Starring Maria Falconetti
Produced by Société générale des films
The court room is abuzz with motion and whispers as the tribunal prepares to try the leader of a rebellion. The tension builds until the leader enters under guard and is revealed to be...
... a waifish 19-year old girl with close cropped hair.
The trial is not so much a judicial proceeding as an effort to extract a confession from the charismatic Joan of Arc. When questioning fails, the interrogators are not above a little torture.
Will Joan confess? Can she live with herself if she does?
The Passion of Joan of Arc has a technical virtuosity that instantly separates it from most 1920s films. It feels like it was cut and edited by Michael Bay's great-grandfather.
Of course, instead of special effects like explosions, alien robots or Nic Cage, Dreyer gives us one of cinema's most indelibly perfect images: the face of Maria Falconetti as Joan.
We live almost entirely within Joan's face for over an hour. The extreme closeups bring us into her terror, her uncertainty, and ultimately her resolve.
Indeed, the only time we seem to leave our heroine's face is to see her accusers. And once again Dreyer's camera brings us right into their grotesque features. No bead of sweat or unsightly wart goes undocumented. Dreyer's camera looks up at Joan's tormentors, making them larger than life.
Of course, the actual trial amongst men is only a small part of the drama. The real struggle is for Joan's soul. We see her torment writ large across her face. You never doubt what she's thinking.The dialogue intertitles are almost extraneous.
There's a courage in setting this entirely at this point in Joan's life. Let's be honest: few saint stories have the cinematic potential of the life of this warrior saint. Dreyer skips over the obvious, potentially cliched moments and instead wrings all of the drama of her short existence from a trial.
In case it was not obvious, I loved this film. The Passion of Joan of Arc is the perfect melding of story, star and direction. Highly recommend.
***** out of *****
NOTES: This is Falconetti's only real credit. She was in a couple of silents in 1917, but that was it. Somehow her never acting again in another film role is simultaneously tragic and perfect.
Dreyer built massive and very expensive sets for the film... and we almost never see them.
Photo from The Baltimore Sun
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