If one picture is worth a thousand words, Maria Falconetti's eyes are worth a thousand frames ...

Rating: 10/10 (12 October 2011)

Never had the torment of a woman been as beautifully portrayed, inspiring nothing but pure sympathy, as in Dryer's silent masterpiece, "The Passion of Joan of Arc", pure sympathy in the Christian meaning of the word, and I'm not even Christian.
I can't describe the emotion that tunnels me through Falconetti's eyes; words are feeble, futile, risible, such a performance can't be praised enough, it's like the divine touch of Joan of Arc really embraced Falconetti, she WAS Joan of Arc reincarnated on celluloid, it's even as if Carl Theodore Dryer traveled in time and shot the real trial of Joan of Arc  I know, this is from Jean Cocteau, but I'm only paraphrasing what is probably the feeling of a vast majority.
We will never know how God inspired Joan to resist to the English Invasion during the Hundred Years War, and it's only fitting that this unintelligibility is featured in a silent film. What we see is an ounce of divinity inhabiting the eyes of Falconetti, this life in her eyes is the guiding light that comes from the bottom of her soul, we see but we can't reach it, because Dryer doesn't deify the heroin, not even make a martyr out of her. Indeed, if one word could describe Joan of Arc in the film, it's a vulnerable, poignant and heart-breaking humanity. Her face provides such a wide range of emotions that she hypnotically embodies the weakness of a woman harassed by a bunch of heartless judges, scared to death, scared OF death, yet she stands for her convictions. Her body betrays her emotions, but her eyes resist, her eyes mirror the true strength of her soul: an unflappable faith.
Dryer's directorial work also deserves praises for the significant part it plays in the film, if you combine it with the editing and the screenplay. The movie is a period drama, but there are no castles, no riding knights, no feasts, no battles, except for the chaotic execution's aftermath. And the trial is only an excuse for probably the first cinematic character study, centered on one of the most legendary heroin that even graced the course of humanity's history, and God knows not enough women did what Joan did. Joan of Arc defines the very word of heroin as someone who's anything but a victim, choosing her fate, her destiny, not out of bravery but despite her fears. It's easy to die when you're not afraid of dying, but never heroism can be displayed without something precious at stakes. In the case of Joan, how could have she discredited her belief that God came to her ... to save her life?! What was the point of living after that?
Like for any hero, there's the pivotal test, when she's subtly lured into signing the infamous paper that would saved her from excommunication, from the bonfire, at her integrity's price. But when she realized she signed out of fear, she immediately retracted and symbolically signed her own death warrant. How could she lie to herself when her eyes breathed the truth in its purest form? This is what the story is about, Joan's passion, a passion transmitted to the crowd when her head was shaved, when she carried the cross, when she burnt on the bonfire. Joan embodied a Christ-like martyrdom, sadder than inspiring, we feel sad because she's human, mortal and vulnerable. For the judges, the crime isn't even blasphemy, it's pretension. They mock her, shout at her, even condescendingly laugh, but there's always one moment where her eyes manage to penetrate the soul of one of them, and for a brief instant, one heart is touched by a sort of ephemeral light betrayed by one imperceptible facial expression.
On that department, the movie is a school case. I said it's not a period drama made on a epic scale, it's not even on the scale of a trial film. The whole film is made of countless cuts and close-ups with a close to perfect capability to convey the right feeling. The film is a masterpiece, not just by silent films' standards, it reaches a level of artistic greatness independent from any attempt to tell a story. Look at the film even without that haunting medieval music and you'll still find yourself transported by these eyes, these facial expressions, even the wrinkles on the faces, the severity of a closed mouth, emphasize the nightmarish feeling endured by Joan. The camera is always kept low with the antagonists as to reinforce their powerful position, while Joan is under the camera with her eyes looking in God's direction. Whenever she feels weak, she looks down then turn her eyes to God, at times, her eyes move in every direction, when she's panic-stricken as any 'weak' woman, but ultimately, she recovers the extreme serenity of a privileged human being touched by the divine grace.
Yet, at the end, she's still scared, and when she finally meets God, you can tell on people's eyes, the guilt carried on their heart, to have allowed such a martyrdom to happen. What follows is a chaotic violent battle, that leaves us almost emotionless because Falconnetti drained all our emotions, and we're simply exhausted after such an intense and disturbing experience. Again, you can analyze and make all the essays of the world, it always comes to this : Maria Falconetti's performance as Joan of Arc is the soul of the film, and the greatest cinematic performance ever, and the fact that it's her only role, makes it even more legendary, Falconetti and Joan of Arc are almost equally iconic.
And in these recent days where the growing success of "The Artist" revived the interest for the Silent era, movies like "Joan of Arc" are vital to understand how silent films, beyond their nostalgic value, elevated cinema to its truest essence as maybe the most powerful artistic medium, to convey the universal language of the soul.