The Two Popes
Netflix's history when it comes to movies is, to use the most polite term I can think of, spotty. Their television has, for the most part and with some exceptions, been very good. They were the entity that first really encouraged the practice of binge-watching after all. However, the film-rental, turned streaming service's history with films has frequently left, at least in my case, much to be desired.
I've found a few gems over the years, of course. Their first film, The Fundamentals of Caring, was in my opinion a fairly good film. I certainly enjoyed it because the sense of humor showcased through the film chimed so well with my own (biting, blunt, and dripping with sarcasm). From what I've heard of it also, Martin Scorsese's latest venture, The Irishman, is apparently brilliant (when I finally get around to watching it, I'll let you know my opinion).
With that said, one of their recent feature-length cinematic ventures that I have enjoyed is the recently released The Two Popes.
Now, I was raised Catholic, but that isn't why I became interested in this film when I saw the initial teaser.
Like any kind of drama based on real-life events (a genre, along with it's historical counterpart, I've found myself drawn to more recently), what drew me to it was the cast. The two central characters--the eponymous two Popes in question--are played by Sirs Jonathan Pryce and Anthony Hopkins. These are two high-caliber, amazing actors, and no matter what they appear in, their presence and their talent immediately elevates the project. As Jorge Bergoglio (later Pope Francis) and Josef Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI), the two Pryce and Hopkins give amazing performances, which do much to humanize these two leaders of the Catholic Church. Both actors perform in a way that allows their characters to contrast, and therefore, come into conflict with each other.
Benedict, as played by Hopkins, is a conservative zealot among Catholics. He views his task as leader of God's Chosen Church on Earth to bring an old-fashioned viewpoint, which sounds a lot like the viewpoint of the 1950s, back into Catholicism, and thereby back into the 21st century. Coupled with that ironclad conviction, however, is a human side. Benedict is portrayed as both a bookish scholar, well-trained in Latin and several other languages, and an accomplished, recorded musician. However, he is also a lonely man, isolated by both the position he desired and by his very nature.
Set against this, played by Pryce, is Francis. While certain things about him are similar to Benedict (he is just as Catholic in some regards, as his stances in real-life have proven), but he's a much wiser, more worldly man, with a past. As a young priest, Bergoglio allied himself with the Argentine Dictatorship, commonly known as the Junta. However, as the film shows, he did so mainly to protect his own priests, who were being slaughtered left and right for dissenting with the status-quo. This choice, however, is what led him to become the wiser, humbler man he grew to be. A man who does not want power, rather a man who merely wishes to help the members of his flock.
Over the course of two hours, these two diametrical opposites engage in an ongoing dialogue, which always has a tension coursing beneath it.
To return to something I said before, one of the most wonderful elements of this movie is the performances. There's a very specific quality about both Hopkins and Pryce's portrayals that makes this movie worth watching in one sense: both humanize their subject.
The Catholic Church, like any organized religion, has its fair share of pomp and circumstance in terms of how it presents itself to the world. The cassocks, the rosaries, the stolls, the hats, the relics, the holy days of obligation, and the other strange-seemingly traditions can make it seem almost alien, or inhuman to an outsider (and even to some insiders). However, one of the messages that this film hits hard is the idea of human imperfection (a Catholic theme if ever there was one). The people who run the Catholic church, every authority figure to pass through the halls of Vatican City, clad in their robes, is just a human. They're just as fallible, just a flawed, and just as imperfect as any lay-person. It's recognition of this innate imperfection that both Benedict and Francis struggle with, and thus allows us to sympathize with them both even if we may view one of them as more sympathetic than the other.
In exploring this quality of imperfection in its characters, the film is also not opposed to going into exploring the imperfect side of human institutions. The child molestation charges leveled at the church are not ignored by this film. In fact, they're dealt with in a very mature, acknowledging way. If the subject had been broached any further in the film, that would've been the subject of the film. That isn't what this film is about though: it's about a conflict between two men. Nevertheless, that Anthony McCarten didn't sweep the subject under the proverbial rug is a testament to him (and a testament to everyone affected by such actions). Guilt and shame, and the acknowledgment of those feelings through confession, is also apt and typically Catholic.
While on the subject, another great quality about this film is its writing. A script is always the beginning of a movie (though Hollywood might disagree), and there are some great lines in this film. The banter between Pryce and Hopkins' characters is, at times, witty, warm, and humorous, while also concurrently philosophical, serious, and wise. Their dialogue drives the majority of the film's story. Despite it's grand backdrop, the story itself is quite simple.
Though it is Francis about whom the majority of this movie is about, the essential core of the movie is typified by Benedict in two lines: "We are at an impasse. You cannot retire from the church, unless I agree to your going, and I cannot resign until you agree to stay."
That is the essence of storytelling. Two things (in this case, two people), put in conflict with one another, each having something the other wants. One will get what they want, and the other will not, but may in the end get something better (or, depending on your viewpoint, worse). Even though the ending is one we all know for it is part of history, seeing the journey, the story (though dramatized) that leads to it remains gripping.
