France, 1962
Directed by Robert Bresson
With Florence Delay (Jeanne d’Arc), Jean-Claude Fourneau (Bishop Pierre Cauchon)
Jeanne d’Arc, or Joan of Arc, is an extraordinary and mythic figure of the last years of the One Hundred Years War. Born in 1412 in a family of rather poor peasants, she claims to hear voices from three saints and on their advice decides to leave her village and the life of an ordinary countryside girl to fight for the heir to the French Kingdom, whom she meets in 1428. Two clans are then vying to rule the country: the Armagnacs who support the young prince and the Bourguignons who are allied to the English monarchy. Thanks to her military successes Joan of Arc secures the throne for the heir who becomes King Charles VII. His new government wants to settle a lasting peace and ignores Joan of Arc’s willingness to keep fighting against the English. She is captured in 1430 in Compiègne by the Bourguignons and sold to the English. She is put on trial in Rouen and burned in 1431.
This film deals with this trial but still chooses to begin with a statement read by Joan of Arc’s mother at another trial, held in 1456, to rehabilitate her daughter’s honor. The choice suggests where the film’s sympathy lies. The title cards which follow the credits explain that the screenplay, written by the director, is based on the official records of the 1431 trial, which is now widely deemed as unfair. So the film examines an example of justice miscarriage.
The narrative is taut. A business that lasted from January to May 1431 is slimmed down to a series of short scenes totaling only 65 minutes – it is even shorter by around 20 minutes than the film Danish director Carl Theodor Dreyer famously shot in 1928, also in France with a French cast, and based also on the records of the 1431 trial.
The preliminary inquest is overlooked and “Procès de Jeanne d’Arc” begins with Joan candidly answering the first questions put by her judges, most of them members of the Paris University, then a group of religious scholars sympathizing with England and led by Bishop Pierre Cauchon. The reconstruction of the past is strikingly basic: sets are bare and clothes are simple, with the trademark male costume of Joan in black. Medium close shots are frequent. Editing is brisk. This is a deliberate no frills and no fluffs take on the period piece genre that can flummox some in the audience. But it fits in the distinctive style of director Robert Bresson, and even more his desire to avoid the kind of graphic emotion Dreyer delivered.
It helps him to focus on the intellectual confrontation between Joan and her judges. As noted above, she is frank and honest from the start. Her voice and words have a stubborn quality that leaves no doubt about her beliefs, the strongest being that she was destined to save her king. Given the hostile environment surrounding the proceedings, so negative that Bishop Pierre Cauchon decides at one point to get on with them inside her cell and away from the public, she comes across as truly courageous. Joan of Arc handles her case on her own, facing a court clearly put under great pressure by the English. They force the court to go to great lengths to sully her character, like performing a test of virginity (a great sequence: first some women go down a flight of stairs, then Joan of Arc, sitting on her bed, takes a sheet up to her mouth, then the women go upstairs, and it is simply over, the act is rather suggested than shot but its repugnant nature is fully conveyed, as well as its failure). But whatever the difficulties, she remains stolid and stays on the same level than her judges (a sentiment stoked by the clever use of medium close shots that cut through the action and give the same visual style to each speaker as they spar).
She would repudiate some of her thoughts to avoid death but eventually changes her mind since her jailers do not keep their promises, in particular the respect of her physical integrity. She is again led to the bonfire and dies confident she was right. The end is hurried but powerful: a last statement in medium close shot, then a closer shot on her feet as she is rushed down an alley and the hard work of the executioners tying her to a post. She says another sentences and torches, shot on close-ups, set the place on fire. A shot shows a stray dog, the camera then focuses on her just before she disappears in the flames and finally comes the final image, a half-burned post. The tragedy is straight and not sentimental. The strength of the narration’s various choices is to avoid the drama getting too dramatic and to let the audience deal quietly with the basic historical facts.
Given the status of Joan of Arc in the nation’s psyche, this sober and dispassionate depiction may be the best way to handle the story. It does not imply a lack of conviction or sympathy. In its carefully chosen developments the screenplay shows how the judges strayed from common practices and worked with the invaders, though with some uneasiness and only in a step-by-step approach. Joan of Arc’s self-confidence was like a rock-solid hurdle on their path; she was a definitely a lady to get rid of even though, or perhaps because, her authority and success could not be denied; the 1456 trial to redress the wrong was then a predictable development and the flick shows how very justified it was.