Revolutionary

Rating: 10/10 (25 August 2013)

'Joan of Arc' is stylistically a key work in the history of cinema, through its combination of close-ups, camera angles, framing and movements of the characters and of the camera on this characters. Dreyer created a masterful visual sequencing with the movements of the heads inside the screen and of camera panning and tilting on these same heads (of the judges of Joan of Arc). This sequencing suggests an inescapable iron encircling of Joan of Arc (whose close-ups were filmed with a fixed camera) by her vicious judges. All these shots created the same effect as that of the painting 'Christ Carrying the Cross' by Jheronimus Bosch, where the serene face of Christ contrasts sharply with the ferocity of the visages in the crowd around him. The camera angles and the decentered and canted framing further accentuate the contrast between Jeanne's face full of grace and the grim facial expressions of her corrupt judges, a bunch of perfidious theologians and dishonest lawyers.
The film exposes blatantly the corruption of the Catholic Church, which slavishly defends the English crown and its interests. Instead of trying to stay above the political fray, it prefers to play an active role in a war of succession thereby choosing the interests of the foreign forces instead of those of the native population.
The character of Joan of Arc is interpreted sublimely by Maria (Renée Jeanne) Falconetti. Ongoing rumors of Carl Th. Dreyer's misogyny and sadism towards his actresses are contradicted by the testimony of the daughter of M. Falconetti in Torben Skjødt Jensen's documentary 'Carl Th. Dreyer: Min metier'. However, Carl Th. Dreyer put without a shadow of a doubt the quality of his shots and of the final product (his movie) above the fate of his actors and actresses (see the testimony of Preben Lerdorff Rye in the same documentary).
With 'Joan of Arc' Carl Th. Dreyer shot an eternal masterpiece. A must see.