So you saw 'Conclave' the movie. Here's what it got right – and wrong – about real-life conclaves

Speculation surrounding a conclave to elect a pope is a time-honored tradition. But for the impending conclave following the death of Pope Francis, the ranks of armchair Vatican experts have swelled thanks to Hollywood.

“Conclave” the film, a moody 2024 political thriller, introduced many laypeople to the ancient selection process with its arcane rules and grand ceremony, albeit with a silver screen twist packed full of palace intrigue and surprise.

Though it has its critics, the film treats the gravity of a papal election with respect and accurately portrays many rituals and contemporary problems facing today’s Catholic Church. But Vatican experts warn the movie doesn’t get everything right.

Here's a look at what “Conclave” does get right — and wrong — about conclaves. (Spoilers ahead.)

The movie excels at re-creating the look and feel of a conclave.

“The film gets a lot right. They tried to reproduce the mise-en-scene of the Vatican accurately,” William Cavanaugh, a Catholic studies professor at DePaul University in Chicago, said in an email. “They show that a lot of the drama is around the preconclave conversations among cardinals.”

It’s not a perfect re-creation, according to the Rev. Thomas Reese, a senior analyst with the Religion News Service and a Vatican expert.

He called the movie’s production values “marvelous,” but noted slight discrepancies in the cardinals' dress.

“The red in the cardinals’ garments was a deep red, while the reality is more orange. Frankly, I like the Hollywood version better,” Reese, a Jesuit priest who wrote “Inside the Vatican: The Politics and Organization of the Catholic Church,” said in an email.

The movie aligns with real-life expectations for a quick conclave, said Massimo Faggioli, a historical theology professor at Villanova University in Pennsylvania.

“A long conclave would send the message of a Church divided and possibly on the verge of a schism. The history of the conclaves in the last century is really a story of short conclaves,” he said via email.

Reese pointed out other discrepancies. While the voting process was depicted accurately, he said, the ballots are burned not after each vote, but after each session, which is typically two votes.

There are a few particularly egregious errors that, if corrected, would lead to a very different movie.

A key character in the film, the archbishop of Kabul, Afghanistan, arrives just before the conclave with paperwork declaring the late pope had made him a cardinal "in pectore" — “in secret” — allowing him to vote for the next pope.

“The biggest mistake in the movie was the admission of a cardinal in pectore into the conclave,” said Reese. “If the name is not announced publicly by the pope in the presence of the College of Cardinals, he has no right to attend a conclave.”

Cavanaugh agreed and noted that while the movie's twist about the Kabul archbishop was far-fetched, it does point to a certain truth about conclaves.

“The cardinals do not always know who they’re getting when they elect a pope,” he said. “If the cardinals knew how (Jorge Mario) Bergoglio would be as Pope Francis, many of them wouldn’t have voted for him. Pius IX was elected as a liberal and turned into an archconservative. John XXIII was supposed to be a jolly caretaker pope, and he unleashed Vatican II,” a series of modernizing reforms.

Another of the movie's more outlandish storylines involves the dean of the College of Cardinals breaking the seal of the confessional by revealing to another cardinal what a nun confessed to him, said Reese.

“He committed a mortal sin and would be automatically excommunicated. Such an action would be egregiously wrong,” Reese said.

In addition to that, a cardinal paying for votes, as shown in the film, is unheard of in modern times, said Cavanaugh, and the politicking is exaggerated.

And so are the politics.

The movie errs in making cardinals into either liberal or conservative champions, said Kurt Martens, professor of canon law at the Catholic University of America in Washington.

“Those labels don’t help us,” he said because cardinals are very cautious in expressing their opinions and “even someone we think is a liberal cardinal is pretty conservative by secular standards.”

And he added that even in an unusually large conclave like this year’s, the rule requiring the next pope wins at least a two-thirds majority of the vote ensures that “whatever we call extreme” likely won’t get enough votes.

Associated Press writers Giovanna Dell'Orto and Nicole Winfield contributed to this report.

Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

FILE - Cardinals walk in procession to the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican, at the beginning of the conclave, April 18, 2005. (Osservatore Romano via AP, File)

FILE - People walk at dusk in St Peter's Square at the Vatican, Thursday, Feb. 27, 2025. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth, File)

FILE - Cardinals leave St. Peter's Basilica after the funeral for late cardinal Angelo Amato in at the Vatican, Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino, File)

FILE - New Cardinals sit during consistory inside St. Peter's Basilica, at the Vatican, Saturday, Aug. 27, 2022. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, File)

FILE - Cardinals hold the red three-cornered biretta hats before a consistory inside the St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican, Saturday, Nov. 19, 2016. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia, File)

FILE - Italian Cardinal Giacomo Biffi, center, takes an oath at the beginning of the conclave to elect the next pope in the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican, Monday, April 18, 2005. (AP Photo/Osservatore Romano via AP, File)

A mental health advocate suspected of killing her police officer husband was found dead Monday, six days after she disappeared from her Massachusetts home, authorities said.

Karen Solomon, an advocate who called for improvements and greater awareness of police mental health issues, had disappeared after Worcester Police Officer Kurt Solomon was found dead at their home just before 5:30 a.m. on Aug. 18. Officials had named Karen Solomon a suspect and said she was believed to be armed.

“We believe this case is a tragic murder-suicide that occurred,” Worcester Police Chief Paul Saucier said at a news conference Monday.

Two people who worked at Fairlawn Rehabilitation Hospital reported finding human remains nearby, and officers recovered a woman’s corpse, Saucier said. A final ID was still pending, but authorities said they were confident it was Karen Solomon.

A handgun found near her body was not a Worcester police service weapon, and investigators were working to determine who owned it.

On Aug. 19, authorities released doorbell camera footage of Karen Solomon walking down a street in a T-shirt, shorts and flip-flops, just minutes after officers responded to the couple’s home and found her husband’s body.

Kurt Solomon, who had served 31 years with the police department, was mortally injured with a sharp object, authorities have said.

Worcester County District Attorney Joseph Early Jr. said Karen Solomon had been at the house on the morning of her husband's death, and investigators were looking to question her. An arrest warrant issued over the weekend charged her with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon.

Police handed out flyers with her photo to drivers in the area. An intensive law enforcement search that included local, state and federal agencies centered on the area near the couple's Worcester home and a reservoir about a mile (1.6 kilometers) away. Authorities had deployed drones, boats and tracking dogs.

Karen Solomon, 58, co-founded the group First H.E.L.P., which advocates for the mental health of police officers. She also wrote two books — “Hearts Beneath the Badge” and “The Price They Pay” — about the physical and psychological experiences of first responders.

In a 2020 interview on the “Dr. Phil” show with Phil McGraw, she said police departments often offered little help to the families of officers who took their own lives.

In a statement read by Saucier during Monday's news conference, the Solomon family thanked law enforcement for helping them find some answers.

“The nightmare of the past week has left our family heartbroken and rudderless," the family said. “The compassion, dedication and empathy of all agencies involved have given us light in face of darkness.”

A wake for Kurt Solomon was scheduled for Tuesday, and his funeral for Wednesday, the police chief said. The local police union president, Thomas Duffy, described him as “a tremendous human being” who was like family.

This screen grab made from video provided by WCVB-TV shows a police officer standing guard over a home in Worcester, Mass., Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2026. (WCVB-TV via AP)