from surgery because God gave him that Constitution.

Berger makes a remarkable effort to introduce us to the Vatican Palace. Some details escape. For example, the hotel of Santa Martha, Domus Sanctae Marthae, is a few steps from the Sistine Chapel. There lives Francisco, however, the film shows small buses that in which the cardinals or that beautiful image of the white umbrella move.

Another success of Berger is that he does not catch himself in the rules and norms that govern the assembly. The rules are contained in a thick document called Apostolic Constitution Universi Dominici Gregis, written by John Paul II in 1996 with slight adjustments of Benedict XVI. The text has many prohibitions, such as group speaking or proselytizing for or against any candidate. Therefore in the 80s, then Cardinal Emeritus of Vienna, Franz König, said that the conclaves are boring and tedious events. Contrast with the film’s approach in which the political approach and its intrigues predominates. Contrast when Bellini claims Lawrence: This is not a conclave, it is war.

Finally the issue of women. In Rome the nuns walk looking at the floor. Sister Agnes (Isabella Rossellini), responsible for the food of the Assembly, reproaches that women are invisible in the Church, but God has given them eyes and ears. They know everything, but they have no voice. The film ends with an image of hope, with two careless sisters that cross the Vatican courtyards such as seeing another future for the Church.