Salomé (1922)

Let's be realistic.

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

Absolutely the worst movie.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

An excerpt taken from the Bible when Herod ruled the throne, this is a creep show with morally lacking characters. Herod lusts over his stepdaughter Salome and promises her the throne (over her mother, no less) if she will dance for him. Salome initially rejects the offer, desiring the imprisoned prophet John instead, but when John rejects her she has him killed. There is also a melodramatic subplot about a gay man who kills himself because Salome attempts to seduce John instead of him. The film doesn't tell us he's gay, but IMDb trivia says it was an all gay cast, and really, you could just tell. You might think the filmmakers did this to say something about Babylon at the time, but it was said to be done in honour of gay playwright Oscar Wilde. So clearly this is a film that is interested in concepts such as this, as opposed to the best methods of storytelling.So the characters are all fairly hideous, and so drawn out is the incredibly limited story, that it feels more like art posturing than entertainment (actually the staging reminds me of a tableau vivant - which is pretty much exactly that - art posturing). It is not a compliment to say the most memorable thing about it is the costume design - full of elaborate hats and wigs, a lipsticked Herod, a short dress designed solely to show off our heroines legs, some sort of white painted nipples for our apparently straight gay man, and bare chested black slaves forever in the background, waving umbrella like flowers gently over the Royals to fan them. Characters sway and open their arms wide and look to the sky and take an eternity to do anything, before our heroine finally dances for Herod. Herod looks like he's going to have a heart attack for excitement, yet in possibly the most embarrassing dance routine ever recorded, all it shows is that she is anything but a dancer! Can you believe they made this with a straight face?!IMDb trivia also tells us this film flopped at the box office. I don't always agree with the general public, but in this case they are far closer to the money than those out there dubbing it an 'art film classic'. Just because it has funky costumes does not mean it is a classic. To date I have not yet seen or read anything by Oscar Wilde that I liked, and Salome is no different. A film set in pre-Christ Babylon, I guess it should have been expected..

Salome (1922) ** 1/2 (out of 4) The fourteen-year-old Salome (Alla Nazimova) seduces her uncle Herod (Mitchell Lewis) in hopes of capturing something that she wants. Seductive Russian star Nazimova wasn't too happy when her career at MGM started to fall apart and the studio refused to fund the movies she wanted to make so she simply went out and financed them herself. One such production was this film, an adaptation of the Oscar Wilde play. When the film was originally released it wasn't a critical or financial success but today it remains slightly interesting.I say slightly interesting because visually it's quite impressive. The sets are all rather simple but I found the cinematography to be extremely good and I also thought that a lot of time went into the costumes and hair design. Hair design really isn't something that I normally comment on but there's some sort of gadget in the hair of Nazimova that is rather unique to say the least. The story itself is of mild interest only as everything is pretty much just building up to the eventual seduction dance.As for Nazimova, she was forty-two when she did this role of a 14- year-old girl. That got headlines at the time but I thought in the long shots she actually looked the part. Whenever a medium or close-up was done then the effect wasn't there. As far as her performance goes, there's certainly nothing special about it. She was good but that's about it.SALOME has pretty much been forgotten over the years and while it's not a classic or even a good film, it's unique enough to where film buffs will want to watch it at least once.

By the early 1920s, Alla Nazimova had lost her standing as one of the premiere actresses of her time. She had an appeal some compare to Greta Garbo, with much-acclaimed performances in films such as "War Brides" (1916), "Revelation" (1918), and "Out of the Fog" (1919). Unfortunately, these films are presently unavailable. Today, Nazimova's most widely seen silent film appears to be her ludicrously impressionistic version of "Camille" (1921), which was precisely the sort of film which made audiences and exhibitors conclude Nazimova's star had set. By the time "Salome" was released, her appeal was low.This is unfortunate because "Salome" was the best of Nazimova's art-house period, and could have been a hit comparable to some of the foreign imports of the day. It follows the plot of Oscar Wilde's play, but works more as a visual feast of images. Nazimova's opening hair style alone is among best in all of filmdom. A heavily "homosexual look" (many said) to the film has been said to stem from Nazimova's use of an exclusively gay cast and crew, including most notable stylistic contributions from Natacha Rambova (aka Mrs. Rudolph Valentino). Like a lot of hyperbolized Hollywood, the whole is more of a bisexual affair.********* Salome (10/22) Charles Bryant ~ Nazimova, Nigel de Brulier, Mitchell Lewis, Rose Dione

In a mere 39 minutes this one set "pantomime" manages to be the most outrageously campy silent film ever. Get those guards, and their extreme poses -two of the gayest lads ever to grace the screen. And get that big budget for marshmallows -they all wear marshmallow necklaces and Nazimova has them popping out of every hair follicle. It's over the top silent posture acting at its worst but it's a lot of fun as well. Rambova deserved some sort of award or at least a nomination for her outrageous costumes (JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR owes everything to this production). You'll howl.