For the Love of Jeanne (DVR Alert!)

Filmbrain is unashamed to admit to an almost fetishistic fascination with Jeanne d'Arc films. From the sublime (Dreyer's unsurpassed The Passion of Joan of Arc), to the....well, far from sublime (Luc Besson's Joan-as-supermodel-cum-warrior The Messenger), there isn't a tale of the teenaged martyr that doesn't keep him glued to his seat. Why the obsession? Filmbrain can't say for sure. Perhaps it is the unfathomable idea of a 15th century teenage girl who, Guided by Voices, convinces an army of Armagnacs to follow her, and then proceeds to lead them to victory. Or maybe it's the injustice of her politically motivated show trial (she was charged with cross-dressing), and resulting execution by fire. Regardless, the story of the Maid of Orleans is ripe for cinematic interpretation, and there have been many filmed versions, dating as far back as the late 1800s. Some notable entries in the canon: La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc (1928), Carl Theodor Dreyer — Almost universally accepted as the preeminent J of A film. Pauline Kael called Maria Falconetti's performance the greatest ever captured on film, and she might very well be right. Joan of Arc (1948), Victor Flemming — One of two films (see below) that finds Ingrid Bergman portraying the young martyr. A grandiose epic in classic Hollywood style that isn't half-bad, though it does have a certain Gone With the Wind-ish soap-opera quality to it. However, Bergman's performance makes it more than worthwhile. Flemming's final film (he died shortly after its release), it turned out to be a box-office failure that some claim was due to Bergman's affair with Roberto Rossellini — for how can an adulterer play a saint? Giovanna d'Arco al Rogo (1954), Roberto Rossellini — Ingrid B once again in drag, this time in a quasi-musical, set to Paul Claudel and Arthur Honegger's oratorio, Joan at the Stake. A loving gift to his wife, this is one that really deserves a proper DVD release. Saint Joan (1957), Otto Preminger — Filmed version of George Bernard Shaw's play, with a screenplay by Graham Greene. This time it's Jean Seberg as Joan (with the perfect haircut), in her big screen debut. Filmbrain recently purchased the French DVD, but has yet to watch it. Jeanne la Pucelle (1994), Jacques Rivette — An incredibly stripped down version of the story (owing more to budget constraints than by design), Rivette takes an almost documentary approach to the material, which includes "interviews" with those who knew the Mlle. from Domrémy. Told in six hours over two films (The Battles and The Prisons), this is the most detailed account of her story, and Sandrine Bonnaire does an excellent job showing us that before Joan was a saint, she was a young woman fraught with doubt and fear. Rivette gives us a very human Joan, and it's a remarkable pair of films that should be seen back to back. Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1988), Stephen Herek — Ok, Bill & Ted may think she's Noah's wife, and she may not do much more than take over an aerobics class, but hey....it's still Joan as played by Jane "Go-Go's" Wiedlin. The Messenger (1999), Luc Besson — One of Filmbrain's guiltiest of pleasures. But then again, any film that has Dustin Hoffman acting as the conscience to Milla Jovovich's Joan (not to mention Vincent Cassel as child serial killer Gilles de Rais), can't be all that bad. One significant film missing from the above list is Robert Bresson's Procès de Jeanne d'Arc from 1962. Though rarely thought of as one of his best, Bresson's short feature (just over sixty minutes) takes as its source the actual trial transcripts to achieve (in Bresson's words) "a non-historical truth by using historical words." Filmbrain has never had the opportunity to see it, but that will soon change as Turner Classic Movies is showing it at the insomniac-friendly time of 2:00 AM tonight, March 10 (Friday night/Saturday morning). Set your DVRs and Tivos, for this is a rare showing of a film that is unavailable on DVD in this country. Please feel free to share your thoughts on the film below.>

Comments

[flickhead]

A bit of trivia: Sandrine Bonnaire reprises her appearance as Jeanne d'Arc (albeit briefly) in Agnès Varda’s wonderful Les Cent et une nuits de Simon Cinéma (1995).

