An Argentine Saint

Several American movies that touch on sensitive political themes have been attacked well before they opened. One of those is ''Evita,'' starring Madonna, the movie version of Andrew Lloyd Webber's hit musical. Directed by Alan Parker, who is English, with a budget of more than $60 million, the film has caused a bitter debate in Argentina over whether the Material Girl is fit to play Eva Peron, the wife of Gen. Juan Domingo Peron, the populist strongman who dominated Argentine politics for nearly three decades. Eva Peron is, even in death, a national figure whom much of the nation adores. Opening on Christmas Day to mixed reviews in the United States, ''Evita'' is likely to become the ''Michael Collins'' of Argentina, attracting huge audiences and angry debate when it opens next month.

Meanwhile, a local, more patriotic film version of the saga, ''Eva Peron,'' has already become a domestic ''box office sensation,'' according to Variety. Starring Esther Goris, a popular actress in Argentina, as Evita, the film skims over the more scandalous aspects of the First Lady's rise to power, concentrating instead on the last two years before her death, in 1952. Opening in Argentina on Oct. 24, partly to pre-empt Mr. Parker's extravaganza, the film drew an impressive 90,000 viewers in its opening week. It has been selected as Argentina's entry for the Oscar for best foreign-language film and has already earned $300,000 in its first two months, according to Maria de la Paz Marino, the executive producer.

Ms. Marino said that although she had not yet seen the American film, Argentina owed the ''Evita'' film makers gratitude. ''Now everyone in the world knows Evita, thanks in part to Alan Parker,'' she said.

Other Argentines have not been as charitable. When ''Evita'' was being filmed on location in Buenos Aires last January, hard-line Peronistas greeted Madonna with placards and graffiti that read: ''Evita Lives! Madonna Out!'' Several Congressional representatives presented resolutions calling for Madonna and Mr. Parker to be declared persona non grata. President Carlos Saul Menem, a Peronist, even told local newspapers that the musical was ''a libelous interpretation of Evita's life,'' and that Madonna was ''unsuitable'' for the role. While Madonna tried to woo Argentine public opinion in an interview with a local gossip magazine, much of the good will she generated evaporated in November when, in diary excerpts published in Vanity Fair magazine, she called Argentina an ''uncivilized'' country with ''no gyms and no decent food.'' Nor was President Menem thrilled, according to the Argentine press, by Madonna's description of him as a ''charming'' leader with ''small feet'' who ''dyes his hair black'' and who kept looking at her bra strap.

Other Sacred Cows

Jack Valenti, president of the Motion Picture Association of America, said that controversy over political films was nothing new. President Charles de Gaulle of France, he noted, had banned ''Paths of Glory,'' an American classic about a World War I mutiny within a French Army unit, starring Kirk Douglas and directed by Stanley Kubrick. ''The King and I,'' the 1956 film rendition of the musical starring Yul Brynner and Deborah Kerr, has never been shown in Thailand, which is allergic to criticism of its kings. More recently, the military rulers of Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, succeeded in banning John Boorman's ''Beyond Rangoon,'' which highlights the courage of the dissident and Nobel Prize winner Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.

In some movies, American film makers have intentionally taken political sides, hoping to rally public support for or against a cause and knowing that their work will be banned abroad. For instance, Hollywood promoted the pro-Israeli film ''Exodus,'' starring Paul Newman. But it is likely to be a long time before American directors cast an American film hero as Yasir Arafat or Fidel Castro.