France’s national heroine faces the judgement of history in the film that changed world cinema. Screening as part of the What’s with the Face? film programme.
The Passion of Joan of Arc
- Date:
- 6 Aug 2026,
19:30–22:15
- Age restrictions
- 18+
La passion de Jeanne d’Arc
1928, Carl Theodor Dreyer
France
108 minutes, silent with Russian intertitles
Starring: Renée Jeanne Falconetti, Eugène Silvain, Maurice Schutz, Antonin Artaud
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When writing the screenplay, Carl Theodor Dreyer drew not on the established myths surrounding the Maid of Orléans, but on a specific historical document—the transcripts of Joan of Arc’s interrogations from the French National Library. Instead of large-scale reconstructions and battle scenes, the film focuses intently on close-ups. The camera doesn’t let go of the tormentors’ faces for a single second, catching their every word and forcing them to testify against themselves, whilst Joan’s unblinking eyes become a mirror in which the viewer can clearly see the abuses of state power, the bias of justice, and the absurdity of repressions.
Shot from The Passion of Joan of Arc, 1928
Let there be no mistake, that prodigious fresco of heads is the very opposite of an actor’s film. It is a documentary of faces.
—André Bazin, What is Cinema?
