Dorathen Better Late Then Never

CrawlerChunky In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Hadrina The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Phillipa Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

betty dalton John Malkovich. Faye Dunaway. Dustin Hoffman. I will see any movie with those grandmasters. Milla Jovovich plays a part that was written for her. She is the perfect Joan of Arc. I really can believe in her. And with these great actors who all perform at their best we add the maestro Luc Besson to the mix. I think "Joan of Arc" is his best work, next to "Leon", which I saw back to back recently without realizing at first that they were both written produced and directed by the french virtuoso called Luc Besson, who also produced "Taken" and the "Transporter"."Joan of Arc" is a story about a girl (Milla Jovovich) in the Dark Ages who got a lucid vision in which she is ordered by God to fight for her King (John Malkovich). Will she succeed in her quest ordained by God? "Joan of Arc" tells the standard story that any movie does about knights and kings, but I havent ever seen the dark ages being portrayed so incredibly glorious and bloody. What a shattering tragedy too. No happy end, a viscious one. The film starts gloriously. Ends with heinous crimes and defeat. But hey, it is history which is being portrayed here. And history does not care about box office hollywood happy endings. But the producer of "Taken" who made this movie, still gives this defeat at the end a glorious ring. If you are a sucker for Milla Jovovich (Resident Evil) then you will love this movie. But you are gonna have to suck mud or to put it more politely: the NOT happy ending contains half of the movie. If you can swallow the shattering defeat end part of the movie then this will be a great knights movie for you: resident evil goes medieval. And then better!

Joshua Mcnellis Any practicing Christian, especially Roman Catholic, should NOT watch this liberal, leftist, pathetic portrayal of Joan of Arc. The movie starts off great, and does a COMPLETE 180 half way through the movie. I knew it was going to crap as soon as Dustin Hoffman 's character came into the scene. Almost threw my TV out into the middle of the street. Hollywood's constant attempts to degrade Christians, their beliefs, and their martyrs, Saints, is disgusting. Never see any movies portray other Religions or leaders of any minority groups/movements, any leftist crappy causes in a negative or disrespectful light. Anyone who would give this pile of s..t more than a 1 star speaks volumes about their beliefs and mindset.

Steven Patterson The film opens terribly with small, fast-scrolling revisionist history in an ersatz medieval script superimposed on a nearly featureless map of a northern coastline, presumably somewhere in Europe. French place names compete for our attention as blood seeps over the obscure territory, presumably representing English invasion. All this when a simple date would tell us as much as we need to know. Then there is a wonderful series of establishing shots, rendering all the previous text unnecessary. Here is medieval agrarian , here is the title character, here, her conflicted relationships with the Church & God, the ambiguity of what is real, what is visionary. A melange of differing accents alerts us that we are dealing with an ensemble cast. Then John Malkovich, Faye Dunaway, and Dustin Hoffman remind us again. Americans in medieval ...hmmm. Of the three, Dunaway seems the most at home in her role. Hoffman...does anyone ever forget he is watching Hoffman? Jack Crabb is the last role I saw as a character and not Hoffman-in-a-role. My point isn't to disparage his acting, but that the casting director has placed too-high-profile actors in ing roles. With Hoffman, the question is never what will the character do next, but rather, what will Hoffman do with the character. Milla is nearly perfect for the part - wild eyed volatile delusional virginal zealot, not much different from her roles in other films (Fifth Element). But one almost waits for her to go off on a rant in Ukrainian. Has a French actress ever played this role in an English language film? I liked the props and most of the sets. Much of the photography is beautiful, but there is a visually disturbing lack of roads leading to some of the castles. And in the end, the story runs down without reaching a memorable conclusion. Or maybe I dozed off.

Gehan Pinto If you're a fan of history themed movies, trust me, this ISN'T the one for you. Compared to hits such as braveheart, gladiator & patriot this falls miles short. The acting itself is simply awful, Milia jovovich comes out as a emotionally insecure renegade rather than the savior of . & same goes for the other characters, Duke of Alençon & the Dauphin charles are portrayed as if they're mentally unbalanced. Nothing like men soldiers would want to follow into battle. Filming was in the worst possible taste too, where's movies braveheart and gladiator give the audience a feeling for the characters, this leaves them cold. No inspired battle scenes, Just crack a few jokes, charge into the battlefield screaming like maniacs, chop off few heads & the war is won in minutes. That just about sums up the "Message" of The MessengerSomething to watch if you want Jeanne de arc looking like project "ALICE" of resident evil. My recommendation: 2/10