The Passion of Joan of Arc

The original title of the film is La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc.

Beautiful, moving, startling. I had seen snippets of this before: Renee Falconetti’s face in this movie is such a well-known image (for good reason) and part of me wondered whether the movie would live up to my expectations. Falconetti’s acting is…sparse. (Not to mention the austere production design.) And since Dreyer shoots nearly the whole movie in close-up, there are long stretches where it feels like there’s not much going on.

But what I wasn’t expecting was the editing and the camera movement, both of which felt kinetic and almost hyper-modern at times. Together, the movie was really effective at creating a space of heightened tension and subjugation, which began to draw out these really subtle emotional cues from Joan’s expression. And while I’m not religious and the elements of her devotion didn’t resonate with me on a personal level, I found myself reading the film through a feminist lens that connected me to her experience on a universal level. (Also want to shout out to the musical accompaniment on the Criterion release, which apparently was an oratorio composed by Richard Einhorn–it was great.)

Incredible close-ups, wonderful acting by Renee Falconetti, the last 10 minutes are insanely powerful. A film that looks like it came out in the 90's, it's incredibly modern, I keep wondering how it's possible that in the 20's such a film came out

8/10

The tactility of prosopography; and of that holograph.

Beautifully made, but that’s it for me. There is enough to like if you have a love for silent films or if you want to study movies in any way. As someone who has neither, this was just not my cup of tea.

this must have gone over my head entirely, as a standalone movie, and going into it with no prior knowledge of its significance it was just a generally poor film that does not stand up at all to modern cinema in my opinion.

[MUBI] Religiously cinematographic experience. These faces that appear on the screen, inquisitors, inflexible, Machiavellian. And Maria Falconetti-Juana de Arco. Sublime representation of pain in every corner of his face. Yes, a silent film. Because it is almost impossible to express this experience in words.