Conclave Director Explains Ending’s Final Twists

This article contains Conclave spoilers.

For many viewers who think they recognize a bit of foreshadowing when they hear it, having Cardinal Bellini (Stanley Tucci) demand to know what would be the chosen papal name of Cardinal Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes) seemed to promise a likely finale: the reluctant and doubtful priest we’ve been following this whole time becomes pontiff and heir to the throne of St. Peter. After all, as is wrongly said more than once about Bellini, isn’t the man who does not want power the most deserving of it?

Yet if you saw Conclave this weekend, then you know this obvious ending did not occur. While our heroic, conflicted Lawrence eventually tells Bellini he would be known as Pope John if given the chance… in the end, he never gets it. Rather it is the totally unexpected Cardinal Benitez (Carlos Diehz) who gets the chance to rechristen himself as Pope Innocent.

The hard left-turn ascent occurs after Benitez offers a humane and heartfelt plea of compassion following a terrorist attack near the Vatican. Whereas other members of the conclave are quick to declare war on the Other, especially Muslims (despite not knowing the motive of the attack), Benitez announces himself as the one cardinal with intense hands-on experience in battlefields after being the Archbishop of Kabul.

It’s already a pretty shocking—and faintly unlikely—scenario before we learn the true final twist of the movie: in addition to Cardinal Benitez being the priest selected to ascend to the ultimate patriarchal seat, Benitez will also become the first pope born with the anatomy of both a man and a woman—a fact the heavily cloistered individual did not even realize until he was in his 30s. At the time, it caused him to grapple with his faith and identity, as it does one of the few other priests who now learns the truth. Yet, in the end, Cardinal Lawrence elects to keep Pope Innocent’s secret and to see him as God made him.

We doubt many audience members saw that coming, unless they read the Robert Harris novel Conclave is based on. Not only does the ending intentionally defy what perhaps many conservative Catholics might think they know about gender, but it also in its own way subverts a movie often defined by its sense of doubt. Was it not our protagonist who gave a prescient sermon about the importance of doubt in a pontiff? And yet, the man who becomes the next pope is filled with faith, even as their existence contradicts the rule and letter associated with papal law.

These contradictions, both within gender and belief, are what appealed to director Edward Berger when we discussed the ending of the movie.

“I think in the end Ralph recognizes the right person becomes pope,” Berger says of the finale. “Because it is a person who is pure, who still believes… and I think that’s what it’s more about. To keep the purity, the innocence of your true belief. It doesn’t really matter whether you’re a cardinal or a filmmaker or journalist or an engineer.”

Admittedly, however, the film very much is tapping into a third rail which is occurring right now among conservatives in the Catholic Church in the U.S. and outside of it, with debates over gender becoming a central part of the U.S. presidential election. For Berger, such discussions have two elements, the first of which is the absurdity that such an ending might be considered offensive in some circles.

“People can disagree with it,” Berger shrugs. “I’m not worried about it. I do think that this fanatic fundamentalism is an American phenomenon that is not so much present in Europe. It is probably [there] a little bit, but not as much. So I just wasn’t worried about that. I mean, religious fanatics? I don’t have them in my daily life in Europe.” More importantly, though, he sees the ending as wading into a debate about a type of leadership which goes back to antiquity, including the founding of the Catholic Church.

“This movie is about the oldest patriarchal institution in the world, representing many other patriarchal institutions in the world,” says Berger. “And at the end of the movie, there’s a crack in that institution, a crack of perhaps femininity, ya? It’s a crack that a light can shine through, a guiding light for the future, perhaps. And the future is a world where maybe both can exist?”

This would tie into a recurring subplot of bitter irony throughout Conclave, a movie where cardinals are men of ecumenical power feasting on their wine and privilege while the women around them, as exemplified by the observant but largely silent Sister Agnes (Isabella Rossellini), are expected to be seen and never heard. Always subservient.

The Conclave ending is obviously a big swing, albeit one that its filmmaker views as ultimately supportive of the importance of our institutions, even if it is hinting at the need for far greater modernization. Says the director, “I personally believe if we didn’t have faith, no matter what it is, if we didn’t have mosques or churches or synagogues or temples… what would we have? There would be very little that is left. There would be no identity, no history, no culture. So much is brought through these institutions. So I do think they are a very important pillar in our society.”

Hence the beauty that the entire film is designed around. For despite being set in the aesthetic splendor of the Sistine Chapel and the medieval glories that shimmer throughout the film’s version of the Vatican, the movie is often contrasting that classicalism with the oppressive nature of the Church’s secrecy.

“I wanted to find the visual equivalent of Ralph feeling empty and lonely and oppressed,” Berger explains. “So how do you build that? In Rome you have a lot of marble, but I still wanted that marble to feel like a jail cell. So when Ralph’s door closes, there’s a whoosh, and then basically all you hear is the hum of the fluorescent [light] and his breath. Otherwise, he’s shut away.”

As the director admits, the whole thing is built in a way so that the ending “can really sing.” And what kind of voices does that life-affirming harmony intone?

“Once that conclave is over, the shutters open, and [Lawrence] opens the window, and lets the air and the sun and life back in,” says Berger. “And he hears that feminine laughter of those three nuns. In a way, it’s the future and it evokes a smile on him.” It’s the promise of a more egalitarian tomorrow with a pope who might offer some understanding for all people, no matter their gender or sex.

Conclave is in theaters now.