People: Mar. 4, 1985

Panned by some critics and damned by the church, Jean-Luc Godard's new movie, Hail Mary, is naturally packing in scandal-loving French moviegoers. Since it opened last month, the film has been banned briefly (a judge lifted the censorship), and demonstrators have jostled and insulted ticket holders in line. The reason for the fuss is the film's plot, a contemporary version of the virgin birth. Mary is the outspoken, truculent daughter of a gas-station manager; Joseph is a taxi driver who at the news of her pregnancy mutters about how good her other lovers must have been; the Archangel Gabriel is a drunken roughneck; and Jesus turns out to be a turbulent toddler who exclaims, "I am the one who is," leading Joseph, behind the wheel of the family car, to reply, "Shut up and get in." For good measure, Mary, played by Myriem Roussel, has several nude scenes. Godard, 54, has replied to the criticism with questionable contrition: "If we, producers of sounds and image, have sinned, it was only in approaching, with the too young pride of modern cinema, she who Georges Bernanos had written was 'younger than sin'-- the Virgin Mary."