I came to this two part, near four-hour telling of the story of France's great heroine after reading a biography of her short life and so was really looking forward to it. However, while it had some good points, in the end, I think it failed its noble subject for some fairly blatant reasons. For one thing, I'm not sure the story told here was historically accurate. Things like her testy relationship with her father, the sacrifice of her brother and her "relationship" with Jean Le Metz had the whiff of contrivance about them, inserted for dramatic purposes, plus while I could just about accept the mixture of accents, few of which were authentically French, all speaking in everyday English, more than a few times phrases from the present day jarring my ears, crept in to the dialogue. Though there was little stinting on locations, crowd scenes and battle sequences, with smoke and mud abounding, there was little actual blood on show (apart from when Joan herself takes an arrow in the shoulder) which again detracted from credibility. I thought Leelee Sobieski looked the part in the title role and acted reasonably well while as the hired heavyweight support, Peter O'Toole unsurprisingly dominates as the conflicted Bishop Couchin.The special effects used for Joan's visions of her saints I considered a little on the tacky side, all soft focus and wing-bearing and felt that the climax of her trial and execution by burning might have been extended and made more of. At other times I felt I was watching a period-set MTV music video of the 80's, with the slo-mo camera much in evidence, this impression aided by an over-obtrusive soundtrack too. Even the descriptions offered by scene-setting graphics were over fussy.Nevertheless, Joan's wonderful story just about breaks through but on the whole this made-for-TV movie betrayed its target audience ambitions and was guilty of over-dramatising a story which has more than enough real-life content to not need such artificial aid.

We watched this movie and were completely enthralled in it from start to finish! As a way to draw people into history it is a remarkably fascinating movie! It's believable on its own without the story of Joan behind it to give it a dramatic edge. The actors were believable in their parts without the over the top acting that one so often sees in a medieval movie. This is something that I would watch again!I found the historical facts and the legend were all personified to a very believable extent, and the attention to detail in the wardrobe was good. It would have been easier to gloss over the gorier aspects of the legend here, but the ending scene paid full justice to what happened. There were a few discrepancies in the footage (seen as goofs) but honestly, until they were pointed out we never noticed them.

wow, this is a really great epic film. i loved the maker's attention to details. it was greatly acted as well. the amazing leelee sobieski did a PERFECT job as joan of arc. i loved it and could watch it over and over again. there are great shots and even better action scenes. leelee did a great job all around. it is a TV movie, too! it just blew me away. the story of the amazing joan of arc truly comes alive in this movie. it's a very inspirational film and its story couldn't have been told any better. the acting, the detail, the action, the backgrounds, the historic representation, even the extras are all excellent. sorry to sound redundant, but this is the best it can get. it is so touching and you will learn things about joan of arc you never knew. it teaches you and gives you so much to take in. GREAT FILM!!

This is a very good movie and I think that this film is very realistic how it was back then. The actress who looks almost exactly like Helen Hunt Leelee Sobieski stars as the title name and she has a powerful performance. Powers Boothe, Jonathan Hyde, Peter O'Toole, Robert Loggia, Shirley MacLaine, Maximilian Schell, Neil Patrick Harris, and Peter Strauss all put on great performances. The music in the film is very good. I think everything looks very realistic and there maybe few battles but all are good. Back to her performance, Sobieski acts very convincingly as Joan. This is a very good film that is emotional, interesting, and exciting and really shouldn't be missed by any big movie fan or fans of Gladiator and The Lord of the Rings trilogy. I strongly recommend this title!