Hail Mary

The box from this mid-80's Godard film proudly states, "The most controversial film of the 80's," perhaps because it had the distinction of being condemned by the pope. Godard is no stranger to controversy, though the battle this time is over a religious issue and not a political one. At times Godard has been, unfairly in my opinion, criticised for neglected the spiritual in favor of the social and political. In a sense this may be true, but when watching his film, I often get the sense that he's trying to reach for something deeper than a system of government, and this is the film in which it becomes most direct. Before Scorsese's film, this is like The Last Temptation of Christ for Mary, the mother of Jesus. Unfortunately, it is a more interesting film than it is a good one. It's set in modern day France when Mary, a young high school girl is informed that she will bear a child despite the fact that she has pledged to not have sex. She is, in fact, a virgin, a detail that annoys her boyfriend, Joseph, especially now that she is becoming pregnant. The human doubts, struggles, and disbeliefs over such a miraculous occurrence all play out in the film. How can she be pregnant and still be a virgin? After all, the Mary and Joseph of this film are two very ordinary young people. Perhaps the central focus of this film, in my opinion, is the mysterious dichotemy between body and soul. Much of the controversy over the film I suspect stems from the numerous scenes in which Godard's camera observes Mary's naked body as she develops. Though it is all presented very non-sexually, there seems to be a real facination with the physicality of flesh. Yet this is a film about a divine miracle and life growing within this girl -- the soul. It then also seems to compare the body/soul dynamic with the dichotemy of sound and image -- a facination with the essentials of cinema that Godard has explored and experimented with throughout his career. It's too bad that much of the film seems unnecessarily oblique and at times even borders on boring (not a common Godard trait). I have a feeling that this could have amounted to more profound statement, as it is however, I will settle for some unique observations that don't add up to a cohesive whole.