What goes on behind the Vatican's doors as Catholics around the world await a plume of white smoke to signal the successful selection of a new pope has been shrouded in secrecy since the first official papal conclave in 1276. Edward Berger's latest film, Conclave, envisions a fictionalized account of the isolated selection process, adapted from Robert Harris's 2016 novel of the same name.
"It is a really ancient process. The history of it is incredibly rich, and it's incredibly interesting how that came about and why it is still that way," Berger tells Exclaim! in Toronto, mere hours before the film's international premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.
He continues, "[Mixing] the archaic with vaping and cell phones and televisions — it just feels at odds to see a smoking cardinal. I wanted to make them human."
The film's main themes concern the politics surrounding the selection of the church's new leader, particularly what the best foot forward for the church should be: a progressive one that embraces the new social constructs and dynamics of today, or a return to conservatism in response to extremism and violence?
Alongside the splintering philosophical factions among the cardinals, there's an undercurrent running through Conclave that speaks to the millennia of history (good and bad) this process and institution carries with it. The old and the new co-existing within the walls of the Wi-Fi-enabled Sistine Chapel.
Berger bestows the weight of this contrast onto Ralph Fiennes's Cardinal Lawrence, who begins the film with heavy shoulders and doubt, as the filmmaker describes it.
"I responded to the question of the doubt in [the film]; Ralph responded to it. That's why we both made the movie," Berger explains.
Toward the end of the film, when tensions are running high and factions are clear, Cardinal Lawrence delivers a rousing speech. "He says [he] doesn't know how the world works and wants to keep guessing, and maybe we should have a pope that embraces doubt," recalls Berger. "I was very touched by that, and very much identified with that speech. I have doubt all the time in my life. Am I making the right decision? Am I making the right movie?"
Berger has been steadily working as a director since 1998, mostly in his native Germany, making an international name for himself two years ago with the first German cinematic adaptation of the war film All Quiet on the Western Front, which won the director his first Academy Award for Best International Feature Film and was named one of Exclaim!'s best films of 2022.
On the surface, the two films could hardly be more different — an intentional move on Berger's part, who explains that he "always flocks to a movie that feels different to the one previous; an urge to cleanse the old one." However, the similarities between the two became apparent when discussing what draws Berger to a story.
"I want to make films that always have a second layer, not just a plot," the Oscar winner explains. "I want to make personal movies that speak to a large audience."
Just as All Quiet on the Western Front wasn't simply a war movie, or even just an anti-war movie, Conclave reveals itself as a discussion around power, gender and, above all, tradition's place in a contemporary society that's changing faster than any era that's come before.
"I think tradition is very important. It is our sense of history," Berger says. "If you forget history, then you have nothing. It's what culture comes from, where manners come from, the way we deal with each other. You certainly have to learn from tradition and move on, but you can never forget it. Pass it on, and then the next generation can decide how to modernize it."
There's a moment during Conclave where Cardinal Lawrence looks out the window and sees three nuns in the courtyard laughing. Observing these women, who are traditionally sidelined during the papal conclave, the cardinal smiles, the political jockeying and scheming that he's been secluded with washing away.
Berger says this is the moment that he hopes audiences connect with and leave the film remembering — an optimistic and hopeful feeling that "there's a way forward into the future."