Between both the quality of the writing and the storytelling, along with the brilliant performances, The Two Popes is definitely a film worth watching.
I've found a few gems over the years, of course. Their first film, The Fundamentals of Caring, was in my opinion a fairly good film. I certainly enjoyed it because the sense of humor showcased through the film chimed so well with my own (biting, blunt, and dripping with sarcasm). From what I've heard of it also, Martin Scorsese's latest venture, The Irishman, is apparently brilliant (when I finally get around to watching it, I'll let you know my opinion).
With that said, one of their recent feature-length cinematic ventures that I have enjoyed is the recently released The Two Popes.
Now, I was raised Catholic, but that isn't why I became interested in this film when I saw the initial teaser.
Like any kind of drama based on real-life events (a genre, along with it's historical counterpart, I've found myself drawn to more recently), what drew me to it was the cast. The two central characters--the eponymous two Popes in question--are played by Sirs Jonathan Pryce and Anthony Hopkins. These are two high-caliber, amazing actors, and no matter what they appear in, their presence and their talent immediately elevates the project. As Jorge Bergoglio (later Pope Francis) and Josef Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI), the two Pryce and Hopkins give amazing performances, which do much to humanize these two leaders of the Catholic Church. Both actors perform in a way that allows their characters to contrast, and therefore, come into conflict with each other.
Benedict, as played by Hopkins, is a conservative zealot among Catholics. He views his task as leader of God's Chosen Church on Earth to bring an old-fashioned viewpoint, which sounds a lot like the viewpoint of the 1950s, back into Catholicism, and thereby back into the 21st century. Coupled with that ironclad conviction, however, is a human side. Benedict is portrayed as both a bookish scholar, well-trained in Latin and several other languages, and an accomplished, recorded musician. However, he is also a lonely man, isolated by both the position he desired and by his very nature.
Set against this, played by Pryce, is Francis. While certain things about him are similar to Benedict (he is just as Catholic in some regards, as his stances in real-life have proven), but he's a much wiser, more worldly man, with a past. As a young priest, Bergoglio allied himself with the Argentine Dictatorship, commonly known as the Junta. However, as the film shows, he did so mainly to protect his own priests, who were being slaughtered left and right for dissenting with the status-quo. This choice, however, is what led him to become the wiser, humbler man he grew to be. A man who does not want power, rather a man who merely wishes to help the members of his flock.
Over the course of two hours, these two diametrical opposites engage in an ongoing dialogue, which always has a tension coursing beneath it.
To return to something I said before, one of the most wonderful elements of this movie is the performances. There's a very specific quality about both Hopkins and Pryce's portrayals that makes this movie worth watching in one sense: both humanize their subject.
The Catholic Church, like any organized religion, has its fair share of pomp and circumstance in terms of how it presents itself to the world. The cassocks, the rosaries, the stolls, the hats, the relics, the holy days of obligation, and the other strange-seemingly traditions can make it seem almost alien, or inhuman to an outsider (and even to some insiders). However, one of the messages that this film hits hard is the idea of human imperfection (a Catholic theme if ever there was one). The people who run the Catholic church, every authority figure to pass through the halls of Vatican City, clad in their robes, is just a human. They're just as fallible, just a flawed, and just as imperfect as any lay-person. It's recognition of this innate imperfection that both Benedict and Francis struggle with, and thus allows us to sympathize with them both even if we may view one of them as more sympathetic than the other.
In exploring this quality of imperfection in its characters, the film is also not opposed to going into exploring the imperfect side of human institutions. The child molestation charges leveled at the church are not ignored by this film. In fact, they're dealt with in a very mature, acknowledging way. If the subject had been broached any further in the film, that would've been the subject of the film. That isn't what this film is about though: it's about a conflict between two men. Nevertheless, that Anthony McCarten didn't sweep the subject under the proverbial rug is a testament to him (and a testament to everyone affected by such actions). Guilt and shame, and the acknowledgment of those feelings through confession, is also apt and typically Catholic.
While on the subject, another great quality about this film is its writing. A script is always the beginning of a movie (though Hollywood might disagree), and there are some great lines in this film. The banter between Pryce and Hopkins' characters is, at times, witty, warm, and humorous, while also concurrently philosophical, serious, and wise. Their dialogue drives the majority of the film's story. Despite it's grand backdrop, the story itself is quite simple.
Though it is Francis about whom the majority of this movie is about, the essential core of the movie is typified by Benedict in two lines: "We are at an impasse. You cannot retire from the church, unless I agree to your going, and I cannot resign until you agree to stay."
That is the essence of storytelling. Two things (in this case, two people), put in conflict with one another, each having something the other wants. One will get what they want, and the other will not, but may in the end get something better (or, depending on your viewpoint, worse). Even though the ending is one we all know for it is part of history, seeing the journey, the story (though dramatized) that leads to it remains gripping.
Between both the quality of the writing and the storytelling, along with the brilliant performances, The Two Popes is definitely a film worth watching.
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