Sorrentino

But let’s not forget that years before Ralph Fiennes slipped into a cassock, filmmaker Paolo Sorrentino sneaked us into his version of the Vatican’s inner political sanctum via “The Young Pope” in 2017 and its 2020 sequel “The New Pope.”

But then, Sorrentino conceived Pius as a conservative hardliner who would have favored brute force anyway.

Sorrentino didn’t intend for his drama to meet that moment, but circumstances turned out that way.

Notwithstanding these fears, the new pope isn’t quite the same as Sorrentino’s titular “New Pope” either.

At least that’s how we’re choosing to see it, while taking in the fanciful speculations wrought in “Conclave” or Sorrentino’s dramas.