Based on the entertaining short read by Robert Harris, and feeling very faithful to that slight book, I found CONCLAVE a perfectly pleasant way to spend a couple of hours, in a very specific way.
When I was a kid, the Sunday afternoon film on tv was a thing. It would usually be a light drama – maybe a war film with Kenneth More or John Mills, maybe a John Wayne film, a Western, Charlton Heston in a period film, in my memory almost always some kind of historical piece. Well-made films that didn’t ask for a lot more than your attention. Involving but not deeply challenging, sober and adult without any jagged edges to it.
My first thought on finishing it, oddly, was TWISTERS. A solidly-carpentered piece with two ridiculously charming leads, about place, people, passion and service under big skies. Great Sunday afternoon movie, and the sort of foursquare American flick that doesn’t seem to get made much anymore. CONCLAVE – which was apparently made for 20 million dollars – got me the same way. Nobody makes this kind of film any more.
CONCLAVE is almost a portfolio piece for the director Edward Berger – it’s beautifully composed, there’s a montage of cardinals towards the top of the film that feels strongly European, Isabella Rossellini has never been better, Fiennes is the sort of sober and contained English actor you’d find in a Sunday afternoon film, Tucci and Lithgow are always a joy to watch, and there are some fantastic shots. In fact, it’s worth a second watch just to look at the way Berger and his cinematographer build those shots.
CONCLAVE is more of a piece of art than it needed to be, and I love that. I also enjoyed that it felt like the kind of film they don’t make any more.