Inside the Vatican
There's something slightly unsettling about the young, toothy, dark-skinned nun clad in white (looking much like an old-fashioned nurse), giggling while nodding in the direction of a pile of white fabric, and revealing that they are the Pope's sheets. In reality, they are not quite the Pope's sheets. They are in the process of being sewn by nuns such as herself, either sitting at machines, or sewing by hand, with a gold thimble on their middle fingers.
But something indicates that this nun rather fancies the intimacy implicit in her being that close to the Pope. It's about as close as she will ever get, but manufacturing his bedding is closer than any of us is bound to get to the Pope.
For some reason, this excerpt has stuck in my mind, but in reality, there are many gob-smacking moments - and statistics - in this two-part documentary (which originally screened on SBS).
For devoted Catholics, Inside The Vatican will provide an unprecedented level of access to footage and facts in and around the Vatican (such as an organic farm in the middle of the Vatican gardens).
For the rest of us, well, it will provide the same thing, but the effect the documentary has on us is likely to be somewhat different*.
In any case, Inside The Vatican is oddly fascinating.
*Okay, okay I'll confess: my heart melted during the scene in which a man talks about a lamb who won't be eaten; it is a lamb who was presented to the pope when it was three days old, and tiny. And it's a heck of a cute lamb! I forgave the Papacy its excesses during that particular scene.