Find out what is being said about Edward Berger’s film, starring Ralph Fiennes and Stanley Tucci.
The Guardian: **** “Berger orchestrates marvellously tense, explosively dramatic scenes and with cinematographer Stéphane Fontaine and production designer Suzie Davies contrives some spectacularly strange and dream-like tableaux.”
The Observer: ***** “Berger milks every last drop of tension and intrigue from Harris’s story, with cinematographer Stéphane Fontaine’s lens picking up on the eye daggers the rival factions fire at each other across the refectory. Equally effective is the ramped up use of sound, which amplifies Cardinal Lawrence’s laboured breath and scuttling footsteps, and the forceful, emphatic score by Volker Bertelmann, reuniting with Berger after their collaboration on All Quiet.”
The Arts Desk: ***** “Fiennes is magnificent, helming the arcane voting process with a pained and regretful sobriety, but always keeping his antennae alert for any hint of sharp practice.”
The Independent: *** “Ralph Fiennes is a vaping cardinal tasked with electing a new pope, in a film that plays as a conspiracy thriller – if only it interrogated its own ideas, though.”
Empire: **** “As conspiracies come to light, Berger’s winding plot unfolds in tight confines — the cardinals are, after all, sequestered — leading to breathless claustrophobia, aided by cold interiors practically devoid of colour. All that stands out is the cardinals’ bright-red attire, matching the passion and bloodlust with which they navigate the movie’s shifting political sands. It all unfolds with such precision: an unlikely potboiler that Berger presents not only thoughtfully, but viciously and deliciously.”
The Telegraph: *** “In this drama about the election of a new pope, Fiennes stars as a cardinal who is Rome’s present-day answer to Thomas Cromwell in Wolf Hall.”
Evening Standard: ***** “On top of all this is the visual feast served up by Stéphane Fontaine’s camera work; one moment hyper-vividly zooming in to every perspiring pore of these embattled cardinals, the next pulling out reveal the grandest of tableaus. Cloaked in deep, velvety crimson, these holy men look like glacé cherries floating on a particularly beautiful cake.”
The Upcoming: **** “Even as it raises a number of important talking points about religion, Conclave peels away the frock to unveil universal objectives of coexistence in a society. With the impending presidential election of a nation on the wheel of global politics, Conclave is one of the most consequential features of the year and should not be missed.”