[All Dreyer's films] deal with man on the outer borders of his being. I believe that the land beyond this border is really of no interest to Dreyer. It makes no difference to him whether there is a heaven or a hell, occult light or biological darkness, a triumph of reason, faith, or tyranny. It is the border situation itself that is of interest.

Nowhere has Dreyer's humanistic pathos found more cogent expression than in The Day of Wrath, that jewel of his works, that jewel of the film art. The Day of Wrath is not based on an "impossible" idea, and perhaps for that very reason is less aesthetic and more direct in its appeal than are Dreyer's other films…. Appearing during the war, it stood for reason and against faith and superstition. And yet, the same motif as in The Word is woven into it: man...