Kutub

One of the best 'cult films' ever made in my opinion and one that defies description or easy genre categorisation which is perhaps why it never receives the kudos or praise it deserves. It was only after watching Space Is The Place that the music of Sun Ra & His Intergalactic Arkestra really made any real sense.

Who was Sun Ra?

Sun Ra was allegedly born Herman Poole Blount on May 22nd 1914 and returned to the stars on May 30th 1993. He was a prolific jazz composer, bandleader, piano and synthesizer player, one of the earliest UFO contactees, a poet and philosopher known for his "cosmic philosophy," musical compositions and performances.
He himself said he was of the "Angel Race" and not from Earth, but from Saturn.

Taken from the official website by the director Jim Newman:

In 1971 American producer Jim Newman appproached John Coney, a producer/director at a public television station KQED in San Francisco with a proposal for a thirty minute performance documentary on the Sun Ra Arkestra. Sun Ra immediately saw the film as an opportunity to make a statement about the conditions of black people on planet earth - and as a powerful medium for his music as a vehicle for lifting them out of their collective misery.
Production began in 1972 with filming and recording the Arkestra, a spaceship landing, a visit to an Egytptian tomb and the creation of a mythic celestial planet derived from Ra's interpretation of passages from "The Book Of Urantia" (The Urantia Book a strange proto-New Age cosmological tract originated in Chicago, Illinois, sometime between 1924 and 1955. Its authorship remains a matter of speculation) as realised in Golden Gate Park. After many months of editing, screen writer Joshua Smith was hired to work on the story line and turn the project into a coherent narrative film.

Wikipedia entry:

Space Is the Place is an 82-minute film made in 1972 and released in 1974. [1] [2] It was produced by Jim Newman, directed by John Coney, written by Sun Ra, Joshua Smith and features Sun Ra and his Arkestra. A soundtrack for the film was released on Evidence Records.

Official website:

http://www.outerspacewaysinc.com

Wikipedia Entry:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_Ra

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Is...