Joan the Woman
About Joan the Woman
In a World War I trench, English officer Eric Trent (Wallace Reid) pulls a sword from the wall and sees Joan of Arc (Geraldine Farrar). She tells him her story. Joan leads French troops, is tried, and is burned. Reid also plays an Eric Trent of 1431 inside that story. Back in the trench, the officer takes Joan's sword and goes out on a mission he does not expect to survive.
Cast & crew
More about Joan the Woman
Cecil B. DeMille directed his first historical picture. Jeanie MacPherson wrote the screenplay, from Friedrich Schiller's Die Jungfrau von Orleans. Jesse L. Lasky produced with DeMille. Alvin Wyckoff photographed it. William Furst wrote the music. Paramount released it. The New York premiere was Christmas Day, 1916. Raymond Hatton plays Charles VII, Hobart Bosworth plays La Hire, and Theodore Roberts plays Cauchon.
Themes
Background
Paramount opened the film in New York on 25 December 1916, while the United States was still neutral and the Battle of Verdun was in its tenth month. The frame story puts an English officer in that war.
Making
Lasky and DeMille built a medieval campaign and a modern trench on the same Hollywood production, and used Farrar, already famous from the opera stage, as Joan.
Look
Alvin Wyckoff shot Farrar's trial and burning and the trench where Reid finds the sword.
Music
William Furst composed the score that accompanied the 1916 release. The picture itself has no spoken dialogue.
Preservation
Complete prints are held at the CNC film archive, the George Eastman Museum, the Academy Film Archive, and the British Film Institute.
Notes
- Farrar, a Metropolitan Opera soprano, later ranked this performance among the high points of her career.
- Ramón Novarro is an uncredited starving peasant. Donald Crisp, Jack Holt, and Nigel De Brulier also appear without credit.
- DeMille edited as well as directed.
- Complete 35mm prints are at the Archives du Film du CNC, the George Eastman Museum, the Academy Film Archive, and the British Film Institute.
Scenes
- Trent draws a sword out of the trench wall and Joan appears.
- Joan is tried and burned.
- He takes the sword and leaves the trench on the mission.
Influenced by
- Die Jungfrau von Orleans by Friedrich Schiller (1801)
