Danish director
Carl Dreyer's silent masterpiece still looks as astonishingly avant-garde today as it did 70 years ago. And stage actress
Renée Falconetti remains the definitive Joan of Arc: As the maiden who led an army in defense of France, was burned at the stake as a heretic, and later canonized as a saint, she gives one of the screen's most remarkable performances. Dreyer chronicles Joan's trial and execution almost entirely in close-ups, isolating faces and objects at startling angles against stark backgrounds. The young martyr's face; tearful eyes cast heavenward; the fleshy, smirking countenances of her merciless judges; the sculpted features of {|Antonin Artaud|} (a memorable presence in the film) -- all become monumental canvases upon which every shade of human emotion registers with unparalleled intensity. Dreyer's original version, unearthed in a Norwegian mental institution and beautifully restored, is enhanced here by Richard Einhorn's exquisite choral score,
Voices of Light. For those who have only seen inferior prints of the film, this splendid Criterion disc will come as a glorious revelation.
