Despite the beauty of its cinematography and the painterly composition of its images, as well as the complexity of the way in which it explores its themes, this was for me not quite the masterpiece it clearly is for many others. It is, nevertheless, an intriguing and frequently gripping movie.

Ordet was probably better!

267

A very fine film about sexual passion in a repressive society.

Serious, stark cinema, peerlessly photographed by Carl Andersson.

A masterpiece from Dreyer. As with "The Passion of Joan of Arc", he shoots his film very darkly, combining heavy shadows and limited lighting with a series of unpleasant, trenchant religious themes. Difficult to determine its outcome, its assertiveness and tranquility kept my eyes glued to the screen. A piercing tale of cruelty and its inevitable repercussions. Recommended !!!

#263

Bleak, beautifully told story about witchcraft, repressed sexuality, and religious zealotry. The bleak cinematography and understated acting help create a complex, depressing world of cruel punishment and unattainable love. Wonderful and unexpected.

Dreyer's camerawork is astonishing. His cold, lingering gaze and haunting black and white photography create an oppressive atmosphere, one which perfectly captures this film's theme. The text is just as impressive and the extraordinarily talented cast only accentuates its effectiveness. A bleak and austere masterpiece.

The pace of the movie drags you down to the unjoyfull experiences of psychological persecution and physical torture built into Danish religions.

a film that seems better in the rearview than it did when i was watching it; some of these images are burned into my brain.

Day of Wrath is anything but easy to get into, but it definitely sat with me after I had finished it. The incredibly heavy religious themes, the austere mood, the closed-in characters, make for a difficult watch, but a very rewarding one, and I definitely think there's a chance I'd like this one even more with a rewatch or two. As it stands, it's pretty good to begin with.

Seemingly quiet and simple, but packs an emotional wallop.

# 280

Unusual. Unforgettable.

Dreyer's is the most depressing cinematic worlds ever. Everyday life is furnished with death, disease, hatred and madness. Dreyer wraps it in a metaphysic that is not one of existential vacuum but of honest-to-God religious conceptions, though not very optimistic ones. In Day of Wrath there is an interdependence of right and wrong, redemption and damnation, love and spite, fact and fiction, heaven and hell... and you have to be dead to get the upper hand in a conflict.

Intense and slow, good and evil, religious and anti-religious all the way through. Thematically and aesthetically similar and only slightly inferior to Dreyer's pièce de résistance, "La passion de Jeanne d'Arc".

This is exactly the kind of movie that, to a 21st-century American, looks like it's going to be as dull as dust... until you sit down to actually see it, and pay attention... and find that it is not. A small movie that has been polished to a high gleam, making you realize that it only sounds boring because many have tried but almost no one can do this kind of story as well as Dreyer can. Excellent acting and lighting effects, and exactly the right ending

266

a remarkable film, though not quite as perfect as Ordet. who else was making such films in 1943??

A frustrating but very rewarding film. Dreyer is meticulous with every aspect of the production, the shot composition, the pacing, the acting and most of all in the way he creates tension in a spiritual drama. At once critical and reverential, cynical and hopeful, you can't be certain how anything is going to turn out and it makes the drama that much more effective.