Product Details

• Actors: Richard Widmark, Richard Todd, Anton Walbrook, John Gielgud, Jean Seberg
• Directors: Otto Preminger
• Format: Black & White, HiFi Sound, NTSC
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Warner Home Video
• VHS Release Date: September 1, 1998
• Run Time: 110 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6303118127
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #243,798 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Young Joan of Arch comes to the palace in France to make The Dauphin King of France and is appointed to head the French Army. After winning many battles she is not needed any longer and soon she is thought of as a witch and sentenced to burn at the stake.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A noble failure, September 25, 2000

By 

"moroccomole" (W. Hollywood, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Saint Joan [VHS] (VHS Tape)

Director Otto Preminger's stab at the George Bernard Shaw play was pilloried for the miscasting of Jean Seberg in the title role, but she's hardly the sole reason why this well-intentioned film version doesn't work. Richard Widmark gives one of his silliest screen performances as the Dauphin, and many of the smaller roles are quite hammily portrayed as well.

Still, this VHS version does include a very well-made behind-the-scenes featurette (for once, you don't have to have a DVD player to enjoy this sort of extra). SAINT JOAN is still worth seeing, if only to appreciate how much more confident an actress Seberg would become in BONJOUR TRISTESSE (also directed by Preminger) and, of course, in Godard's BREATHLESS.

(And if you're a fan of this movie or of Seberg in general, don't miss Mark Rappaport's amazing un-documentary FROM THE JOURNALS OF JEAN SEBERG.)

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars worth re-discovering, June 19, 2010

By 

R. Gorey "Behemoth" (New York) - See all my reviews
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Otto Preminger's stagy retelling of the Joan of Arc history/legend was pilloried on its release, and Jean Seberg's performance roasted (no pun intended). Seen today, the film is a stylized, often uneven, but worthwhile experience. Seberg is rough around the edges, but contrary to popular myth, isn't the shameful embarrassment critics made her out to be. Much worse is Richard Widmark's Dauphin, a cringe-worthy contribution to an otherwise stately, literate, and entertaining adaptation of the George Bernard Shaw play. The movie feels much like a television production from the same era: the crispness of the black and white images and the curiously flat nature of the settings and costumes mark it as something less than the typical fifties wide-screen epic, and something more than the typical "Playhouse 90" offerings of the period. Fans of Seberg will want to see the film: this edition is from the "Warner Archive" DVD releases, and as such is given the bare-bones treatment: no commentaries, no "making of" features, and a print that appears cropped from the original (Cinemascope?) version seen in theaters. I've had some playable issues with other Warner Archive editions: this DVD played well on three players, without skipping or stopping. No masterpiece, but time has been kind to the film, and to Seberg's contribution. Interesting to compare this version to the silent, Dreyer version, and the oddball Technicolor Victor Fleming film (1948), with a too-old Ingrid Bergman. Joan's story is filled with contradictions, betrayals, and turnabouts, and this film version recreates most of them in a compelling, stylized, and sometimes clumsy way. Should you buy the DVD? Well, not if you've been holding out for a special edition with commentaries and documentaries, but the print is clean, and this may be the only way to see Preminger's film for a while.

4.0 out of 5 stars Disagree with critics, February 8, 2011

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C. Simon (Colorado) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Saint Joan [VHS] (VHS Tape)

When Jean Seberg starred in Saint Joan, her first movie, the critics gave her thoroughly negative reviews. Being that this was her first movie and that Otto Preminger was a very demanding and harsh director to work with, I would have thought that the critics and the public would have been more sympathetic. I decided to view this movie with curiosity and some trepidation. I was pleasantly surprised. I believe Ms. Seberg did a very good job, considering she had no experience in movies. The fault I found with this picture was the script. I found it to be rather silly and immature, considering the subject matter.

I would recommend this movie to any Jean Seberg fan.