[Peter Nellhaus]

I've only seen Preminger's Saint Joan on tape, but thought that it was much better than critical reputation would have it. Bresson's film is part of a French DVD set I saw at DVD Beaver.

[Sleeper]

Is it just me, or does that picture of Milla Jovovich bear a strange resemblance to Matt Damon?

[Ben]

Thanks for the heads up! Bresson is a brilliant filmmaker and I can't wait to see what he did with this material.

If I remember correctly, Dreyer's film also used the original transcripts as did George Bernard Shaw in his play of this same story.

[HarryTuttle]

Someone should run a retrospective with all the films, this would make a fascinating comparative study as many auteurs wanted to develop a new interpretation in their own style. I've seen only 4 so far, I'd like to see Jean Seberg and Rivette's at least and we could add the the list : Mélies, Cecil B. de Mille, Jean Delannoy.
Bresson's incarnation is definitely up there with Dreyer's. His choice of a non-actor model also gives Jeanne her true identity of a nobody country girl, which works better than to use a glamour figurehead.
I agree with you about Besson's film, it's very enjoyable, and doesn't deserve the bad press it got. Not much of an auteurist vision, but for a very decent mainstream adaptation.

I just saw Rosselini's version recently and found it ridiculous. Too much of a filmed play to my taste. There are various spectacular scenic tricks with pulleys and elevators but I bet it looks better as a live stage performance. I didn't know Claudel's source material but Saint Dominic acting like a Stooge and showing Jeanne a court from Alice in Wonderland was more of a comical parody than the powerful drama it should be. Not to mention the bishop Cochon (french for pig) literaly disguised as a pig.

as usual this is just my own humble (subjective) opinion.

[Brian]

Thanks for the alert! We lucky West-Coasters don't have to stay up quite so late; we get it at 11.

[anon]

Avoid the Facets edition of Jean la Pucelle, it represents a radically shortened, inferior edit which Rivette has disavowed.

[Filmbrain]

Thanks for that tip anon -- I wasn't aware.

How can a company like Facets -- which was one of the most important (and best) VHS services in all of America release such awful DVDs? The Bela Tarr DVDs were shoddy, as was Heimat, and to now learn that they are selling a shortened version of Rivette -- it boggles the mind.

[Handsome Dan]

I stumbled across the Bresson film tonight purely by accident. Good stuff - that's all I'll say, since all the superlatives and gushing I might otherwise be inclined to do seems, well, un-Bresson.

By the way, due to the similarity of their last names and the slight overlap of their careers, I was convinced for the longest time that Robert Bresson and Luc Besson were the same person! Chew on that...

[Jordan Hoffman]

I hope this review doesn't ban me from Filmbrain forever, but here goes. For the record I *do* like other Dreyer films and films of that era in general. And, yes, I'm mostly kidding:

*
The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928), Carl Theodor Dreyer, C
Dreyer's film (a masterpiece of cinema art, yes, yes) actually has a lot in common with that other Passion movie. Neither have anything resembling a backstory (luckily, I know most of the Joan of Arc saga from that Luc Besson film) or a plot. Basically, all that happens here is that Joan, looking quite unappealing in close up, is yelled at by some judges. She mumbles some psycho bullshit about being sent by God to smite the British. (Would God really choose to smite the Brits over the French? I'll have to mull this one over for a while.) The judges, also looking heinous in close up, yell at her and say she must repent. She will not. So they take her to a torture room. Here, Dreyer parts company with Mel Gibson, because no actual torturing takes place. Joan passes out before we get to see any of that. Then she is threatened with burning at the stake. Joan's eyes go wide. Oy, do they go wide. Just when you think her eyes can't get any wider or any more glassy, there she goes. Finally, she agrees to repent. She signs some piece of paper and is allowed to eat a Ritz cracker. Then her eyes go even wider, she cries even more, and then rescinds her repentance. You know the rest from the Smiths song: The flames rose to her Roman nose and her walkman started to melt. After she is dead, the crowd yells "she was a Saint!" I say, Fuck Joan of Arc. She was just some chick who needed a nice perscription of Risperdol, not to be canonized. If I were British, I'd be pretty pissed off at the Catholic Church for canonizing her. She was a partisan during war and she got caught and they killed her. End of story. Would you blame the USA for killing bin Laden? That's what Joan was to the Brits! She led the French in battle and kicked some ass and the Brits caught her and kicked her ass right back. Take it like a man and die like a soldier, don't waaah waaaah waaaah cry with some bullshit story about you are a messenger from God! That's just like saying, "the devil made me do it." Anyway, all this aside, the film is fine if you like this sort of thing. The photography is striking (I won't say beautiful because the woman who plays Joan is, in my opinion, butt ugly) and the Criterion's transfer has a remarkable silver sheen. I couldn't really get into it because I kept rooting for the bad guys to torch this whiny, holier-than-thou 19 year old skank too stupid to avoid a flaming pile of wood for a phoney baloney God who obviously didn't love her.

[Campaspe]

I have been wanting to see Jean Seberg in this role for ages, since I read a lot about the terrible time she had working with Preminger. Some say it scarred for her life, but she seems to have been somewhat unstable in any case. I do wonder how someone like Gene Tierney, who was as psychologically fragile as they come, could work three times with Preminger, while Seberg's experience had such terrible repercussions. Perhaps it was because she was so very young.

[mattzollerseitz]

I am afraid to report that if you love Joan of Arc movies -- and if you include Arc-referencing movies in that equation -- you have to see V FOR VENDETTA. It's really stupid in a lot of ways, but Natalie Portman spends much of the last act wandering around with a shaved head staring soulfully into space, a clear and perhaps too obvious shout-out to Falconetti and Dreyer. Probably the most baldfaced (pardon the word) reference to that movie since David Fincher's ALIEN 3.

[Craig Shergold]

Jean Seberg was herself hounded to death by J. Edgar Hoover for dating dangerous left-wing Negroes.

[Paul Doherty]

Filmbrain: Thanks for the tip, I loved Bressons close ups and framing.I would have to say I like Dreyers better at this point. Yo Handsome Dan: Do you also root for the Puritans after watching the Crucible????? The church is wacked!

[Paul Doherty]

Sorry Handsome Dan my shout out was for Jordan Hoffman.

[Peter]

Filmbrain, what would you say to a film festival of Francis of Assisi movies: Rossellini, Zeffirelli, Curtiz. Oh, and don't forget the one with Mickey Rourke as Francis!

[David Ehrenstein]

Preminger's "Saint Joan" is really quite good. Not just for Seberg but for Richard Widmark and my favorite actor Anton Walbrook.

[Tim]

The BBC version of Henry VI Part One (part of their attempt to record every Shakespeare play on VT) includes a brief appearance by "Joan La Pucelle", as Jeanne d'Arc was known in England in them there days. It's 20 years since I've seen the thing, but it's an early appearance by Brenda Blethyn, who played Mrs Bennet in the new 'Pride and Prejudice' and the equally awful mother in the underrated 'Little Voice'.

[Darren]

Everyone who's interested in Seberg should immediately queue up Mark Rappaport's essay film, From the Journals of Jean Seberg. (I've written a bit about it here.) It's really a fantastic film.

[Filmbrain]

I was about to watch Preminger's Saint Joan this past weekend, but gut stuck with another of his films that I'd never seen -- Bunny Lake is Missing. I never realized that Flightplan had been made 40 years earlier. Not a great film, but great fun to watch. Noel Coward is brilliant as the sleazy sadist landlord.

Jordan -- I don't ban people for expressing their opinion, even if I strongly disagree with it.

As for the Bresson film -- I did watch it, and was quite impressed, especially with Florence Delay, who did the whole Bresson "thing" (for lack of a better word) perfectly.