''Hail Mary'' (french: Je vous salue, Marie) is a 1985 French
erotic drama film
In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super ...
written and directed by
Jean-Luc Godard. The film is a modern retelling of the story of the virgin birth. It was entered into the
35th Berlin International Film Festival.
Plot
Marie, a student, works at her father's Swiss gas station and plays basketball for a local team; she claims to be a virgin and maintains a
chaste
Chaste refers to practicing chastity.
Chaste may also refer to:
* Aymar Chaste (1514–1603), Catholic French admiral
* Chaste (Marvel Comics), a fictional Marvel Comics martial arts enclave
* Chaste (canton) - see List of townships in Quebec
T ...
relationship with her boyfriend Joseph, a taxi cab driver and college dropout. Joseph remains loyal to Marie even though she will not sleep with him, and another girl, Juliette, entreats him to be with her. When a passing stranger named Uncle Gabriel (who arrives by jet plane and is accompanied by a small girl who acts as his secretary) informs Marie that she will become pregnant despite remaining chaste, she is at first shocked and confused. For his part, Joseph cannot believe that Marie can be pregnant and a virgin, so he accuses her of sleeping around. Gabriel aggressively schools Joseph to accept Marie's pregnancy, while Marie comes to terms with God's plan through meditations that are sometimes angry and usually punctuated by elemental images of the sun, moon, clouds, flowers, and water.
In a parallel narrative, Eva, a college student, gets involved with her professor, who theorizes that life on earth arose from a guided extraterrestrial intelligence. Unlike Marie, who does not allow Joseph to touch her sexually, Eva has an affair with her professor, who ultimately leaves her to go back east to his family, leaving her distraught.
With Gabriel's help, Marie teaches Joseph to "touch" her without touching her. Joseph pledges to act as Marie's shadow, to which she responds, "But isn't that what all men are, the shadow of God?" Alone, Marie wrestles with and then gives herself over to the divine process of her pregnancy. Joseph and Marie are wed and she gives birth to a son. Together they raise the boy, who eventually leaves his family to pursue "his father's business." In the end, Marie explores her sexuality, seeking to link her body and spirit.
Cast
*
Myriem Roussel
Myriem Roussel (born in Rabat, Morocco, 26 December 1961) is a French actress. She is best-known for her role as Marie in Jean-Luc Godard's 1985 film ''Je Vous Salue Marie/Hail Mary'', which was controversial at the time. She had come to Godard's ...
as Marie
*
Thierry Rode
Thierry is a French male given name, derived from the Germanic "Theodoric". It is the cognate of German "Dietrich" and " Dieter", English Terry, Derek and Derrick, and of various forms in other European languages. It is also a surname.
People wit ...
as Joseph
*
Philippe Lacoste Philippe is a masculine sometimes feminin given name, cognate to Philip. It may refer to:
* Philippe of Belgium (born 1960), King of the Belgians (2013–present)
* Philippe (footballer) (born 2000), Brazilian footballer
* Prince Philippe, Count ...
as L'ange Gabriel
*
Manon Andersen as La petite fille
*
Juliette Binoche
Juliette Binoche (; born 9 March 1964) is a French actress and dancer.
She has appeared in more than sixty feature films and has been the recipient of numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a British Academy Film Award, a Silver Bear, ...
as Juliette
* Anne Gautier as Eva
Background
The point of departure for the film was a book by
Françoise Dolto
Françoise Dolto (; November 6, 1908 – August 25, 1988) was a French pediatrician and psychoanalyst.
Biography
Born as Françoise Marette, she was the daughter of an affluent far-right royalist family of traditional Catholics in Paris. Her Als ...
, the popular French pediatrician and psychoanalyst, called ''L'Évangile au risque de la psychanalyse.''
Release
The film was first released in France on 23 January 1985. It was entered into the
35th Berlin International Film Festival.
All screenings in its initial theatrical distribution were accompanied by the
short film
A short film is any motion picture that is short enough in running time not to be considered a feature film. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes ...
''The Book of Mary'' (french: Le livre de Marie) by Godard's longtime companion and collaborator
Anne-Marie Miéville
Anne-Marie Miéville (; born 11 November 1945) is a Swiss video and filmmaker whom ''Sight & Sound'' has called a "hugely important multimedia artist."
