Visions and Victims: Art Melodrama in the Films of Carl Th. Dreyer, Amanda Doxtater (2024).

This article reviews *Visions and Victims: Art Melodrama in the Films of Carl Th. Dreyer* (2024) by Amanda Doxtater, which argues that Dreyer's films, traditionally seen as austere arthouse works, are better understood as "art melodrama"—a hybrid mode combining melodrama's emotional expressivity with art cinema's formal experimentation and reflexivity. Drawing on extensive archival research, Doxtater demonstrates that Dreyer maintained a complex engagement with melodramatic elements throughout his career, challenging prior scholarship that positioned him solely as a formalist auteur opposed to melodrama. The book offers nuanced analyses of Dreyer's major films, including *The Passion of Joan of Arc*, *The Word*, and *Day of Wrath*, incorporating feminist, queer, and performance theory to reveal new interpretive possibilities. While the reviewer notes some missed opportunities to discuss Dreyer's lesser-studied films more fully, the work is recognized as a significant contribution to Dreyer scholarship and film studies.