Joan Of Arc

You remember the dueling Robin Hoods, Christopher Columbuses and Wyatt Earps. Now it seems heavenly voices have been bending studio ears: There are no fewer than three versions of the life of Joan of Arc in the works. Disney's Touchstone is developing a "Joan of Arc" with director Brian Gibson ("What's Love Got to Do With It"); producer Joel Silver is tackling another for Warner Bros.

"The Undefeated," a documentary about former Alaskan governor and vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin drawn from her memoir, "Going Rogue: An American Life," seems to have been made as a piece of political promotion for the 2012 presidential race. But before "The Undefeated" premiered in a tiny number of theaters, Palin announced that she would not run. The film did not do well, either financially or critically. Now it has found a secondary purpose — running on Reelz Channel as an answer to the much-touted HBO film "Game Change.

Timing is everything. In the case of Richard Einhorn's "Voices of Light," an oratorio set to Carl Theodor Dreyer's 1928 silent film "The Passion of Joan of Arc," the dictum applies at least doubly. First, it's pertinent to the synchronization of Einhorn's music to scenes in the film and, in a larger sense, to the appearance of his project on the music scene itself.

  Escorted by knights on horseback, a horde of former Joans of Arc paraded this year's Joan through the darkened streets of a city liberated by their namesake nearly six centuries ago. They were headed to Sainte-Croix Cathedral, where, like a martial Rose Queen, she was handed her sword. As the cathedral filled Friday night to celebrate the 600th birthday of a teenage girl who claimed to hear the voice of God, medieval maidens wearing flowing headdresses giggled on cellphones, bagpipe players from Nantes huddled in a corner and the knights in shining armor wandered through the crowd.

Radiant in her beauty, a teenage girl in medieval armor paces her horse before a mounted army and shouts a call to battle for the unity of France. "Be of good heart, my friends," cries Joan of Arc. "Today our noble king will have a great victory, because we're guided by the king of heaven." An aide hands her a long pole with a military banner, and after Joan poses with it briefly, the scene ends--for the fourth time.

"Joan of Arc in History and Film," a conference sponsored by the UCLA Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies and the Florence Gould Foundation of New York, will be held through Saturday at UCLA's Melnitz Theater and its faculty center. The event will include Jacques Rivette's "Joan the Maid: The Battles" (1994) which screens today at 7 p.m., and its second part, "Joan the Maid: The Prisons," screens Saturday at 2 p.m., followed by a panel discussion at 5 p.m. Today two sessions at 9:30 a.m.

A team of scientists hopes to crack one of the layers of mystery surrounding 15th century French heroine Joan of Arc: Could a rib and other fragments recovered after she was burned at the stake be hers? Eighteen experts plan a battery of tests on the few remains reportedly recovered from the pyre where the 19-year-old was burned alive for heresy -- including a rib bone and some skin.

A rib bone supposedly found at the site where French heroine Joan of Arc was burned at the stake is actually that of an Egyptian mummy, according to researchers who used high-tech science to expose the fake. The bone, a piece of cloth and a cat femur were said to have been recovered after the 19-year-old was burned in 1431 in the town of Rouen. In 1909 -- the year Joan of Arc was beatified -- scientists declared it "highly probable" that the relics were hers.

Verdi and Tchaikovsky composed operas about her. Mark Twain wrote her biography. Sarah Bernhardt adopted her persona on stage. Ingrid Bergman and Jean Seberg played her in movies. French sculptor Emmanuel Fremiet fashioned a massive bronze equestrian statue of her for a central square in Paris. Japanese illustrator Yoshikazu Yasuhiko created a series of comic books about her.

Home Vision released three French films on video this week, ranging from a world classic to kitschy camp. Carl Dreyer's astonishing silent "The Passion of Joan of Arc" ($30), produced in 1928, is one of the greatest films ever made--a riveting, tragic retelling of the famed French martyr based on documentation from her original trial. Masterfully photographed by Rudolf Mate, who later directed films in Hollywood, the film features vivid, near-surreal close-ups of Joan and her inquisitors.

