Both films reimagine the pope's jail cell visit to his would-be assassin, where he preaches forgiveness. Both replay his trip to Jerusalem's Wailing Wall and his emotional connection to the Solidarity movement in Poland. Parkinson's disease and the fall leading to hip surgery are re-enacted. Both revisit the deathbed vigil and take pains to show him as a man of peace, a holy man who endorsed "this gift of suffering."

Among the more pleasing differences is the presence of 75-year-old Ben Gazzara in the CBS telefilm. His raspy, gravelly voice is evidence of his 1999 battle with throat cancer, but he's credible in the role of Cardinal Agostino Casaroli, the pope's confidante.

attempt. The story then flashes back to Krakow 1939, as uniformed Nazis destroy a cross. There's young Karol helping his friend the Jew - that would be the one in the armband and yarmulke.

Kretschmann's portrayal on ABC opens in Jerusalem 2000, as a stooped and thin-looking pope asks forgiveness "for all the sins of the Catholic Church," promising "never again." Cut to Poland 1928, as Karol in short pants hears his mother's horrible cough, warning of loss - and her deathbed scene - to come.

Elwes hands off to Voight in the process of dressing (one head goes in the shirt, the other comes out) as the chronology continues. The cardinals' difficulty pronouncing his name, the pope's interactions with young people, the creation of World Youth Day and the 1993 trip to Denver flesh out the CBS film.

While the genius of a good TV movie is its ability to engage the viewer emotionally, to create sympathetic characters and to evoke powerful feelings of connection, at some point the reverie must end. Waking from the multiple odes to the charismatic modern pope, audiences may be forgiven for harboring nagging questions.

Why is the papal dismissal of a women's demonstration in the streets noted only in passing as protesters bang on his limo? Why nothing more than a nod to the swirling controversies over ordaining women or the question of choice in matters of procreation?

As the actors move us close to tears we find ourselves wondering: Is it enough to show the likable pontiff hiking, kissing babies and asking forgiveness for the sins of the church? Or, at some point, shouldn't a biography consider the storm of criticism whirling around the church for its passivity toward overpopulation in the Third World, its witchhunts of gay priests, its antipathy to science, its pronouncements on the meaning of "family" by men without families?

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