Conclave (The Movie)

Almost eight years ago (January 29, 2017), I posted a review of Conclave, a book by British novelist Robert Harris, noted for his fictionalized accounts of power and its corruptions. That novel is now a movie. Thanks largely to its impressive cast and beautiful filming, Conclave (the movie) is getting lots of well deserved attention and pre-Oscar speculation. The cast includes Ralph Fiennes as Cardinal Lawrence, Dean of the Sacred College and thus the one tasked to manage the Conclave, through whom we experience most of the tension in the film, Stanley Tucci as Cardinal Bellini, Lawrence's friend and leader of the "progressive" faction, Sergio Castellito as Cardinal Tedesco, the leader of the "conservative" faction, Lucian Msamati as Cardinal Adeyemi, the African papabile (until he isn't anymore), John LIthgow as Cardinal Tremblay, another particularly ambitious and problematic contender, Carlos Diehz as Cardinal Benitez, the mystery cardinal, and Isabella Rossellini as Sister Agnes, who is in charge of the domestic arrangements for the Conclave.

To reprise some of what I said about the book that applies also to the film, the conflicts and divisions among the cardinals are what we might expect. They present a plausible portrayal of current conflicts and divisions in the contemporary Church, filtered here through the personal ambitions and rivalries of different cardinals participating in the conclave. The unexpected arrival of a hitherto unknown cardinal (named by the deceased pope in pectore) predictably at first gives the novel a kind of vaguely Shoes of the Fisherman feel, which creates a certain expectation of how it will end, an expectation that persists, despite all the twists and turns and personal ups and downs of the plot  And, as different papabili rise and fall in the balloting and are eventually eliminated by a cleverly constructed series of personal scandals and various political machinations that punctuate the otherwise routine sequence of (beautifully portrayed) ritual ballots, the film does indeed seem to set us up for a predictable outcome. Then comes a shocking and radically challenging finale which no one, no matter how attentive to contemporary ecclesiastical conflicts, would likely have expected (and which I will not reveal lest I spoil the film for anyone).

Having read the book, I knew the surprise ending already, but from the multiple gasps of surprise I heard in the crowded theater I must assume that most of those in the theater with me last week had not read the book beforehand! In any case, so unexpected is the ending (even more so in the movie than in the book, which at least contained mild hints) that I almost think of it as two separate stories. The first is a well-crafted, entertaining, and at times insightful, if conventionally ideological and propagandistic account of the conflicts and divisions in the Church and hence the explosive mix of spirituality, religion, ideology, and personal and national ambitions, with might be expected to characterize a contemporary conclave. The second suggests a scenario so implausible and so spiritually and religiously problematic that it completely overshadows and detracts from the more relevantly realistic first story, submerging it in an outrageous moral ambiguity that far exceeds the moral ambiguities that characterized the first story. 

That said, the movie is beautifully filmed and exceptionally well acted, well worth seeing, whatever one thinks of its finale.