Original subtitles

(Radio static and channels warping)

(Male newscaster speaking Italian)

- The world has stopped turning.

The world has stopped turning.

For days now something has been happening that we haven't seen for a long time.

News and social networks, the front page of newspapers

are not focusing on evil anymore,

but on good.

Not on war and terrorism, butonlove.

And all of this thanks to pius the 13th's heartbreaking love letters.

The world has stopped turning.

The world has stopped turning. To talk about love.

(Contemplative piano music)

(Instrumental rock version of all along the watchtower)

(Clock ticking)

(Breathes deeply)

(Dramatic didgeridoo tones)

(Choir vocalizing)

(Rapid Russian folk music)

(Choir singing in Russian)

Holy father.

You accorded an audience to the head of the Vatican press office.

She's outside waiting.

(Sighs)

(Rapid Russian folk music)

(Choir singing in Russian)

(Music stops)

Are you sure?

(Laughs)

Holy father, the Italian prime minister is continuing to postpone legislation

on taxing the Vatican and civil unions.

His left-wing supporters are calling for blood.

Many of them claim that you are behind this,

that you are the man who changed the prime minister's mind.

And I think the same thing.

That might be the case.

How did you do it?

I humiliated him.

You have no idea how many objectives can be obtained

by humiliating one's fellow man.

- But there's a secret to it. - What is it?

A person humiliated can't realize they've been humiliated.

If you don't mind my saying so, you're diabolical.

You think? People that know me well actually say that I'm a Saint.

How did it go with the patriarch of Moscow?

(Exhales)

The patriarch of Moscow is more boring than watching golf on television.

(Laughs)

So, what is our next set of decisions?

Do you remember that on Wednesday, you promised

to act as a tour guide in the Vatican museums for a third grade field trip?

(Groans)

God almighty, what atrocity can I have committed to deserve that?

I don't know if I'll be able to make that appointment.

On Wednesday, I have to watch golf on TV.

Holy father, you don't want to disappoint the children, do you?

Ma'am, it's the children who've disappointed me.

Didn't you like your childhood?

(Sighs)

All I remember of my childhood is that one day, it wasn't there anymore.

(Ever had a little faith? Playing)

(Music stops)

Clothespin.

Have we found any confirmation of David tanistone's statements?

I would say so.

His mother had a brief affair with archbishop kurtwell

when they were both attending catholic university in Washington, DC.

Then they drifted apart.

She, like the devout catholic that she is, decided to give birth to her son.

After a few years,

and oppressed by the grim economic straits into which she had drifted,

she decided to turn to kurtwell for help.

Which is how kurtwell came to know him.

But in the meanwhile, a veritable earthquake had devastated that man's personality.

And the rubble from it collapsed directly onto that young man.

For the rest of the story, we'll have to ask kurtwell.

Lenny: I intend to shake things up a little.

I would like to have you become my personal secretary.

Sister Mary has completed her mission.

Now, justifiably,

she wants to move on.

- She's completed her mission? - Yes.

The child pope has become a man.

He once needed a motherly presence, and he now needs a colleague.

What do you think of my proposal?

That I can't accept.

Why not?

Because it would be hypocritical.

(Reflective guitar music playing)

What's hypocritical about it?

I'm a horn...

I'm a homosexual, holy father.

And you want to expel all homosexuals from the church.

Every rule has its exceptions.

Gutierrez: But I don't subscribe to the exception that you'd make for me.

I don't subscribe to the rule.

It's a huge mistake not to accept homosexuals.

It's a huge mistake to compare them with pedophiles, the way you do.

An unacceptable generalization.

How can you fail to see,

you, of all people, holy father, you,

the author of those heartbreaking love letters,

that in pedophilia, there is only violence,

and in homosexuality, there is only love?

You say you don't want to be my personal secretary,

but, in actual fact, you're already doing the job.

You offer me some advice.

That's what a personal secretary does.

But in this case, I don't just want to give the advice.

I want you to accept it.

How many things I accept, Gutierrez, and no one notices!

