Juana de Arco

Mediocre is a word that sums up this film well. Finally to summarize, is there really something going on in this movie??? Battle scenes are some ride arena and boring shootings. After the amazement to see Jeanne of Arc played by a cute 10-year-old girl, you would think why not, she can be a real virgin! However, the result is very disappointing. If the director displays his will to shoot a film without "professional" actors, the acting of the protagonists is really bad. The Marshal of France is a pre-pubescent teenager with his first beard, with a castrated voice to make the best gay bars totally hysterical. The protagonists come and go as in a theatre play, the new characters being "announced" by those already present. Let's forget the locations Cathedral of Rouen is now the one of Amiens, the Parisian countryside is now dunes of sands of the north of France, and medieval castles are now WWII! German Bunker or stone on the ground... Let's forget the music, it has been written by the successful seventies French singer Christophe who also get lost in translation, the producers probably asked him to write something about the voices in the head of Joan, and it ended in some long 5 minutes scenes of the young actress almost getting paralyzed listening to the singer rhythms and songs. With so many nominations and a win, we can think the result would be amazing, this is just a disastrous movie because this is pure sick intellectual and they have found 1.5 M euros to finance it. Les Cahiers du Cinema wrote that this is one of the Top5 French films, it is probable, given the box office, one of the Top5 most boring and crappy film made about Joan of Arc!!!

The first half is a bit ridiculous because the film obviously doesn't have a budget. The trial part is more interesting and makes me want to see other films on the subject.

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

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 .

I saw this film seduced being by its trailer and surprised by so young Jeanne. The first half of hour was real weigh because all seems so amateurish, from the sand location to dialogue. But the hope dies the last , and I hoped than the film can be saved in a form of other. And it is. By imagination of viewer knowing the story of Jeanne D Arc, by presence of Fabrice Luchini as unfair old Charles and by the dialogue from trial, by the song of prosecutor and, no doubts, by the last scenes, real inspired ones.

A good point - the effort of so young Lise Leplat Prudhomme to sustain her character.

Obvious, it is far to be a bad film. It is only an eccentric experiment, expression of rich imagination and not the most inspired tools for serve it.

It can be defined, in same measure, as provocative.

So, maybe only sin of it - it is so long ... . And you hope, scene by scene, be more ...profound, remaining, in final, only with the images from Amiens cathedral, strange prison and, sure, the beach of first scenes.