Pope Leo XIV’s Favourite Films & Where To Stream Them
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58 minutes ago
The first American pope is engaging with Hollywood
Hollywood takes Rome: Pope Leo XIV is set to host a celebrity gathering this weekend, inviting the likes of Cate Blanchett, Chris Pine, Monica Bellucci and Dave Franco to descend on the Vatican City, along with Oscar-winning directors Spike Lee and George Miller as well as Brit Joanna Hogg.
The news comes just six months into the Chicago-born bishop’s papacy, and is part of continued Holy Year celebrations – a special year of forgiveness and reconciliation in Catholicism, recurring every 25 years. Organised by the Vatican’s culture office, the objective of this movie special is to create a dialogue between the world of cinema and the Church, exploring how artistic creativity can support Christian missions and values.
Recently, Pope Leo has welcomed Hollywood legends Al Pacino and Robert de Niro to the Vatican, presenting the Godfather star with the microstate’s highest honour, the Lupa Capitolina. But when it comes to the Pope’s own taste in films, it’s safe to say he prefers something a bit less gritty. The Vatican has revealed Pope Leo’s four favourite flicks in a new video – watch it below.
Where To Stream Pope Leo’s Favourite Movies
It’s A Wonderful Life (1946)
Directed and produced by Frank Capra, the first flick on Pope Leo’s list is a Christmas classic that’s also full of Christian values, from love and charity to redemption. It’s A Wonderful Life centres on George Bailey (James Stewart), a selfless small-town banker who finds himself in a $8,000 economic crisis and feels his life is a failure, considering suicide on Christmas Eve. But then Clarence Odbody, a guardian angel, descends from ‘Head Office’ and shows George an alternate reality in which he was never born, leading the woeful man to realise how valuable his contributions to life have been after all.
It’s A Wonderful Life is available to stream for free on Plex or to rent across multiple platforms.
The Sound Of Music (1965)
Born in 1955, Pope Leo is the very first pontiff to be born after the end of World War II, but his second film pick whisks us over to Salzburg just before the war commenced. Starring Brit Julie Andrews as free-spirited governess Maria, The Sound of Music tells the tale of the von Trapps: the stern, widowed Captain Georg (Christopher Plummer) and his seven children. Winning them over with her love of music, Maria and the Captain eventually fall in love and marry, only to return from their honeymoon to find the Nazis have annexed Austria. Refusing to serve in the German Navy, Georg and his family dramatically escape Austria for Switzerland, choosing freedom over their home.
The Sound of Music is available to stream with a Disney+ subscription and to rent across multiple platforms.
Ordinary People (1980)
Robert Redford’s directorial debut bagged the Academy Award for Best Picture and also captured the heart of the future Pope, Leo. It all opens with a tragedy in the upper-middle-class Jarrett family living in Lake Forest, Illinois: the death of the eldest son, Buck, in a boating accident. His brother Conrad (Timothy Hutton) survived the accident but is struggling with survivor’s guilt, mother Beth (Mary Tyler Moore) is emotionally distant, all while patriarch Calvin (Donald Sutherland) is desperately trying to hold the family together. The result is a powerful study of grief, emotional repression and tumultuous mental recovery beneath the veneer of a perfect family.
Ordinary People is available to rent across multiple platforms.
La vita è bella (Life Is Beautiful) (1997)
This Italian tragicomedy is Pope Leo’s only non-American pick, but like The Sound of Music is concerned with WWII. Starring and directed by Roberto Benigni, the film opens in fascist Italy in 1939, when Jewish-Italian Guido Orefice marries Dora and the pair have a son, Giosuè. When the family is deported to a Nazi concentration camp, Guido concocts an elaborate lie to shield his young son from the horrible truth, convincing Giosuè they are participating in a complex game where strict rules and hardships are challenges.
La vita è bella is available to rent across multiple platforms.