That's a pope's fate. That's the fate of power.

Try to reason with me.

If I ask you to be my personal secretary,

am I not already revising my own beliefs about homosexuality?

Or do you actually believe

I knew nothing about your homosexuality

or the fact that you were sexually abused as a child?

I knew that too.

That's why I sent you to kurtwell.

That's why I now want you working by my side.

Because we need to work on the future.

You need the right motivations to do that, and you have those.

The right motivations can move the world.

You've changed

since you came back from your trip.

In what way have I changed?

You've transformed fear into anger.

Very good, Gutierrez.

Very good.

(Coffee cup rattling)

(Rosary jangling)

(Dark tones playing)

(Mild piano music playing)

(Music stops)

I beg of you,

confide in me

the wisest thing you have ever learned.

In the end, more than in god,

it is necessary to believe in yourself, Lenny.

Have you got something

a little better?

That's a banal platitude.

(Chuckles) If only you knew

how true a banal platitude can be, my dear colleague.

After all, look at us.

We are power,

and power is a banal platitude.

(Church bells tolling)

Marivaux: We will be dealing with you one day, your holiness.

Lenny: What do you mean?

Marivaux: You are going to be a Saint. I'm perfectly serious.

I don't need any more steps in my career.

Your prayers, holy father...

Your prayers move god.

Oh?

When?

Let's stick to the facts

and skip the memorable account of what you did at age 14

in the room of the gravely sick wife of the custodian who was suddenly cured.

Now, then, here are the simple facts.

Esther and Peter were infertile, sterile, barren.

The young woman confided in you.

And you, holy father,

you didn't tell her what anyone else would have said,

"go see a doctor."

No, instead, your holiness prayed,

and Esther became pregnant,

and she gave birth to a beautiful child.

Moreover, it became clear that sister antonia

was actually an unworthy woman, an evildoer.

You had the power to remove her from her position.

You had the power to punish her.

All you had to do was to sign a document,

but instead you chose not to do that.

Instead you chose to pray in the rain,

kneeling on the asphalt at a rest stop on a highway,

and at that moment,

sister antonia shuferd off the stage thanks to a divine punishment.

Now, these are the things that saints do.

They are moved by a faith so solid

that they believe in god,

in the power of god,

before they believe in the power of human beings.

As you see, holy father, miracles are more likely to happen.

We only need to keep our ears open.

Lenny: Are your ears always open for the blessed juana?

Marivaux: Always.

(Dramatic orchestral music playing)

When she was 15,

she went to see the children at the hospital,

and always brought tangerines with her.

And she didn't care whether they ate them or not.

But she wanted them to peel them

and to play at squeezing the peels

and spraying each other with the bright and unforgettable scent of the fruit.

Then she told the children,

"I will go away from you, and you will go away from me,

"but it doesn't matter,

"because all that will be left on this earth

"is the scent of goodness."

I could listen for hours.

This story tells us something important.

What?

That goodness,

unless combined with imagination,

runs the risk of being mere exhibitionism.

Hmm, how true. How true.

Marivaux: Well, if you want to know everything about the blessed juana,

there's a wonderful opportunity that we can take advantage of.

You see, every Christmas, the miracle children,

who are now in their 50s,

gather at a Plaza in Guatemala City,

and tell the story of the miracle cures.

I've attended, and it was a very moving and unforgettable experience.

I mean, everyone would be overjoyed to have you there.

Are you suggesting I spend my Christmas in Guatemala?

Yes. It would be a memorable gesture.

All right, then. We'll go to Guatemala.

On the understanding that it will be a small and private get-together

without crowds and without press.

Just us and the miracle children.

It will be exactly as you wish.

(Laughs)

Lenny: All right, children,

today we are going on a tour of the Vatican museums,

and I am gonna be your tour guide.

(Applause)

(Thunder booming)

Earlier it was snowing, and now it's raining.

Too bad.

Snow is so much nicer than rain, isn't it?

Children: Yes!

But if it's raining,

that can only mean you've been bad children.

