By Anne Brodie
Jesus Christ founded the Roman Catholic Church during his earthly ministry around 30 AD. The Church has remained the most powerful in the world since then and in some ways the most secretive. We peer inside its innermost workings in Edward Berger’s transfixing thriller Conclave, adour, dimly lit, festering with ambition, passion and villainy, and millennia of rite, ritual and history, set inside the Vatican in the occasion of the Holy Father, the Pope’s death. The job at hand is for all the global Archbishops gathered by his side, is to vote for the next Pope. Steeped in mysterious, perplexing and arcane ceremonial rite, it is also extremely human, as Bishops nominated to replace the Pope harbour ambition and cunning, as Berger shows us, even in this time of loss and mourning. Our guide, Father Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes) is in charge of “producing” the vote and making sense of covert disinformation campaigns, smears, and the sudden appearance of a woman who had a baby by one of the Bishops years earlier. A popular and unscrupulous nominee was reportedly sacked by the Pope for “gross misconduct” just before his death but it can’t be proven. And the previously unknown Mexican Archbishop of Kabul, Afghanistan appears unannounced, causing a major stir. Fr. Lawrence claims he doesn’t want the position because “being Pope is a HUGE burden” but he does. Meanwhile, Isabella Rossellini is the sole Sister heard from in the film. Vatican nuns are considered lower than the priests, are to remain silent, and make the food and pray for the community in separation. And she knows a secret that could change everything. High drama every which way, a mass of moving black umbrellas carried by figures in black robes, angles and lighting to stir the senses and the intellect, the music – striking single notes in eerie repetition, sudden violin screeches, sombre, serious business. What makes this film so beguiling is the art of its conversation; the script is outstanding whatever it reveals, making this one of the year’s most satisfying and awards worthy films. In theatres now.
Martha, the much anticipated documentary on the force of nature that is Martha Stewart premieres Oct. 30 on Netflix. I’ve seen it and it’s shockingly jucy and provocative. Watch for my review to be posted October 30, because Martha controls when.
Kaniehtiio Horn wrote, directed, and stars in the thriller Seeds concerning an online influencer who returns to her reservation to look after her Aunty’s home while she’s vacationing. Ziggy has just signed a lucrative contract with Nature’s Oath, a seed and fertiliser company that she failed to research. Once at the remote farmhouse, she checks on the precious corn squash seeds passed down from generation to generation in her family to preserve the ancient Indigenous food. Her cousin (Dallas Goldtooth) helps her settle but is stunned that she’s signed with the company calling it “evil”. It’s a global corporation that hoards and withholds seed from farmers, forcing them to pay each year rather than store seeds. It ups profits and causes global harm. Her family seeds are legacy. Graham Greene, playing the Graham Greene we all know and love, shows up on her TV screen in his true crime show but breaks the wall warning her that people are coming for the seeds. And show up they do – in the form of a psychotic, single-minded sadist (Patrick Garrow) who launches a violent search. He hires her “friend” to help him for an enormous sum of money. Ziggy is known around the rez as a badass and sets out to prove her mettle, standing up to the challenge. What happens is primal, ancient and her ex can’t save her. She puts in strong debut double duty in this provocative tale. In theatres now.