Split Decision: “Conclave”
Thursday, February 20, 2025 at 12:30PM In the Split Decision series, two of our writers face off on an Oscar-nominated movie one loves and the other doesn't. Today, for the last convo of the season, Abe Friedtanzer and Cláudio Alves tackle Conclave...
CLÁUDIO: As the Academy congregates to elect a new Best Picture winner, here, at The Film Experience, we continue our Split Decision convos. However, this debate won't finish with the white smoke of agreement - we never seem to come to such conclusions around these parts. And yet, we persevere in arguing because it's fun. Oh, how I wish Conclave were as fun to watch as it is to reflect upon and talk about. I've fallen in love with the movie those Yaoi girlies saw and keep promoting online, but that's not the movie I watched at TIFF. Edward Berger's too self-serious for such levity, even if this adaptation would have significantly benefited from a surrender to its gossipy pleasures. Give us RuPaul's Drag Race: Vatican with a matching Untucked, not this mirthless drudgery that only elicits laughs because it treats its characters as fodder for shock rather than people. I guess that's enough for an introduction. So let me do like Cardinal Lawrence and wrap up this homily. Or should I emulate Bellini and declare war? Whatever the case, let's go, Abe. Come defend your Catholic fave.
ABE: We're off to a good start with this bevy of puns and references, which should make for a great conversation…
I'm also amused by the notion of me defending my "Catholic fave" when, as a viewer, I'm quite unfamiliar with Christianity as a religion and tend to have much more potent criticisms of Jewish content in film (you can see some of that in my participation in the installment on The Brutalist as part of this series). I saw 40 films in person at TIFF and this was one of the more notable entries I knew about beforehand, but I didn't have any particular expectations. I also saw All Quiet on the Western Front at TIFF a few years ago and was impressed but unhappy that Netflix was distributing it since I felt it needed to be seen on the big screen. My impression of Edward Berger was positive and I also appreciate seeing Ralph Fiennes in a lead role.
The experience of watching this film in a crowded theater is one that I feel is vital to the experience since there are such loud reactions, and it also cues you in on when you're supposed to laugh at things that you might otherwise not have thought should be funny. This is a serious drama about who the figurehead is going to be for one of the world's largest religious sects, but the humor comes from the fact that they're all behaving like petty teenagers. I loved how Volker Bertelmann's score elevated the high drama and added some suspense and urgency to it all, but what really stuck with me were the three or four BIG swings that film took that I think it managed to land in each case.
I imagine that your issues with the film are more sweeping, but let's dig into those big swings and if any one of them in particular lost you.
CLÁUDIO: We watched this film for the first time at the same screening, and I had the opposite experience. I felt the audience's raucous reaction highlighted some of the picture's worst impulses, further illuminating the discrepancy between a pulpy airport read and Berger's portentous style. You say we're meant to laugh, but I see very little in the staging suggesting that tone. What absurdities arise seem accidental, often destabilizing, and even a bit ugly. That was what marked me most at TIFF.
For example, I think the Benitez twist is one of the big swings you're referring to. That's in Harris's book, which I read as prep for Toronto, so the shock wasn't there for me. The same can't be said about the apparent joke our audience saw. Look, I'm willing to appreciate humor in a serious package and even acknowledge the points in Conclave that (maybe?) play up those qualities - Sergio Castellito's performance and the plot's gossipy nature - but this scene wasn't one of them. The impression I got was of failed seriousness and writing so clunky it turned an appeal for tolerance, doubt, living in between certainties, into a cheap rug pull.
What do you make of that scene?
ABE: So, I do understand that sensation of an audience enjoying a film too much tainting the experience if it seems like you're the only one not enjoying it. My TIFF example would be The Banshees of Inisherin a few years ago, which my audience loved and I just didn't find particularly funny. What I liked about this film, on the other hand, is that I didn't know whether it was supposed to be a comedy or a drama, and I'm still not entirely sure. I appreciated the chance to laugh but also liked the high drama, like that terrorist attack that happens midway through which is never fully explained or resolved but brings home the seriousness and global implications of what they're doing. Bridging multiple genres is something many films do these days, but I liked not knowing what kind of film I was watching from start to finish.
I didn't read the Benitez twist - and the audience reaction - as a big joke, but instead a humorous highlighting of the fact that Lawrence has spent the entire film trying to shy away from even the slightest controversy and now ends up with - spoiler alert for anyone who for some reason is reading this without having seen the film - a pope who some wouldn't consider biologically male. I loved the message that he imparted (I've actually grouped him in with Benjamin Clementine's Ife from Blitz as the two 2024 film figures who could save the world if they were allowed to dictate how everyone behaved), and I especially loved it after all the petty squabbling and conniving that took up most of the film. The illicit actions undertaken by Tremblay and Adeyemi felt more standard and less button-pushing (but still compelling), so I really liked that this film (and apparently the book) saved its best and most surprising pivot for last.