"Why?"

Because raindrops are the tears of Christ!

And if Jesus is crying,

that can only mean you've made him angry.

(Children crying)

What?

Hey, I was just kidding.

Have a sense of humor, for Pete's sake.

All right, children. Here's what we'll do.

Right now, we are all going to eat hamburgers and French fries,

and after lunch, we'll continue our tour of the museums.

Follow me.

Aren't you gonna eat hamburgers and French fries?

My mommy wants me to stick to the mediterranean diet.

I understand.

I don't want a mommy with a beard.

You need to learn to settle for what you get.

I don't want to settle.

You're right.

I don't want to settle anymore either.

(Somber string music playing)

(Both speaking Spanish)

- How are you?

- Who, me? I'm always in a good mood.

- I've always associated good mood with stupidity.

- And not without reason, your holiness.

However you can't imagine the amount of energy

that comes from good mood and stupidity.

- What did you want to tell me?

- I wanted to update you on a survey

in the magazine "catholic universe" that I've been publishing for eight years.

- What is it about?

- We asked a question to a mixed group of people:

If they'd like to attend a sermon of the pope face-to-face.

- How many? - 99% of all catholics.

- And would this change things?

- No, your holiness.

It wouldn't change things.

A pope doesn't change people.

- Well, then you're confirming that there is no

good reason for me to appear in public.

- No, actually yes, there is a reason. - And what would that be?

- If you appear in public, it would help these people to be in a good mood.

- I'm not a comedian. - That doesn't matter.

It's the show of being there that helps

- that's not my duty.

- Yes.

Yes, it is.

Your holiness...

You've changed a lot

since you began your papacy.

- Affliction changes us, aguirre.

- But good mood doesn't.

(Indistinct chatter)

(Xylophone tinkling)

(Smooth rock music playing)

Lenny: Accipe anulum de manu petri

et noveris dilectione principis apostolorum

dilectionem tuam erga ecclesiam roborari.

(Crying)

(Crying)

(Xylophone tinkling)

(Music stops)

(Praying indistinctly)

Amen.

Lenny: What happened to your hands, your eminence?

Oh, holy father.

The cold in Alaska, when I say mass in the open air.

Haven't you tried using skin creams?

I am allergic.

And then there is the rheumatism.

These look like the hands of Christ on the cross.

God bless you, holy father.

(Crying)

I can't even hold a glass anymore.

(Sobbing)

(Inquisitive flute music playing)

(Giggling)

(Children laughing)

(Children laughing and shouting)

(Children laughing and shouting)

(Dark music playing)

(Shower running)

(Dramatic percussive tones playing)

Ku rtwell: That man's name was Jack walser.

He was the superintendent of the building

where we lived...

Before the lord called me to him.

He had divided the tenants into two categories.

The "natives" and the "nomads."

My family belonged to the category of the nomads,

because we didn't have enough money to ensure the stability enjoyed by the natives.

One day, Jack rang our doorbell at 10:00 in the morning,

confident that I would be at school.

But that day,

I was still at home, in bed with a fever.

And the door to my room was open,

and he stretched out on a little sofa

where my father sat when he listened to the radio.

And he drenched it... (Labored breathing)

With his wet clothes.

And he... he told me

that the party was over for us nomads,

that the owners had decided to double the rent.

And he said it as if he had something good, something fragrant in his mouth.

And then he gestured for me to come closer.

And he said to me, in a tone of voice I'd never heard in my life,

he said, "on your knees."

At last...

He said the most vulgar phrase I've ever heard in my life.

He said, "there are only two reasons a human being would get down on his knees.

"And one is to pray,

"and the other is to know himself."

(Crying)

I was only 12 years old, holy father.

I was 12 years old!

(Somber music playing)

You need to continue, archbishop.

Your story isn't finished yet.

(Exhales heavily)

What... what else do you want to know?

What happened aftennard?

Oh, you want to know whether or not I, as an adult, became like Jack walser.

Certainly, that's all you care about.

