Film Forum

This screening is presented as part of Carnegie Hall’s Afrofuturism festival and in association with Brooklyn Institute for Social Research

(1974) “Everything you have desired on this planet and never received will be yours in outer space.” Jazz master and self-described Saturn alien Sun Ra co-wrote and stars as himself in SPACE IS THE PLACE, an Afrofuturist classic based on his mythmaking 1973 album. When his spaceship lands in Oakland, California, the pharaoh-attired Ra squares off against “the Overseer,” a diabolical pimp who derives his power from subjugating Black people. Ra attempts to recruit Black residents to beam up to his planet with the promise of a utopia, through his Outer Space Employment Agency. A low-budget subversion of science fiction, blaxploitation, and concert film tropes, studded with far-out space-age costumes and production design, SPACE IS THE PLACE inspired the visual language of Afrofuturist films and music videos for years to come. Featuring performance footage of Ra with his Arkestra and June Tyson, who sings “It’s the end of the world. Don’t you know that yet?” DCP. Approx. 85 mins. Special thanks: Emily Woodburne and Brian Belovarac, Janus Films; Jim Newman; Haden Guest, Harvard Film Archive; Stephen Holl, Rapid Eye Movies.

Reviews

“[SPACE IS THE PLACE] illuminates Sun Ra's work. For him, outer space wasn't just a gimmick or a convenient source of song titles. It was a zone where racism was inoperative, where blacks could make their own destinies.”
– Jon Pareles, The New York Times

“An ambitious blend of Afrofuturist sci-fi, Bergman-esque symbolism, funky Blaxploitation, and, well… Sun Ra.”
– Tyler Wilcox, Pitchfork