The Two Popes,” the 2019 film starring Jonathan Pryce as the cardinal who would go on to become Pope Francis, saw its viewing on Netflix increase more than 30 times in the week following the pontiff’s death,

The Two Popes, a 2019 Oscar-winning film about the relationship between Francis (Jonathan Pryce) and his predecessor Pope Benedict XVI (Anthony Hopkins), returned to Netflix’s top 10. Its viewership increased by more than 30x the prior week, Netflix said, when Pope Francis was ailing but still alive.

That makes sense, given that Edward Berger’s Oscar-winning 2024 film is quite literally a dramatization of the process that takes place after a pope dies: the cardinals gather i