What do you care about a 12-year-old boy on his knees

in front of a man in wet clothing on a chilly day in February in 1955?

We care, archbishop,

about all children.

All of them.

(Crying softly)

Fine.

Let's get on with it then.

Yes, holy father.

For the rest of my life,

I have behaved like Jack walser.

(Kurtwell sighs) Can that be enough?

Lenny: Come here, archbishop.

I've made my decision.

I'm sending you back to the United States.

(Gasps)

Where do you want to go?

Kurtwell: To New York.

I want to go home.

Fine.

Oh, holy father, infinite is your compassion.

Infinite is your capacity for forgiveness.

Lenny: I have one simple request.

Anything, your holiness.

I want to make sure

you really do want to go home.

So I want you to plant your finger on New York

on the globe.

(Somber violin music playing)

Ketchikan, Alaska.

I know the place.

Very nice.

Small town of 8,000 inhabitants that's so cold, it'll split your fingers.

But in the words of the nobel laureate brodsky,

"beauty at low temperatures is beauty."

(Sighs)

Archbishop kurtwell,

your disease has deceived you.

(Lighter clicks)

Sister Mary: There's a rumor going around that I'm about to leave the Vatican.

You have to admit that the rumors that circulate in the Vatican

almost always correspond to the truth.

Where will I go?

Where you've always wanted to be.

With children.

You're an orphan.

Orphans want to stay with children forever.

How do you know I'm an orphan?

I've always known.

How do you know?

It's difficult

for a Saint to answer all the questions of humanity.

Can I start calling you Lenny again?

(Bright guitar music playing)

Only if I can call you ma.

Yes. You can call me ma.

But where will I go?

To Africa.

To take sister antonia's place.

And there you'll be in charge of all 250 villages of goodness.

I'd like to open new ones, just for the children.

What do you think?

I think it's a good idea.

In the end, we all have to go back to where we began.

And you?

When will you go back to where you began?

Where did I begin?

You began with two hippie parents.

I've stopped searching for my parents.

I've stopped searching for god.

Never say that again.

The truth is, you've never searched.

You've been hiding yourself.

(Sighs)

When do you want me to leave?

Tomorrow morning.

Before you go, if you'd like,

you can say goodbye to the cardinal secretary of state.

So long, Saint.

So long, ma.

(Pulaski a t night playing)

(Sighs)

(Music stops)

- (Groans) - Your holiness!

Don't you feel well?

No, no. It's just a passing discomfort.

- Should I get a doctor? - No, no, no.

It's not serious. It's over.

Are you certain you don't want me to call the doctor?

All better now.

Do you believe in god?

(Sighs)

Yes, I do.

I don't.

Those who believe in god don't believe in anything.

(Melancholy guitar music playing)

(Voiello speaking Italian)

- You already knew I had fallen in love with that woman, didn't you?

Of course you knew it.

I'm an open book to you.

And here we are again

at the same age-old question:

Who ever said that a man can't love god and a woman at the same time?

That's bullshit.

Ah... (Weak laugh)

There's one thing I've never understood about you:

Whether you're a lazio fan like your father or whether you root for napoli like I do.

You're unclear on this point.

What?

You want to know what became of tonino pettola?

Look, well...

Tonino pettola... what happened is that...

Jesus, what an unseemly thing!

I didn't want to, but the pope...

Basically, tonino pe...

Oh god, I was about to tell you!

No, my friend. You'll have to forgive me. But I...

I can't tell anyone what became of tonino pettola.

Forgive me, but I can't even tell you, and you're my best friend.

There are certain secrets so important that only one person should know them.

Don't resent me for this. I love you like the son I never had.

But I can never reveal to you what became of tonino pettola.

(Girolamo grunts)

Merry Christmas, girolamo.

You know, you were right.

- When an orphan matures... - (Praying indistinctly)

He may discover a fresh youth within.

And at that point, he will have something to say.

You have something to say.

I know it,

I feel it,

and you will say it.

Your holiness, you will say it. (Chuckling)

You'll say it.

