Oscar hopes are dashed Conclavea film that asks “what if an episode of Gossip Girl was set at Vatican?” A a solid box office this past weekend only increased attention to the film, a delightful mashup of Real Housewives And The Da Vinci Code. Ralph Fiennes might now be our favorite for Best Actor for his role as Olivia Pope in a stunning red cassock.

To be clear, as sarcastic as it may sound, all of the above is an endorsement. Conclave is a prestige film that will resonate with general audiences, but is seductive and juicy, bordering on a soap opera, in a silly way that they may or may not realize.

As such, everyone who has seen the film is abuzz, with as much fervor as those tea-spilling priests in the film, especially over the ending.

Based on the 2016 novel by Robert Harris, the film centers on Cardinal Thomas Lawrence de Fiennes, who is in charge of the papal conclave to select a new pope after the previous one’s death.

Rolling down stairwells and dark corners of hallways feels more like an episode of Succession that some of us might like to know, as the cardinals present campaign, plot, and try to muster enough votes for their so-called candidate to be the next Holy Leader. But everything is turned upside down by the arrival of a cardinal who, under the previous pope, worked in secret for his own safety in dangerous parts of the world. Suddenly, all calculations about how the conclave could or should play out are overturned.

(Warning: Big spoilers ahead.)

It is best to enter Conclave not knowing what will happen, because he has one of the most WAIT…WHAT?!?! twists and turns in recent memory. We’re about to talk about this reveal, so don’t read any further if you want to stay intact.

Throughout the film, the high-ranking members of the conclave try to figure out what the problem is with Cardinal Vincent Benitez (Carlos Diehz), the surprise guest. They go so far as to check his background, revealing mysterious doctor’s appointments, made through the Vatican, which he never attended.

However, when the other cardinals’ toxic political agendas reach an ignition point, Benitez steps in with a speech so pure and central that the conclave inevitably votes them to be the new pope.

It is After It turns out that Cardinal Lawrence receives one last vital piece of information from all those background checks on Benitez: the surgery that was booked for Benitez was for a hysterectomy. Benitez is intersex and was given male at birth. It has a penis, a uterus and ovaries. “I’m like God me,” Benitez tells Lawrence when confronted.

It’s an explosive confrontation with the film’s audience. Forget how you feel about Catholic Church and his position on women in cloth. How do you perceive gender identity? The conclave had just chosen, depending on your position on the issue, a pope that some would call biologically female.

There are film critics who have a hard time accepting the whiplash of this twist. And of course there are Catholics who are unhappy…especially with the film’s resolution, which is that Lawrence decides to keep this information private. Benitez is the new pope.

There is the intense reaction you expect. “Don’t watch this movie!” The controversy surrounding the “conclave” for Catholic viewers” ​​is a big success on YouTube for the film, with the account behind it having 47,300 followers. Ben Shapiro YouTube screed to its 7 million subscribers is more direct on this subject: “Catholics should make fun of this film”.

There is even a entire Reddit thread titled “Conclavecan I watch? The message: “I don’t want to watch anti-Catholic movies. But interested in the film Conclave. Is this okay to watch as a practicing Catholic? »

Back on Earth, away from the extremely online world, however, the reaction from Catholic critics has been more nuanced than I expected, at least as a non-practicing practitioner.

“A serious, even lugubrious, tone and a first-rate cast add weight to the ecclesiastical melodrama. Conclave“, said the review which was published in the Catholic magazine. “Yet the film is fundamentally a power struggle fueled by gripping plot developments – the last and foremost among which Catholic viewers will likely find, at best, uncomfortable.”

About that ending, the review had spicier thoughts: “Not only professors of dogmatic theology, but all movie buffs committed to the beliefs of the Church will therefore want to approach this serious, visually engaging but manipulative – and sometimes sensationalist – production. with caution. The ideological smoke it gives off always remains gray.”

The Catholic news site Angelus was less measured in his reviewmixing his indignation at the plot with his judgment on the overall quality of the film. “Aside from anti-Catholic prejudices, Conclave is just bad,” the title reads. His assessment of what he calls the “totally gratuitous” plot twist: “The film made fun of these corrupt and idiotic cardinals. It turns out that God is also making jokes at their expense: the savior of the Church of Men is actually a biological woman. »

For its part, Twitter / too serious.