#9 – The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928), dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer
Shackled round the ankles and dressed simply in boy’s clothing, Joan of
Arc is escorted into a austere white room to be jeered and ogled by
hostile soldiers and scheming clerics. The fearful teenage girl is
placed upon a stool and the gallery of old men sets to work wringing a
confession from her. What follows in Carl Theodor Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc (La passion de Jeanne d’Arc,
1928) is a very unusual take on the courtroom drama, and not just
because of its medieval setting and strongly religious elements. A
fortune was apparently spent constructing the movie’s elaborate castle
sets, but you’d never know it as Dreyer photographed almost the entire
film in close-ups, making The Passion of Joan of Arc a viewing
experience very different from traditional narratives. With few
intertitles and almost no wide shots to get one’s bearings, it is the
makeup-less faces of the actors that communicate the downfall of the
heroine of Orleans. (82 min.)
from:
An ongoing conversation about the Sight & Sound Top 250 films of all time
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