The Vulture of Rouen

 I want to talk about this guy:

This character from The Passion of Joan of Arc is credited as Nicolas de Loyseleur - at the time, a canon of Rouen Cathedral and one of the judges in Joan's trial. The record of the trial does not show him as playing a significant role, but twenty years after Joan's death, the Pope of the time ordered a retrial to examine whether her conviction and execution had been just. According to the testimony in that trial (at least the version of it I was able to find online), 

"the Earl of Warwick, the Bishop of Beauvais, and Maitre Nicolas Loyseleur told us that Jeanne had spoken strange things in regard to her visions, and in order the better to know the truth about them, it was agreed that Maitre Nicolas Loyseleur should pretend to be from the Marches of Lorraine-Jeanne s own country and in the following of the King of France; that he should enter her prison in a layman's habit, and that the guards should retire and leave him alone with her: there was, in a room adjoining the prison, a hole, specially made for the purpose, in order that I and my companion might be there, and hear what was said by Jeanne. Thither we went, unseen by her. Then Loyseleur, pretending to have news, began to question Jeanne of the King's estate and of her revelations. Jeanne replied, believing him to be in fact of her own country and party: and the Bishop and the Earl desired us to put in writing what we had heard. I replied, that this ought not to be, that it was not honest to carry on the Trial by such means, but that, if she spoke thus in open Court, we would willingly register the words. And, ever afterwards, Jeanne had great confidence in this Loyseleur, who often heard her in confession, and would generally have private speech with her before she was taken before the Judges."

This character, though, is much more than his namesake was. Before looking up his name, I called him "the Vulture," and I still think that title is well-deserved. Indeed, I would not be surprised if Dreyer had consciously chosen to portray him as reminiscent of a carrion bird: he looms over Joan and the other judges, his head with its black skullcap and aquiline nose rises from his black and white robes, gathered at the neck like a vulture's ruff. He says very little, but mostly watches, and waits, giving the occasional silent nod when he orders the "removal" of a troublesome priest or encourages Joan to betray herself.

He is sinister, ominous, a carrion bird waiting for his prey to give up before he descends on it. Where the other judges rant and jeer, his restrained presence is terrifying. And then, we see this:

 

After Joan retracts her confession and is condemned to death, one of her partisans arranges for her to confess and receive Communion. Though I'm no expert, I am fairly certain this isn't something one is supposed to do for a condemned heretic. The Vulture sees this. He sees the priest bless Joan and give her the Communion wafer. He should, by all rights, stop this - after all, even if he has failed to destroy Joan's credibility by making her recant her actions, he still has an interest in preventing her becoming seen as a martyr. Surely he should swoop in, stop the priest, have the monk who believes in Joan "removed" by the English soldiers, and not allow this sacrament to give her any appearance of being in the right. Instead, he simply stands and watches the ritual, tears forming in his eyes; in this shot, he is not looming in a position of command and fear, but leaning against a wall, half concealing himself from sight, half holding himself up. It's a sudden, shocking humanisation of this manipulative villain, and I cannot help but wonder whether there was not some underlying truth in what he said to Joan even as he was deceiving her into recanting: "I have great pity for you." For the first time in the film, we see this character as we have seen other characters, as we have seen Joan: a static, close-up shot of his face in which he betrays actual emotion, just for a brief instant, before going on to watch Joan burned at the stake. It astonishes me how profoundly my whole understanding of the Vulture's character is shifted by this single moment in the film, how much depth is added by this glimpse of him, paralysed with emotion, unshed tears shining in his eyes.

-William Mason