The Passion of Joan of Arc

Seldom has the face provided a more harrowing window to the human soul than in Carl Theodor Dreyer’s moving late silent masterpiece, often cited as one of the greatest films ever made. Based on actual transcripts of the proceedings, the film compresses the 18-month trial, torture, and execution of Joan of Arc into a single 24-hour period; Renée Falconetti, in the only film she ever made, gives a legendary performance in the lead. The brilliant cinematography of Rudolph Maté employs extreme close-ups against stark white backgrounds, and eschews the use of make-up on the actors. The result is a wrenching tour-de-force of emotion and expression. Dreyer’s original version of the film was long thought lost; for decades, only substandard screening prints, in differing versions, were available. This gorgeous digital restoration was made from a pristine copy of Dreyer’s original discovered in 1981 in a Norwegian mental institution, and features as musical score Richard Einhorn’s Voices of Light , a 1994 oratorio inspired by the film. “One of the greatest of all movies. . . Falconetti’s Joan may be the finest performance ever recorded on film” (Pauline Kael). “Like an historical document from an era in which the cinema didn’t exist” (Jean Cocteau). B&W, DVD, silent with musical score and French intertitles with English subtitles. 82 mins.