What also stuck me with me and positively affected the experience was having scenes other films that felt somewhat reminiscent of this storyline and still finding this to be incredibly fresh. The Two Popes is one example, even if the focus of the film, based on actual events and real people, is broader. Nanni Moretti's 2011 film We Have a Pope is one I enjoyed greatly that does have a similar if even more comedic focus. I imagine that you've seen this one, and I'm curious how that colored your experience of watching this one.
CLÁUDIO: I will say I enjoyed Conclave more than The Two Popes and We Have a Pope. The former is a dispiriting example of trophy-hungry cinema that tackles real-life issues and figures in a way that feels more interested in prestige than in saying anything worthwhile about its chosen milieu. The latter is another example of post-1990s comedic Moretti that I can't quite gel with, no matter how much I try. The director's formal disinterest in how film functions as an audiovisual art seems to have peaked around the time he made We Have a Pope, and the psychological storytelling feels more like a crutch than ever. That being said, both films are saved by strong leads. I'd heartily applaud the efforts of Anthony Hopkins and Michel Piccoli. Then again, I can say the same about Conclave. I might have a lot of issues with the flick, but Ralph Fiennes ain't one of them. Indeed, the whole cast is excellent, if sometimes perfunctorily unsurprising - Lithgow, I'm looking at you.
Do I have something against papal cinema? I should watch The Shoes of the Fisherman to make sure. I know I recently loved Mario Bellocchio's Rapito, though that's more focused on skewering the systemic anti-semitism baked into Catholic power structures and Italian history than celebrating the papacy. I'm not asking Conclave to do that, but maybe it'd be better if it embraced the pulp and left the costume of realpolitik behind. And the pretense of profundity, too. Peter Straughan might talk about Mean Girls all he wants, but the Conclave screenplay wants to be taken seriously and talk about OUR TIMES, maybe even lecture the audience while at it. Perchance the filmmakers want to have their cake and eat it, but that's not how it works. I gather another director could make the contradictions combine in polysemic congruity, but Edward Berger is not that man.
Recently, I showed the movie to my parents, who I expected would love it. Surprisingly, their reaction was more of a meh. Mostly, they felt very little happened and that the characters were boring. Hell, they thought the whole thing was boring. While hearing their take, I couldn't help but wonder if they'd like it more if Conclave was a TV miniseries, more invested in developing its players and their pre-narrative relationships, less preoccupied with sending messages, ostensibly snarkier, sudsier, stupider. The present structure certainly lends itself to episodic divisions. First part introduces us to the world, and three subsequent chapters each culminating in the defeat of a candidate - Adeyemi, Tremblay, Tedesco. Do you think you would have liked a Conclave for the small screen?
ABE: Potentially, but I think it works perfectly as is. I actually misread your question at first and thought you were asking if I would have liked Conclave as much if I had watched it on the small screen. But I do sort of like that we're left with many unknowns and not everything is so spelled out. I'd like to know more about some of the characters but, as with many compelling cinematic experiences, going into much more detail isn't ideal (see that Parasite HBO series that probably isn't happening anymore).
At a solid two hours, Conclave is already relatively long for a festival film, but I found it entirely worthwhile. From the conversations we've had and the fact that we both attend festivals and see radically different films, I know that our tastes aren't the same and my affinity for these pope-related movies is naturally going to be stronger. I don't feel as if I've learned that much about Catholicism but rather that I've confirmed that there's a universality to religious leadership and the fact that, representative of the divine as they may claim to be, they're ultimately just human and not above base impulses.
My parents, for the record, did enjoy Conclave and they watched it on Peacock (we didn't watch together). As we head into the final stages of Oscar season, it looks like this film may just win Best Picture. Without getting too much into precursor talk, I still think that Anora is likeliest, with this film occupying a #2 position, followed closely by The Brutalist, which could still have a comeback even though it would seem unlikely given its near-absence at SAG. The frontrunner status of Conclave in the ensemble category there should only help it, and as you said earlier, even you might be happy with an ensemble prize for this cast.
My final question to you would be: given your disappointment with this film, how would you feel it it did win Best Picture, regardless of what it beats?
