Die zwei Päpste

Ein angenehmer Film, in dem man sich viel unterhält, wo sich der Papst Kommissar Rex ansieht oder eine Pizza vom Stand genießt. Meirelles gewinnt die Zuschauer*innen eben dadurch, dass er den Papst als jemanden darstellt, der auch manches erzählen möchte und der auch an seiner Aufgabe zweifelt. Die Freundschaft, die zwischen den zwei am Anfang ganz unterschiedlichen Geistlichen entsteht, wird zum Hauptthema des Films. Eine sehr gute Besetzung von beiden Hauptfiguren. Hopkins spielt den deutschen Radikalen mit Vergnügen und Jonathan Pryce reicht für die Darstellung des sanfteren Gegenpols sein Naturell. (08.01.2020)

An amazing humanization of two characters about which you may hear but it is almost impossible to get a little bit closer to. The closest I was able to get was when Pope Benedict XVI came to Stará Boleslav 10 years ago. But even that is nothing in comparison with this movie, which is humorous, enjoyable, interesting and mainly full of dialogues between two completely different people that have, precisely thanks to their differences, a lot to say to one another. The movie has great dialogues that may be unnecessarily long in the 2nd half; otherwise it would have been good enough for 5 stars. (31.12.2019)

I liked the way it was filmed, acted, voiced, performed. I don't care that it's a movie about Catholic bigwigs. Overall, I don't even think the film had aspirations to be a faithful historical reproduction. I think it wanted to show two gentlemen getting on in years and becoming friends, even though they root for different teams. The fact that they both tried out for the papal chair is simply taking advantage of the alluring setting. An enjoyable film, it flows very nicely; the two hours passed like a breeze. I just walked away satisfied, absolutely not wanting to think about everything the Pope symbolizes, how much that circus costs to maintain, what all he's covered up. For me, it's a nice film with no critical overlap. (25.01.2020)

An outstanding conversational drama with a fantastic cast. Light on its feet, funny and touching. The popes are both nice people and, thanks to the excellently written dialogue, you get an exact idea of both of their viewpoints. The scenes with Anthony Hopkins having a Fanta and a pizza inside the Sistine Chapel and he and Pryce watching football and drinking beer are priceless. An unbelievably humane and positive movie. (06.09.2020)

A film as divisive as the opinions of its two main characters. I have no interest in getting into the issue of religion, but the theme “should and how could the Church humanize its practices in order to adapt to the current freedom of thought” is universal and simple enough, and the exchange of opinions between these two distinguished figures was fun and interesting overall. Or, more precisely, I was interested in the liberal views of Francis, whom the first half of the film profiles as a herald of good and progressive will being cut off by a grumpy Benedict that avoids getting caught up in a conversation. The relationship between these two strong and intelligent men is portrayed hastily and in the second half the narration shifts to unnecessarily long to flashbacks that have very little effect on the storyline, they are there probably to give the film a better drive so it wouldn’t be only a “boring” conversation – which would certainly not have happened if Meirelles had dived deeper into the conflict and friendship of the two popes and had let those two fantastic actors play even more. In this way, The Two Popes is at a crossroads between an important conversational drama with great historical insight and a stylishly edited pop-culture clip with an undoubtedly talented filmmaker with a feeling for timing performing an unnecessary formal exhibtion – in his hands this could have been major film and it’s a shame that it didn’t turn out like that. 70% (07.01.2020)

I really liked the work of the cameraman and the performances of the two leads, but I find it hard to evaluate the film as a whole. I don’t have a very good opinion of the Catholic Church, and because I am democratic in this regard, I lump all the religious flocks together into one big, stinking pile. The popes did some serious soul-searching in the film, but I consider all totalitarian regimes essentially the same. If the Catholic Church ever came to power in Europe, it would not surpass the Nazi or Communist regime in terms of casualties simply because it would not have the technical means to do so. I’m convinced of that. All of these regimes burned inappropriate literature, got rid of people who had their own (meaning different) opinion, and built their network of informants. The film’s theme deserves a Boo! rating from me, its saving grace is the cinematography and the two gentlemen. (08.08.2020)

The advantage of this film is that even if no one is particularly interested in the subject, there is a pretty good chance that everyone will enjoy it. Why? Because Anthony Hopkins and Jonathan Pryce could very well be explaining how to peel potatoes and their rendition would still make it an acting tour de force. Their Oscar nominations rank among the most well-deserved ones. The sentence that comes to mind, "it didn’t happen but could have," rings true in every scene. This film almost felt too short, which has not happened to me in quite some time and I consider it to be the biggest surprise of 2019. (02.02.2020)