The story of Joan of Arc, historian Andre Maurois wrote, is at once the most amazing miracle in history and the most logical sequence of political acts. But the church court trying the teenage girl saw neither divine intervention nor uncommon acumen in her astonishing triumphs. It saw heresy - and death by fire. Seventeen-year-old Jean Seberg plays the visionary Maid of Orleans in Otto Preminger's production of Saint Joan, adapted from George Bernard Shaw's play by Graham Greene and cast with a company of bravura talents. Richard Widmark turns his tough-guy persona on its head to play a Dauphin more court jester than future king. And stately John Gielgud is the English commander who scoffs: The angels may be on the side of the church - but I have 800 soldiers.
