Procès de Jeanne d'Arc - Robert Bresson (1962)

Non-actors portray the trial of Joan of Arc with a script that comes directly from the trial transcripts. Unlike Dreyer's film, camera tricks and torture are minimized, but equally stylized acting eliminates every trace of emotion and mannerism. Trance-like rhythm is induced through the editing of the interrogations and the ways that Joan's eyes flicker from submission to boldness with every response. A shot of feet opens the film and closes the film. A procession into a cell then a procession out to an execution. Oddly, her cell door seems always to be left slightly ajar. A trap?