Product: The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc (Region 2) (1999)
Rating: 2.0
Not accurate of worth watching.
Throughout the years, the story of Joan of Arc has stimulated the production of several motion pictures. Her life, actions and words have inspired and intrigued for more than five hundred years. From a historical standpoint, it is unfortunate that we do not know enough about Joan of Arc's life to fully understand who she was and what she did. While what she accomplished cannot be denied, and her recorded letters, speeches and trial manuscripts form a profile, much of what we know of Joan comes from eyewitness accounts and the memoirs of those around her. Due to these historical obstacles, writers and cinema directors will always have room for individual interpretation when relating her tale.In 1999 "The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc" was released in theatres as a full length feature film. Director Luc Besson's intention with the film was to accentuate the fact that we cannot prove what her visions were or from whence they came, and in doing so cast doubt on Joan's legend. Unfortunately, while depicting Joan as a schizophrenic, hesitant self doubter, he also made some glaring historical mistakes.The first inaccuracy occurs at the very start of the movie. While Joan's village is being sacked by the English, she is hiding in a closet, watching her sister being killed and having her corpse raped. Admittedly, this does assist in creating the image of Joan as a traumatized nut-job, however, her sister was certainly never murdered or raped.Secondly, the movie fails to accurately present Joan's wound received at Orleans. It makes no mention of her specifically foretelling her being shot with an arrow between her "left neck and shoulder", during that specific battle. More importantly, in the movie, Joan passes out from the wound and awakens the next morning. In reality, Joan was treated and returned to rejuvenate and lead the French soldiers in a final attack, which resulted in the victory.Perhaps the most disturbing errors occur during Joan's trial, shortly before her execution. This is the best documented and most historically evident portion of Joan's life. Meticulous minutes were kept recording every spoken word, and most of the trying members wrote notes concerning the atmosphere of the room and Joan's demeanor and reactions to the questions. Joan was given a wooden bench to sit on and always remained fully chained. Throughout the trial, Joan remained courageous and absolutely steadfast in her faith and beliefs, confidently answering fully any questions asked of her, excepting those which she believed God to have forbid her to. In the movie, she is standing, and only chained at the wrists. In addition, she is stuttering and unconfident, not sure of herself. She is shown to not only begin to doubt what she had done and lose faith, it is also intimated that she did kill during the battles, which is untrue.While whether or not the viewer will enjoy this movie is probably based on their beliefs as to whom Joan of Arc was as a person, which is relatively subjective, the historical mistakes are unforgivable. This movie fails to paint an accurate or truthful picture of Joan because of these misconstrued facts, which stem wholly from the creators apparent need to vilify and lay suspicion on her.The DVD does get 2 stars (instead of 1) because it was in fact shot well, with decent special effects and good cinematography. Also, Joan of Arc material is limited and for the most part inaccurate, so this movie is just as good as any.