A Film for Bible Purists

With a scriptwriter named Luke and a cast of thousands

At Warner Bros., the left hand apparently careth not what the right hand doeth. The studio is distributing Monty Python's Life of Brian, the British comedy troupe's send-up of the Gospels that is widely condemned as blasphemous by Christians and Jews alike. But almost simultaneously, it is releasing another movie that will please the pious. This film, titled simply Jesus, is calculated to appeal to the most ardent biblical purists: all the action and virtually all the words spoken by the actors and off-screen Narrator Alexander Scourby are taken straight from the Gospel of Luke.

In a way, Jesus is not so much a movie as a religious documentary drama, which is its weakness as well as its strength. Since the Gospels are basically collections of episodes that were set down for inspiration and information, a film that follows them faithfully cannot help jumping from event to event without much narrative flow. However, the movie is also mercifully spared the hype that commercial film makers usually inflict on biographies of Christ, as in Nicholas Ray's 1961 remake of Cecil B. DeMille's silent epic King of Kings and George Stevens' overwrought 1965 The Greatest Story Ever Told. In this new film, there is no digression into the sexual enticements of Salome, no subplot on Barabbas, and no theorizing about the motives of Judas as in Franco Zeffirelli's TV Jesus of Nazareth. On the other hand, there is almost no character development, although Brian Deacon, an English actor, manages to portray a Christ who is much less mystical and more appealing than most of the previous celluloid renderings.

The film's British producer, John Heyman (The Go-Between), who comes from a Jewish background, decribes Je sus as not a conventional "movie movie" but a "translation" of the Gospel into a new medium. Jesus is not church-basement fare, however. It was produced on a sizable budget ($6 million) with a cast that includes more than 5,000 extras, and meticulous attention to authenticity. All the filming was done in the Holy Land, and a Sanhedrin of Bible scholars and other experts was consulted on costumes, sets and historical sites. The film deals frankly with the signs and miracles in Luke. At Jesus' baptism in the Jordan River, a dove flutters down to the Nazarene's damp shoulder. In other scenes, fishes and loaves multiply, the halt and the blind are healed and Christ physically returns from the dead.

The film uses much footage on Luke from Heyman's so-called Genesis Project, his five-year-old effort to film the entire Bible for educational purposes (Heyman has also filmed most of Genesis). He hopes that the proceeds from theater and TV showings of Jesus and future spin-offs will allow him to complete his project, which has already cost $22.5 million, before the end of the century.

Jesus' chief financial backer is missionary-minded Dallas Billionaire Nelson Bunker Hunt; he invested more than $3 million in the film and has signed over his proceeds to Here's Life, a Protestant campaign that aims to evangelize the entire world. The film is being released first in the West, Southwest and part of the Midwest. Its move to the East will begin on Nov. 18, with a premiere at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., sponsored by a variety of notables, including Texas Democrat James Wright, the House majority leader; Actress Helen Hayes; and Roman Catholic Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, who has proclaimed the film ''a masterpiece.''

Another booster is Rabbi Marc Tanenbaum, interreligious affairs director of the American Jewish Committee. That is not as surprising as it seems, since the film, in a spirit of tolerance, includes several reminders that Jesus was a Jew; for instance, he is shown reciting traditional Jewish blessings. The narration also notes, in one of the few additions to Luke's words, that only one faction of Jews was out to get Jesus, and underscores the responsibility of Pontius Pilate, the ''most vicious'' of Roman overlords, for the Crucifixion.

Says Heyman of what is virtually becoming his life work: ''There is nothing more worthwhile to do than to communicate the Bible.'' Many people may not read Scripture, but Heyman hopes they will sit still for a screen rendition of what he considers to be ''the source book for living, for values--for our society.''

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