Saint Joan is one of the few truly cursed films in the history of cinema. Not only was it shunned by the public and ripped apart by critics, it was also misconstrued and portrayed as the very opposite of what it was: a film unfaithful to Shaw’s play… How could Preminger have been unfaithful to Shaw…, when he had numerous affinities and commonalities with the Irish writer: scepticism, a taste for paradox, a rejection of sentimentality and, beneath the cold and modest exterior, a genuinely generous spirit? In both the play and the film of Saint Joan, the penchant for paradox bursts forth through the heroine, who is as realistic as she is mystical, capable of attracting (or repelling) agnostics and the devout alike… Beyond its fidelity to Shaw, Saint Joan is also 100% a film d’auteur. As in Laura, The Fan, Bonjour Tristesse and others, reality is seen from a distance, as if from the other side of a mirror, in a realm of eternity that restores its complexity and subtlety better than if it were caught in the net of what is immediately visible. (The technique of presenting Joan’s story through flashbacks based on Charles VII’s dream was invented by Preminger and Graham Greene, who drew upon the epilogue of Shaw’s play for this purpose.) Joan, as incarnated by Jean Seberg with an uncanny spontaneity and authenticity, is a quintessential Preminger heroine: stubborn and fascinating, multifaceted and yet true to herself, whose victory and apotheosis will also result in tragedy. The veiled essence of the film, and, in all likelihood, what interested Preminger most in Shaw’s play, is the relationship between Dunois and Joan. Through her, we see – as always in the Preminger oeuvre – that love is never more powerful than when it remains unfulfilled … In terms of directing, Preminger reached an extreme level of sophistication, given his predilection for long, complex, sinuous, reptilian shots (exemplified by the hopscotch scene), which transform a theatrical space into a cinematic one … More than once, Preminger succeeded in elevating a minor subject into a feature of universal scope. With Saint Joan, he did the reverse; starting from a universal theme, he created an intimate, secret film, one to personally treasure, made for his own enjoyment and intended for the happy few, who here, are fully gratified.

Jacques Lourcelles,Dictionnaire du cinéma. Les films, Editions Robert Laffont, Paris 1992