Cast: Milla Jovovich, John Malkovich, Faye Dunaway, Dustin Hoffman, Pascal Greggory, Vincent Cassel, Tchéky Karyo, Richard Ridings, Desmond Harrington, Timothy West
Director: Luc Besson
Producer: Patrice Ledoux
Screenplay: Luc Besson, Andrew Birkin
Cinemtography: Thierry Arbogast
Music: Eric Serra
U.S. Distributor: Columbia Pictures
Not since the 1920s (in the years following her canonization) has there been this much interest in Joan of Arc. In 1999, not one, but two, major entertainment events have been built around this icon. The first, a made-for-TV miniseries starring Leelee Sobieski, garnered impressive ratings during the May sweeps. The second, Luc Besson's epic motion picture, has been released into theaters during the heart of the Oscar season. However, in the midst of such a crowded and impressive field of major films, The Messenger is unlikely to find much favor with Academy members, nor is its box-office take expected to astound the officials at Columbia Pictures.
Over the years, the story of Saint Joan has inspired many motion pictures. Three of them are especially well-known, although not necessarily for the right reasons. Carl Th. Dreyer's classic silent movie, The Passion of Joan of Arc, made in 1928, was thought forever lost until a pristine copy was discovered in a Norwegian asylum in 1981. Victor Fleming's 1948 version of the story made the laughably bad choice of casting 33-year old Ingrid Bergman as a girl nearly half her age. Otto Preminger's 1957 Saint Joan represented the disastrous debut of Jean Seberg, who was selected after an exhaustive search uncovered her (revisionist critics have since softened their view of this picture). Besson's latest version is the most lavish and expensive telling of the story, but, because of several key problems, it will not be regarded as the definitive cinematic biography.
Besson's approach is considerably different than that of his many predecessors. Typically, filmmakers have taken Jeanne/Joan's divine inspiration as a given - it is the foundation upon which a melodrama of greed, corruption, and unshakable faith is built. Besson, however, questions the nature of Jeanne's revelations and the voices that impart them to her. While the possibility is left open that God has spoken to the peasant girl, Besson allows (and perhaps encourages) an alternative interpretation - that Jeanne's religious fervor is the result of paranoid schizophrenia. Are her actions prompted by faith or insanity? This approach links the film thematically with Lars Von Trier's Breaking the Waves (with a hint of Scorsese's The Last Temptation of Christ thrown in for good measure). Unfortunately, The Messenger does not have Emily Watson; it has Milla Jovovich (The Fifth Element).
To be fair, the model-turned-actress (who was married to director Besson at the time of filming, although they have since split up) is close to the right age to play the part, and she willingly allows herself to be shown in a very unflattering light (covered in dirt with a nearly shaven skull). There are also isolated scenes in which she is effective. Unfortunately, those are more the exceptions than the rule. Predominantly, the role defeats Jovovich. Unable to capture the complexity of Jeanne, she resorts to going over the top, reducing the character to little more than a comic book-type heroine with minimal depth and breadth. The script doesn't help - it touches on Jeanne's occasional concerns about the genuineness of her revelations and her horror at the realities of war, but fails to develop those elements in a way that makes either issue gripping.
As is often true of French-made films (as opposed to their Hollywood counterparts), The Messenger's adherence to history is good (although, as with all narrative features, a certain amount of dramatic license has been taken). Jeanne was born in 1412 in Domrémy, France, when much of her country was occupied by the English army (this was during the so-called "Hundred Years War"). The movie first introduces her in 1420, when an English raiding party attacks Jeanne's village and kills her sister. Already hearing voices that she believes to be of divine inspiration, she is sent off to live with an aunt and uncle while her parents attempt to rebuild their home. When next we meet Jeanne, she is 17 years old and is seeking an audience with France's uncrowned king, Charles VII (John Malkovich, being someone else). Charles is so impressed by Jeanne's intensity that he believes her claim that God has chosen her to "save France from Her enemies and bring Her back into the hand of God." He gives her an army and allows her to attack the English at Orléans, where she wins a great victory. She becomes an immediate French folk hero, and is at Charles VII's side when he is crowned in July of 1429. A year later, after a failed attempt to re-take Paris, Jeanne is captured by England's Burgundian allies outside the walls of Compiègne. She is transported to Rouen, where she is imprisoned and tortured before being brought before an ecclesiastical tribunal. The result of her trial for heresy and witchcraft is a guilty verdict. The penalty is to be burned at the stake.
Despite impeccable production design, stunning cinematography (by Besson collaborator Thierry Arbogast), and a rousing score (by Eric Serra, another Besson regular), The Messenger proves to be a little flat. The battle sequences are humdrum and routine; they take up a lot of screen time without involving the audience. Besson makes frequent use of quick cuts to emphasize the chaos of war (and to limit the amount of gore), but this style becomes tiresome after a while, especially when so few recognizable characters are in harm's way. Most of the time, we're watching faceless combatants hack at each other. The film looks great (as one would expect from the director of La Femme Nikita and The Fifth Element, both handsome productions), but, in terms of intensity and spectacle, what we're given here is just a pale shadow of Braveheart.
Paradoxically, The Messenger is both too long and too short. The film contains several dead patches that make the 2 1/2 hour running time feel excessive. On the other hand, the choppy editing leaves the viewer with the sense that significant chunks of footage were left on the cutting room floor. There are times when The Messenger's transitionless jumps are not only disconcerting, but create more than a momentary sense of confusion about what's going on.
The best part of the film is the trial; sadly, it comes two hours into the proceedings, when we're starting to grow weary of Jeanne's ordeal. It's here that Besson stays mostly true to history, drawing heavily on the existing transcript. No other filmed version of the Joan of Arc story has been this accurate (not even the Dreyer movie, which also used the transcript and attempted an almost-documentary style), and this segment of The Messenger offers a helping of potent drama. The church officials are not painted with a purely black brush (although the English are), and Jovovich is at her most convincing. The inclusion of Dustin Hoffman in a small but pivotal role gives us clues, although no real resolution, about whether or not Jeanne is sane.
The Messenger becomes the latest foreign production to film in English using a primarily British and American cast in order to secure seamless worldwide distribution. Most of the "big name" stars - Malkovich, Hoffman, and Faye Dunaway (playing Charles VII's manipulative mother-in-law, Yolande D'Aragon) - have limited screen time and don't give exceptional performances. It's left up to supporting actors like Tchéky Karyo (as the French commander at Orléans), Richard Ridings (as one of Jeanne's faithful men), and Timothy West (as the head of the ecclesiastical tribunal) to do the real thespian work.
It's a pity that Jovovich can't handle the title role, because Besson's innovative approach to the legend is enough to warrant attention. In fact, even with such an unimpressive lead performance, there are times when The Messenger shows glimpses of greatness, and reminds viewers of what it could have been. Ultimately, however, the final product comes across as more of a second-rate Braveheart than a moving and complex study of one of the millennium's most intriguing and tragic stories: that of a 19-year old girl who saved a country, then died for her faith.
© 1999 James Berardinelli