Joan of Arc

First thing to bear in mind is that it's the second part of a diptych dealing with the French heroine; the first one,released the precedent year,called 'Jeannette ,l'enfance de Jeanne" , partly a musical, told the early years in Domremy ,the heavenly voices and the beginning of the legend .

The most famous story of our history,told,and told and told and TOLD.And filmed and filmed and filmed and FILMED :from Dreyer to Besson ,via De Mille , Preminger,Fleming,Bresson,and so many others it's impossible to count them all .

In "destinées" (1953),Jean Delannoy ,a director hated by the NV ,had sketched a new approach : it was only a sketch (about 40 min) but for the first time,it did not show Jeanne's epic but her moments of doubt and fear ,after the king was about to negociate and did not want to carry on with the fight.

"Jeanne" begins just before the siege of Paris ,the first of the heroine's failures .From the very beginning,one knows what to expect : not the usual scenes ,nothing spectacular ;if you're looking for this ,you'd better move on.

So much for the prelims : "this will be a defining moment" they all say ,before coming to the Parisians' rescue : her brothers in arms ,the duke of Alençon and Gilles De Rais (he's told :"you are not a sorcerer yet" ,an ominous line ");then heavenly voices which seem to sum up the epic for Joan is tired of the war and admits that she longs for the gentle way of life when she was spinning the wool .Then a very long scene which depicts movements in the horsemen which eventually produces a hypnotic effect .

Probably influenced by Bernard Shaw and Jean Anouilh,Dumont puts the stress on the supporting characters :hence the long discussion between the judges before the trial ,priding themselves on their degrees and on their high competence ; the trial takes place ,oddly ,in the cathedral of Rouen , which makes Joan all the more small and frail since the actress looks hardly like a teenager .This may be the only moment the viewer finds something to cling to ,for some of the lines are historically true (notably Jeanne's state of grace).Then again a threnody is heard ,sung by singer Christophe who wrote the music and appears here as preacher Guillaume Evrard -sadly Christophe was to pass away recently ,a victim of the covid 19.

The artistic choice is brought to the fore one more time in the final scenes : the torturers talk about their instruments ,and there's a pathetic quarrel about the prisoner's chain ;likewise , the guards of the dungeon show no compassion ,no desire (she's a witch and people were superstitious),and are more interested in the bottles of wine one of their mates bring:their derisory words are not unlike these of the warden in Jean Anouilh 's " Antigone" : it's not their business.

Defying historical realism , Jeanne 's jail looks like a WW2 bunker ; the audience is even refused the stake (Anouilh's "influence again :in "l'alouette" ,he had the stake destroyed) : only a small smoke ascends towards the absolute . It's not a very accessible film :but it possesses a mesmerizing fascinating power .

Anyone who is knowledgeable about the history of Jeanne the maid of Lorraine will be puzzled by this torpid representation of her ordeal.

The casting is baffling. A 10 year old plays Jeanne, who was 19. The wonderful Fabrice Luchini, a man in his late 60's, plays King Charles, a man in his mid 20's. Apart from Luchini, most of the cast are dreadfully wooden. The camera work is perfunctory at best. The first 40 minutes is excruciatingly slow and shot mostly in sand dunes near the English Channel / La Manche. We are expected to suspend disbelief enough to imagine this variously represents the vicinity just outside Paris or in the garden of the Château de la Trémouille. A battle scene consists of about two dozen cast on horseback performing an equine dance routine. The dialogue appears to be straight from a play this film was based on. Exposition by announcing characters as we watch them trudge through the sand is amateurish beyond belief. The editor must have been high when this section of the film was cut. Incredibly long passages of nothing happening.

I gave up around the 35 minute mark, and a day later was about to write a review when I thought to be fair I should watch the movie in its entirety first and try to fathom how it achieved the awards it received. So I sat and watched the rest.

Around the 40 minute mark the locations shift to inside Amiens cathedral which provides some photographic interest and gradually the dialogue picks up. I assume the dialogue is from Jeanne's trial. Towards the end of the film, Jeanne's prison in Rouen is a WWII bunker in the middle of nowhere.

The budget for this film is supposedly EUR1,500,000. I can't see what it was spent on. The money would have been better spent shooting the stage play with no other pretensions.

'Cahiers du Cinéma' named Jeanne (Joan of Arc) the 5th best film of 2019. I assume they only saw 5 films. The French film industry is better than this.

This film has a certain look and feel which can be described as cheap and tedious. So don't bother with this one. You will only be exasperated that you wasted over 2 hours for nothing.

Starting with the acting part of the movie, the said were only said not delivered , the locations didn't seem to fit the narrative in the first shots of the movie ,the only tried to convey the emotion of the charechter but didn't take the story forward which to seemed like a waste of time , the idea and effort of using more metaphors was something i admire, but more thought needs to be put in making the metaphors work and hvae the impact they need to have

I liked the fact that this adaptation wasn't your typical overblown rubbish with gratuitous sex scenes that are churned out of Hollywood. Other than the one overacting blusterous priest that wouldn't shut up. I found this play like structure rather enjoyable.

I see that there are reviewers who were expecting a George Lucas Star Wars type of production full of glamorous but wooden actors. I feel that this young actress did a fantastic portrayal of Joan of Arc and the absent of sex in this film tends to place more focus on the actual story being told.

There are plenty of ways in which a director and script writers can go when putting together a historical production such as this. I for one prefer art over sex appeal, and talent over exposed flesh.

This incredibly, well-paced french film with an ego-less perspective set during the middle ages perfectly captures the story of Joan of Arc. It felt holy, symbolic and absolutely beautiful.

If you're not a fan, at least you've experienced a contrasting perspective to your every day experience!

Wholesome and intelligent.