Reviews

Jeanette: The Childhood of Joan of Arc (2017) - Film

Quick Summary: Jeannette: The Childhood of Joan of Arc has the dubious distinction of being both profoundly strange and profoundly boring - while also being philosophically annoying!

Title: Jeannette: The Childhood of Joan of Arc (Jeannette, l'enfance de Jeanne d'Arc)

Release: 2017

Director: Bruno Dumont

Starring:

Lise Leplat Prudhomme (Joan, age 8)

Jeanne Voisin (Joan, age 13 - though the actress must be at least 20)

According to Wikipedia, the first film made about the life of Joan of Arc was a short film made in 1898 and titled simply, Jeanne d'Arc. Since then, more than 40 later films have also explored the life of the teenage girl who changed the course of the Hundred Years' War and became a beloved saint. Unfortunately, Jeannette: The Childhood of Joan of Arc is probably the dullest of all of them.

A musical about Joan of Arc's childhood prior to going to Orléans doesn't sound like a bad idea on the surface. Movie musicals are fun, right? Well, not when the first hour of the film takes place in a single location (which looks nothing like what Google streetview tells me the countryside around Domrémy actually looks like), the child actress clearly doesn't understand the words she has to sing, the English subtitles mimic none of the poetry in the original French, and nothing happens, plot-wise, for 3/4 of the movie.

Okay, sure, Jeannette talks with her friend, Hauviette. She dances with her sheep. She talks with her uncle, who looks younger than she is. She asks Madame Gervais (played by a pair of twins - for more dancing, one assumes, than a single actress could provide), a local woman who left town to study at a convent and become a nun, why there is evil in the world, and gets the least useful answer ever (God is mysterious!). For a good five minutes at one point, she harangues pantomime versions of St. Catherine, St. Margaret and St. Michael (except one tends to think that actual pantomime versions of saints would have the saints' typical artistic attributes, which these saints do not). And then, she goes to Orléans and the movie ends before she gets there.

I really disliked the handling of philosophy and morality in the story. Madame Gervais's answers to Jeannette are utterly pointless, consisting exclusively of the "God is mysterious!!!!" variety noted above. Gee, thanks, Madame Gervais. I really expected better from an allegedly well-educated nun living a time and place steeped in Scholasticism. And on the morality side, Jeannette lies, insults her friends and family, neglects her sheep (the poor sheep get no attention whatsoever), and still arrogantly thinks she's perfect and God's gift to humanity. Yech.

I also disliked the music and the choreography. Aside from the headbanging nuns and some dabbing by Jeannette's uncle, the dances consist mostly of jumping or running on the spot. Not exactly inspired.

The settings and costumes, while pretty, are severely limited. There are a total of perhaps four locations, of which a single one is used for the vast majority of the movie. The acting is . . . well, like I said, it was clear that the little girl playing the younger Jeannette didn't understand what she was singing.

It's all a little painful to watch.