Ralph Fiennes in Conclave. (Focus Features/Courtesy Everett Collection)

When the pope dies, cardinals gather for a secret meeting — known as a conclave — to select a new pope. The process was depicted in the 2024 film, Conclave, which won an Oscar this year.

The film, starring Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci, John Lithgow and Isabella Rossellini, is based on the 2016 novel of the same name by Robert Harris, which examines what happens when cardinals from around the world fly into Vatican City to begin voting for the next pope.

While the plot of the movie is fictional, how accurate was it in depicting conclaves?

Conclave properly depicts how cardinals are cut off from the outside world as they talk with each other to try and decide who should be elected the next pope. Until a two-thirds majority chooses someone, the ballots are burned after each vote and the smoke tells the public whether a pope has been elected or not.

While the Casa Santa Marta, which is where the cardinals stay both in the movie and in real life, is run by nuns, Rossellini, who plays Sister Agnes, seems to have more activity and involvement in the conclave than is normally allowed for anyone who isn’t a cardinal, NPR reported.

Prayers in the Vatican are usually either in Latin or Italian only, not in English and Spanish as is shown in the movie, Piotr H. Kosicki, an associate professor of history at the University of Maryland, pointed out to the New York Times.

And, of course — no spoilers — but what happens at the end of Conclave is unlikely to happen in real life.

The “acting and production values were great, but the plot twists were bizarre and unbelievable,” Tom Reese, a Jesuit priest and church commentator, told CNN.