You... you'll say it.

You'll say it. You'll say it.

- You'll say it. You'll say it. - (Rapid percussive tones)

You'll say it. You'll say it. You'll say it. You'll say it.

You'll say it. You'll say it. You'll say it.

You have a very tight family, eminence.

Very affectionate.

It's been a lovely Christmas Eve.

May I be indiscreet, your holiness,

and say something that concerns you personally?

You may.

Your parents abandoned you when you were a child.

Nothing so strange about that.

One might feel constrained to abandon a child

for all sorts of reasons.

There is no evidence to suggest they are dead.

You've become one of the most famous people on the planet,

but they do not get in touch with you.

"Why?" I asked myself.

A guilty conscience, perhaps?

But the prospect of a reconciliation should be more powerful than any sense of guilt.

So what explanation did you come up with, then?

A very simple one.

They were hippies.

Presumably they hold the same libertarian

and progressive opinions today as they had then.

And you become the worldwide champion of ideas

that run completely counter to theirs.

So you're saying the reason they didn't reach out to me

is a difference in political opinion?

I am saying that whoever had the courage

to abandon a child

might also find the strength

to repudiate him.

(Melancholic music playing)

Holy father, the plane is on the tarmac waiting for us.

Whenever you like, it's all ready.

Lenny: We aren't going to Guatemala after all.

The miracle people of the blessed juana will be so disappointed.

Yes, they will.

But in time, they'll understand.

All I ever wanted when I was a child was to be a cardinal.

What about you, holy father?

What did you want to be when you were a child?

I wanted to be a child.

Tommaso: And now where is god?

In venice.

Tommaso: In venice?

And where does he live there?

That's something I have to find out.

(I remember playing)

(Speaking Italian)

Holy father.

I got you

something stupid.

It has no real worth, but

I saw it, and I thought of you.

(Lenny chuckles)

Says here you can see for more than 100 meters.

Holy father,

the manager of the restaurant and all the staff

wonder if you'd be willing to give a benediction.

They are all behind you waiting.

If you were to turn around, for them,

it would be something of a minor miracle.

That would be an exhibition.

(Laughs)

(Gentle instrumental music playing)

Lenny: (Over speakers) When they asked her,

"who is god?"

"God is a line that opens,"

replied the blessed juana.

She was just 14 years old.

(Gulls calling)

And no one understood what it was she was trying to say.

And then,

all the children asked the dying blessed juana

dozens of questions.

"Are we dead or are we alive?"

(Birds chirping)

(Over radio) "Are we tired or are we vigorous?"

"Are we healthy or are we sick?"

"Are we good or are we bad?"

"Do we still have time or has it run out?"

"Are we young or are we old?"

"Are we clean or are we dirty?"

"Are we fools or are we smart?"

"Are we true or are we false?"

"Are we rich or are we poor?"

"Are we kings or are we servants?"

"Are we good or are we beautiful?"

"Are we warm or are we cold?"

"Are we happy or are we blind?"

"Are we disappointed or are we joyful?"

"Are we lost or are we found?"

"Are we men or are we women?"

"It doesn't matter,"

replied the blessed juana

as she lay dying

at the age of just 18.

And she added,

on the verge of death,

with tears in her eyes...

"God does not allow himself to be seen.

"God does not shout.

"God does not whisper.

"God does not write.

"God does not hear.

"God does not chat.

"God does not comfort us."

And all the children asked her,

"who is god?"

(Sighing)

And juana replied... (Voice breaking)

"God smiles."

And only then did everyone understand.

(All cheering and applauding)

And now,

I beg all of you, (inhales)

Smile.

Smile.

Smile.

(Crowd cheering)

That's right. Smile.

(Mutters indistinctly)

(Breathing heavily)

(Feedback over mic)

(Gasping)

It's nothing. It's nothing.

One day, I will die.

And I will finally

be able to embrace you all.

One by one.

(Chuckles)

(Inhales) Yes.

I will.

I have faith that I will.

- Get a doctor. - (Breathing heavily)