91Èȱ¬

The story of Joan of Arc has been brought to the screen many times before, but never as an opera set in a modern Hungarian hospital. Sadly, novelty alone isn't enough to sustain Johanna, a feature-length expansion of a short by second-time director Kornél Mundruczó (Pleasant Days). The potentially riotous combo of sex, song and surgery palls all too quickly, leaving us waiting around for morphine addict turned maverick nurse Orsolya Téth's inevitable date with flaming destiny.

Mundruczó cleverly wrong-foots us in the opening reel with what appears to be the aftermath of a horrific traffic accident. Turns out it's just a hospital training exercise, with Budapest locals hired to play patients. Among them is Johanna (Téth), who takes the opportunity to top up her drug habit. Winding up in a coma, she then returns to the land of the living with the new-found ability to cure sick men with sex. But she doesn't go down well with the medical staff, who won't stand for supernatural interference in their scientific domain.

"A PAIN IN THE ARIA"

All of this is played out as musical entertainment, the big-lunged cast trilling every line of dialogue. It amuses for a while but eventually becomes a pain in the aria. It would help if there were some relief from the ugly green interiors, by turns garish and gloomy. What's most amiss is the lack of emotional punch, inviting unflattering comparisons with the likes of The Passion Of Joan Of Arc (1928), whose silence seems even more golden after this.

In Hungarian with English subtitles.