On Jan. 6, people around the world will come together to celebrate the 600th anniversary of the birth of St. Joan of Arc, the brave peasant girl from the French countryside who in 1429 lifted the English siege of Orléans, walloped the enemy army and led her king to be crowned at Reims. French President Nicolas Sarkozy plans a special visit to the village of Domremy, her birthplace. There will be a parade at 6 o'clock in New Orleans, a French pilgrimage retracing the route that led to Joan's martyrdom at the stake in Rouen, prestigious classical music concerts and ceremonial viewings of Carl Theodor Dryer's silent-screen masterpiece, "The Passion of Joan of Arc. " And how typical of the magic of Joan's story that she should have been born on so important a Christian holiday, the Feast of the Epiphany, celebrating Christ's baptism and the coming of the Magi.

With only a week left before the crush of fall films begins in earnest, this might be a good time to take a step back and immerse yourself in one of cinema's classics. Carl Dreyer's 1928 "The Passion of Joan of Arc," with Maria Falconetti in the title role in a rare screen appearance, is one of the acknowledged masterworks of the late silent period. See it one time only with a modern electronic score played live by Klive and Nigel Humberstone, collectively known as In the Nursery.

A rib bone supposedly found at the site where French heroine Joan of Arc was burned at the stake is actually that of an Egyptian mummy, according to researchers who used high-tech science to expose the fake. The bone, a piece of cloth and a cat femur were said to have been recovered after the 19-year-old was burned in 1431 in the town of Rouen. In 1909 -- the year Joan of Arc was beatified -- scientists declared it "highly probable" that the relics were hers.

A team of scientists hopes to crack one of the layers of mystery surrounding 15th century French heroine Joan of Arc: Could a rib and other fragments recovered after she was burned at the stake be hers? Eighteen experts plan a battery of tests on the few remains reportedly recovered from the pyre where the 19-year-old was burned alive for heresy -- including a rib bone and some skin.

I was there to research a book. The curanderas (healer women) of Cuernavaca had agreed to meet with me and discuss the secrets of their trade. They lived in a modest house, and later in the night they offered me a plastic bowl of green Jell-O. Nothing magical. No one was burning incense, burning candles, sprinkling holy water or chanting mantras. A very noisy, very bad ranchero band was playing in the neighbor's yard to celebrate a barrio wedding.

Verdi and Tchaikovsky composed operas about her. Mark Twain wrote her biography. Sarah Bernhardt adopted her persona on stage. Ingrid Bergman and Jean Seberg played her in movies. French sculptor Emmanuel Fremiet fashioned a massive bronze equestrian statue of her for a central square in Paris. Japanese illustrator Yoshikazu Yasuhiko created a series of comic books about her.

Composer Richard Einhorn read more than 3,000 pages of ancient female mystical writings, in addition to verbatim transcripts of Joan of Arc's trial, before settling on which texts to use for his "Voices of Light" oratorio honoring the French martyr. He spent weeks merely locating the original Latin and Old French versions. Three years ago he traveled to France to visit important Joan of Arc historical sites; he recorded a church bell in her birthplace for use in performances.

To some, she was an environmental Joan of Arc, patron saint of the Save the Redwoods movement and tree-sitting bane of the Northern California timber industry. To Berkeley writer Kate Coleman, she was a fascinating cross between nuclear whistle-blower Karen Silkwood and the late anarchist Emma Goldman. Environmental activist Judi Bari died of breast cancer six years ago in a Mendocino County cabin. She was 47.

Home Vision released three French films on video this week, ranging from a world classic to kitschy camp. Carl Dreyer's astonishing silent "The Passion of Joan of Arc" ($30), produced in 1928, is one of the greatest films ever made--a riveting, tragic retelling of the famed French martyr based on documentation from her original trial. Masterfully photographed by Rudolf Mate, who later directed films in Hollywood, the film features vivid, near-surreal close-ups of Joan and her inquisitors.