CLÁUDIO: Does Conclave work, for me, as a comedy of human smallness in the face of the grandiose and the divine? Not really. Berger's direction detracts from that and the pontification of the script is too message-oriented to allow space for such levity. Does Conclave work as a message movie, then? Only if one yearns for a shallow understanding of said message, often sabotaged by textual clumsiness and too many over-simplifications of thorny subjects. For example, the way the film grows soft on Adeyemi after the characters compare him to the always antagonistic Tedesco is a cheap trick that makes its depiction of the latter man register as hypocritical or, at the very least, undercut. Does it work as a pulpy thriller in Catholic costume? At times. But its stakes often feel too low, its emotions too lost in limited characterizations, its melodramatic appeal too tempered by prestige-feigning affectations. Does Conclave work as a feat of formal showmanship for solid middlebrow filmmaking? Honestly, yes. Kinda. That and the ensemble's work are what most appealed to me about the flick at TIFF - as I described in my review for ICS - even if it admittedly looked a tad too color-graded towards blue during my small screen re-watch.
But that's not what you asked me. Let me answer that Oscar-y inquiry by saying I'd be relieved it's not Emilia Pérez or A Complete Unknown. I may even prefer it to Anora because it'd sever a bit of that connection between Cannes and the Academy that's doing the former no favors. Also, it'd bring much joy to the online yaoi girlies and I'd love to see them get a win. It would be an inoffensive, mediocre but far from egregious victor. So, I suppose my final answer is: Meh, sure, it could be worse. It could be much worse.
Previous Split Decisions
- A COMPLETE UNKNOWN with Eric Blume and Ben Miller
- EMILIA PÉREZ with Lynn Lee, Nick Taylor, and Juan Carlos Ojano
- NOSFERATU, with Cláudio Alves & Nick Taylor
- A REAL PAIN, with Eric Blume & Cláudio Alves
- ANORA, with Abe Friedtanzer & Juan Carlos Ojano
- DUNE: PART TWO with Cláudio Alves & Lynn Lee
- THE BRUTALIST with Nick Taylor & Abe Friedtanzer
- NICKEL BOYS with Nick Taylor & Nathaniel Rogers
Reader Comments (7)
The criticisms I’ve heard of Conclave make me think: This is why we can’t have nice things.
It’s a fantastic piece of mid-budget grown-up entertainment, the kind of story that usually gets made on TV these days. The run time flies by, the performances are excellent, the visuals are immaculately composed, it contains exciting twists and turns, constantly propelling the story whether you find them predictable or not. The fact that this movie recouped its budget 5x is one of the most welcome film stories of the year, let’s hope the industry takes note.
If all that plus Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci, John Lithgow and Isabella Rosselini (all in fine form) can’t win you over, good luck babe.
DK -- Well, I did love dozens upon dozens of 2024 films. Just not CONCLAVE. So I guess I was lucky, thank you.
One of my faves of the year,yes it's elevated beyond it's long haul flight readability but I had a great time with it and the twist is one I never saw coming.
Best thing about it is a top form Fiennes and the worst not giving Isabella much to do but have a door fetish and raise her voice once and photocopy a piece of paper.
Hope it beats Anora but it's a very safe choice and won't go down well as a major Best Picture though none of this years crop would bar The Substance which will be talked about in horror circles for years as will Demi's performance,Anora and The Brutalist are just films of the moment.
I quite liked Conclave, and put it in the category of "perfectly respectable."
And what I appreciate most is the audible audience reaction to the twist. Seeing this in a cinema was amazing - must be (a little bit) what it was like to see Crying Game with an audience in 1992.
The whole movie is '90s-coded, really, and I'm here for that.
I finally got around to watching this last night and was surprised that the twist hadn't been spoiled for me in all these months, especially with all the Emilia Pérez brouhaha. I enjoyed it much the way I enjoyed CODA and Argo, which is to say, there are at least two other films I'd rather see win Best Picture.
(I was dying to read two more of these on Wicked and I'm Still Here...)
It was a well-made film but I found no part of it particularly gripping or engaging. Too bad Fiennes isn't winning though, he's overdue.
I did see it in a theatre. And I felt that others shared the experience that this was a comedy -- a campy gay Mean Girls remake. I loved it! If I was supposed to take it seriously as -- well, I'm not sure what Berger wanted me to get from the film, really -- it didn't work.
I did not think the performances were noteworthy -- Fiennes, in particular, seemed like he was suffering from severe constipation the whole film -- with the exception of Sergio Castellito, who seemed like he got the tone the movie was striving for (i.e. over the top gay camp).
So it was a very enjoyable evening at the movies, except I believe it wasn't the enjoyment the filmmakers wanted me to experience.