Another of 76-year-old Polanski's prominent defenders, French philosopher Bernard-Henri Levy, also spoke out, rejecting the new allegations by British actress Charlotte Lewis, while Cannes Film Festival president Gilles Jacob said no one was above the law.
Allen, 74, said Polanski, who is fighting extradition from Switzerland to the United States to face sentencing in a 1977 child sex case, had paid a high price for his actions and that it was time to draw a line under the case.
"It's something that happened many years ago... he has suffered.... He has paid his due," Allen told French radio station RTL.
"He's an artist, he's a nice person, he did something wrong and he paid for it. They (his critics) are not happy unless he pays the rest of his life. They would be happy if they could execute him in a firing squad," he said.
"Enough is enough," he added.
Lewis, now 42, who starred opposite Eddie Murphy in the 1986 adventure comedy "The Golden Child", on Friday accused Polanski of abusing her just after her 16th birthday.
"Mr. Polanski knew I was only 16 years old when he met me and forced himself upon me in his apartment in Paris. He took advantage of me...," she said in a statement at a Beverly Hills press conference with her lawyer.
Some 33 years ago Polanski, currently under house arrest in Switzerland, is alleged to have given 13-year-old Samantha Geimer champagne and drugs during a photo shoot at the Hollywood Hills home of actor friend Jack Nicholson before having sex with her despite her protests.
The director was initially charged with six felony counts, including rape and sodomy. The charge was later reduced to unlawful sexual intercourse after a plea deal agreed in part to spare his victim the ordeal of a trial.
Polanski served 42 days at a secure unit undergoing psychiatric evaluation but fled the United States on the eve of his sentencing in 1978 amid fears that the trial judge planned to go back on a previously agreed plea deal.
After Lewis's allegations of abuse, Levy told AFP Saturday: "This doesn't change my position and my anger at the methods used by California courts."
One of Polanski's defense attorneys Georges Kiejman told French news channel i-Tele he was "absolutely astonished" by Lewis's allegations, and that if she repeated them "it is probable that we take her to court".
Kiejman said he found it "quite disturbing" that Lewis appeared in Polanski's 1986 period flop "Pirates" three years after the director allegedly forced himself upon the actress.
Another of Polanski's lawyers, Herve Timime, was more direct in challenging Lewis's credibility: "Everything that has been said is a web of lies."
Lewis's attorney, Gloria Allred, said the actress was speaking out to counter suggestions from Polanski's legal team that his earlier case was an isolated incident.
Levy's drive to rally support for Polanski suffered a setback on Friday when Hollywood star Michael Douglas -- in Cannes to promote Oliver Stone's "Wall Street -- Money Never Sleeps" -- said he would not sign a petition against his extradition.
The festival president meanwhile tried to calm the speculation and distance the festival from the controversy.
"There is the film-maker and the citizen. The film-maker is a great film-maker. There is the citizen. No one is above the law," Jacob told RTL on Saturday.
"... one does not know the case -- it is not for us to judge," he said.
Allen was himself the center of a moral furor in 1992 when, at 56, he began a relationship with Soon-Yi Previn, then 22, the adopted daughter of his former longtime partner Mia Farrow. Allen and Previn married in 1997.
Posted 05:08:00 05/16/2010
Agence France-Presse
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