Spoilers for the plot and ending of conclavenow in the cinema.

You might not expect the most surprising twist of the year to end up in a movie about the election of a new pope, but it’s important to remember that the Vatican is a dirty bitch that lives for drama. Edward Bergers conclaveAdapted from the novel by Robert Harris, it showcases the colorful rituals and elaborate displays of Roman Catholicism while offering an intimate (if imagined) look into the backroom dealings and ugly confrontations that play a role in the election of the supreme pope. While the film’s ending is sure to surprise audiences, it’s far from the only mystery revealed during its two-hour running time – and it plays into the theme of progress versus tradition that plays into it conclaveis the central conflict.

Ralph Fiennes plays Cardinal Lawrence, the dean of the College of Cardinals who is tasked with overseeing the papal conclave after the Pope’s sudden death. His preferred candidate for the next bishop of Rome is Cardinal Bellini (Stanley Tucci), a liberal with (relatively) forward-looking views. On the other side of the ideological divide are Cardinal Tedesco (Sergio Castellitto), a harsh critic of the late pope who believes the church has become too open-minded, and Cardinal Adeyemi (Lucian Msamati), who believes gays should be sentenced to prison , then hell. Then there’s the ambitious Cardinal Tremblay (John Lithgow), a candidate who leans liberally but whose only real belief seems to be that he should become pope.

The wild card of the conclave is Cardinal Benitez (Carlos Diehz), the Mexican-born archbishop of Kabul. Since Benitez was named pectore – meaning the late pope did so without telling anyone else – he is a surprising addition to the College of Cardinals. There is limited information about Benitez, but Lawrence’s assistant Monsignor O’Malley (Brían F. O’Byrne) uses his role as an outsider to the conclave to gather and share information with Lawrence, including the fact that Benitez is due to mysterious health problems reasons almost resigned as archbishop.

As voting begins, Lawrence learns that Bellini does not have the votes to become pope. But during the conclave he also finds out why the other candidates are not suitable for the role. Adeyemi was leading the polls until it was discovered that decades earlier he had a secret relationship (and possibly a child) with a then 19-year-old nun. Tremblay seems the next likely option until he is exposed for paying several cardinals to vote for him and for being fired by the Pope in his final act. In the end, it seems as if the Liberals’ last hope lies with Tedesco and Lawrence himself, but a terrorist attack spurs Tedesco to give an impassioned speech in which he rails against tolerance of Islam and declares a religious war, which makes him the Support from everyone else costs its most stubborn defenders.

In response to Tedesco’s outburst, Benitez – who has seen real wars firsthand – delivers a counter-message about not giving in to hate, emphasizing that the Church is not about tradition or the past, but about “what we do next”. The next step is to elect Benitez as pope. But just as Benitez chooses his papal name, Innocent, O’Malley returns to share what he has learned about the clinic in Switzerland where Benitez almost traveled for treatment. Lawrence confronts the newly elected Pope, who shares the truth: although Benitez was raised as a man, he was born with a uterus and ovaries. He still identifies as a man, but acknowledges that his chromosomes would define him as female in the eyes of some people.

conclaveThe revelation that Benitez is intersex follows the novel closely – the film as a whole is a very faithful adaptation – but there are some key differences that hint at the underlying themes. While the new Pope declares in both the book and the film, “I am what God made me,” he emphasizes in the film that his intersex identity could make him more useful in his role, precisely because he “exists between certainties.” . It’s an allusion to the impromptu sermon Lawrence gives before the cardinals’ imprisonment, in which he claims that “certainty is the enemy of unity and tolerance.” Lawrence, struggling with his own doubts, wants a pope who doubts and sins. This is taken by most cardinals as a call to elect a liberal, and that is where the conclave ends up, with a pope whose gender identity, albeit accidental, represents a radical advance for the church.

Some will refuse conclaveThe late-stage reveal is a cheap twist, and considering how much the film traffics in rumors and Bravo-level nastiness, it’s not an unreasonable conclusion. But there’s clearly something deeper going on here too. The election of Benitez as pope amid the fall of his brothers reflects the reality of human complexity – there could never have been a candidate for supreme pontiff without flaws. (Intersex identity is not a flaw, of course, but Benitez’s traditionally female anatomy would be seen as a mark against him by the patriarchal Roman Catholic cardinals who elected him.) As one of Bellini’s allies says in making the case that the Liberals coalesce around the least offensive candidate: “We serve an ideal; We can’t always be ideal.”

Regardless of the message, Benitez’s intersex identity is a surprise and is likely to be met with resistance. It is in the context of a long cinematic history of “Unsettling Gender Reveal”. The lawyer once called it – a trope best associated with The wine game but with even more disturbing examples to point to, such as Ace Ventura: Pet Detective And Sleeping camp. In both of the latter films, a trans villain’s genitals are treated as a punchline and his trans identity is linked to deception. conclave is well aware of the stereotype and does his best to distance himself from it: Benitez’s final conversation with Lawrence portrays his gender not as something shameful or terrible, but as a divine gift approved by the former pope himself.

It’s not my job to decide whether or not conclaveThe ending is insulting; I’ll leave the decision to the trans critics. But when you compare it to the end of the novel, it at least seems to be a thoughtful and deliberate update of the source material. In the book, Benitez reveals that he has a vagina; in the film a uterus and ovaries. Although the difference may seem minor, it is important: the new pope has the reproductive organs that traditionalists like Tedesco want to control. When Bellini expresses his liberal views at the beginning of the film, he makes it clear that he supports contraception, an ongoing debate within Catholicism. Pope Francis has reiterated the church’s opposition to artificial birth control while advocating for “responsible parenthood.”

conclave However, he does not exactly support Catholic teaching. If the film has a message, it’s less about the church specifically and more about the inevitability of progress. After Bellini revealed that he believes women should play a larger role in the Curia, his supporters advise him to keep that role to himself – that’s the line even many liberals won’t cross. But the women in the film prove crucial, even if they are undeniably outnumbered: they are Sister Shanumi (Balkissa Maiga), whose confrontation with Adeyemi leads to his downfall, and Sister Agnes (Isabella Rossellini), who turns the cardinals against Tremblay brings up. The film ends with the election of a pope who is not a woman, but whose anatomy and existence “between certainties” allows for a far broader perspective on gender than someone like Tedesco would have.

In the end, all the cardinals’ bickering and betrayal can’t stop the rise of female power that feels preordained. Here, conclave seems to suggest that “the world only moves forward,” as Tony Kushner once put it – while it’s a hopeful and perhaps overly optimistic notion, it’s not unwelcome in October 2024.