Biography
Miéville was a practising photographer when she met Jean-Luc Godard, who would be ...
.
The film receives home media release from the
Cohen Media. The blu-ray package follows this tradition and places ''The Book of Mary'' right before ''Hail Mary''.
Reception
''Hail Mary''s religious themes and scenes of
full frontal nudity
Nudity is the state of being in which a human is without clothing.
The loss of body hair was one of the physical characteristics that marked the biological evolution of modern humans from their hominin ancestors. Adaptations related to h ...
offended some
Christians
Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words '' Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρ ...
.
[Je vous salue, Marie](_blank)
Spiral (Retrieved 24 February 2008) Pope John Paul II
Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...
criticized the film saying that it "deeply wounds the religious sentiments of believers." Protesters showed up at some theaters on opening night, and its premiere screening at the Sydney Film Festival was disrupted by protestors and a bomb threat that caused the theatre to be evacuated. The film had only 353,877 admissions in French movie theaters.
It was banned in Argentina and Brazil (where the movie was banned until 1988).
''Hail Mary'' received mixed reviews, including one in the ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' that characterized the film as "not especially provocative or entertaining", but also called it "an utterly serious attempt to examine the nature of relations between women and men and the possibility of profound friendships not based on sex. It's also about the demands of faith, which, in this time of cynicism, may be the most truly controversial aspect of the movie." Many other serious critics were more favourable: ''
Time Out'' said "Composed like a brilliant mosaic, Godard's film gives fresh meaning to everyday images; makes us listen to Dvořák with renewed appreciation; and shows the female nude as though never filmed before." Channel 4 Film's critic wrote "The Virgin Birth is presented as a reality - the mystery for Godard being womanhood and birth in general. This he explores through stunning images of nature and the nude figure of his heroine - the latter photographed chastely without voyeurism or sexism, after certain classic paintings." Filmmaker
John Waters
John Samuel Waters Jr. (born April 22, 1946) is an American filmmaker, writer, actor, and artist. He rose to fame in the early 1970s for his transgressive cult films, including '' Multiple Maniacs'' (1970), '' Pink Flamingos'' (1972) and '' Fe ...
wrote a highly favorable review that was included in his book ''Crackpot''. In contrast, writer and director
James Gunn
James Francis Gunn Jr. (born August 5, 1966) is an American filmmaker and executive. He began his career as a screenwriter in the mid-1990s, starting at Troma Entertainment with ''Tromeo and Juliet'' (1997). He then began working as a directo ...
claims it is his least favorite film he has seen.
At the
Cannes Film Festival
The Cannes Festival (; french: link=no, Festival de Cannes), until 2003 called the International Film Festival (') and known in English as the Cannes Film Festival, is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films o ...
,
Noël Godin
Noël Godin (born 13 September 1945) is a Belgian writer, critic, actor and notorious pie thrower or ''entarteur''. Godin gained global attention in 1998 when his group ambushed Microsoft CEO Bill Gates in Brussels, pelting the software magnate ...
, disappointed that Godard, in his opinion, made a religious film, threw a shaving cream pie into Godard's face, making international news.
[GODARD HAS A BAD DAY IN CANNES...AND TRIES TO WITHDRAW 'HAIL MARY' IN ITALY](_blank)
New York Times (Retrieved 24 February 2008) Under heavy criticism, Godard attempted to withdraw the film from Italy, but his distributor was unable to do so.
He also claimed that the film is not about the Virgin Mary, but about "a young woman named Mary who, at a certain moment in her life, finds herself part of an exceptional event that she would never have wished for herself." Despite the initial heavy criticism, the film has also been praised for its beautiful cinematography.
''Hail Mary'' currently holds a 70% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 10 reviews.
References
External links
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hail Mary (Film)
1985 films
1980s erotic drama films
Censored films
1980s French-language films
French avant-garde and experimental films
Erotic fantasy films
Films about the Nativity of Jesus
Films directed by Jean-Luc Godard
Portrayals of the Virgin Mary in film
Films set in Switzerland
French pregnancy films
1980s avant-garde and experimental films
French erotic drama films
1985 drama films
Film controversies in France
Film controversies in Argentina
Film controversies in Brazil
Obscenity controversies in film
Religious controversies in film
Religious controversies in France
Religious controversies in Brazil
Religious controversies in Argentina
1980s French films