Pope Joan (2009)

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

This is an astonishing documentary that will wring your heart while it bends your mind

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Layered with historical facts, legends and fiction Pope Joan gives us an insight of the dreadful condition peasant women endured in the Dark Ages, where education for them was discouraged and even forbidden by the reigning Church. Die Papstin, a fascinating story of a remarkable, ambitious, intelligent and courageous poor woman from the 9th century, whom the Catholic Church wants erased not only from the papal chronicles but also from all historic documents that mentions her existence. Unwanted only because she was born female, at birth her father, the village priest, was disappointed and believed she was born out of "…punishment from God, for my past sins" a common and foolish creed even in these days, when something dire happens to a believer. Johanna von Ingelheim at birth, remarkably played by Johanna Wokalek, and latter becomes John Anglicus, a healer, a priest, a linguist, much loved by anyone around her, (by now him), even by then reigning Pope Sergius, played effortlessly by the great John Goodman. After a harsh and violent childhood and after her brother is killed in a Viking attack, she decided to go into the world as a boy, enrolling into a Benedictine monastery where she continues her studies and gains medical knowledge that ultimately gives her entry into the papal circles. The film is well directed, acted and full with lavish images and scenes from the very distant past of the Dark Ages, even if I personally had a problem with the ending; I think it was over dramatized. Nevertheless, I recommend it to all who are interested to know about this extraordinary human being, historical figure, or myth. We will never know for sure, but we know, there is no smoke without fire.

The story is old. The details are spices of dusty legend. The tragedy of a Roman Church "accident" is chapter of many conspiracy books. But, behind that things, "Pope Joan" is a beautiful film. And this fact is important.For costumes and atmosphere, for extraordinary John Goodman and for the art of details, for the basic fact than the IX-th century is another XXI century, for the perfume of serenity and the force of a myth to be stronger than reality. For the feeling than Joan exist without any testimony. For the spring air and grass smell. For the art to destroy clichés. For remember of essential values of human circle and the end as fly of ash bird. For the warm impression . Historic movie, it is in fact a parable. Like many who sleeps in our memories.

This movie is about the indomitable spirit of many of our species regardless of race or sex. It's not about liberal or conservative, it's about right or wrong. Not about girl or boy, but about the abilities of each of us to advance the human cause on this earth. It's not about Buddist, Jew or Christian but about aleivating all the suffering we can. Consider that for one month of the cost of the war in the middle east, every human could have access to clean drinking water. Who knows where the next Einstein or TuTu will come from, surely the potential exists and needs a chance to show itself without the intolerance of prejudice for one of a different color, sex or the distance from your home they come. We have a duty to expand our knowledge and expose all to the light of reason and in that we have no fear. This movie is a gift to parents and adults that want to find the ways to help all. Ignorance is not bliss, the scene about the mustard seed is worth the price of this great movie. Allegory is when your teacher thanks you. Thank you mother.Wokalek and Flack are superb and a joy. John Goodman is like your pastor or priest and as amiable as I imagine JohnPaul II. Petherbridge as Aesculapius is exactly my image of Hesse's Magister Ludi and Wenham, a developing Chomsky, could of evolved into a Smedly Butler! For those in power this could be a great mini-series for all involved, IMHO. Villains don't get a mention, sry Iain and AT. m.

Although critics in my native Greece were very circumspect when valuing this movie I disagree with them. Many found that it lacked grandiose crowds in the battle and acclamation of the Pope scenes, but I think that in reality medieval battles and the assembly of Roman plebeians acclaiming the Pope must not have been particularly grandiose events and that added a quality of realism to the movie.Also the structure of the story, the equivalent of what Germans call Bildungsroman-that is the process of the development of character through life, was presented in a very able manner, showing the evolution of Joan, a simple but charismatic country girl, to supreme Pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church.The love story subplot was also good adding romance to a tale that would have been dull otherwise and proving that even scholarly girls are not immune to the pleasures of the flesh.I have to comment on the acting of Ms Wokalek, which I found admirable in the way that it portrayed the subdued power of the character of Joan under a facade of neutral manners and also the surprise role of John Goodman who played a larger than life exuberant and kindly Pope.The evocation of the age was also excellent avoiding excesses, and presenting the mendacity of peasant life in the villages as well as the relative luxury of the ruling classes.Of course the main point of the story concerned the barriers that gender and class posed to a talented poor woman during that dark age. I think the story has similarities with that of Joan of Ark. The final surprise, which I will not disclose, must have been a novelistic devise relative to modern concerns about the Church invented by the author of the novel on which the movie was based and not an integral part of the Pope Joan legend as preserved through the ages.All in all a very able movie which I greatly enjoyed. It is a pity that the response of the Greek critics was at best lukewarm.