Space Is the Place (R)
IMDb; Janus Films; Rotten Tomatoes; TV Tropes; Wikipedia
streaming sites: Criterion Channel; Hulu; Max

This came out in 1974 (the year before I was born), but I didn't see it until 2025. It is an Afrofuturist film, which I first heard of in 2017, when I watched a short web series called Afrofuturism. Before I watched it, I thought I would end up putting my review under "science fiction", but while I watched it, I vacillated between "weird" and "art". It's certainly weird, but I think a more appropriate term would be avant-garde, so I ultimately went with "art".

I'd say it's kind of hard to follow the story. It begins with avant-jazz musician Sun Ra landing on another planet, and deciding that Black people should move there from Earth. He then travels back to 1943 Chicago, where he meets an adversary called the Overseer. After that, throughout the film we'll see the two of them in like the desert or whatever, playing some kind of card game that will, I guess, decide the fate of Earth's Black people (and the planet itself).

Most of the story takes place sometime in the 1970s, when Sun Ra lands his spaceship in Oakland. He tries to spread his message of transportation through music, though most (or perhaps all) of the things he says are rather... esoteric. He strikes a deal with a guy named Jimmy Fey to help spread his message. But Fey also works for the Overseer in some capacity that I never really understood. Mostly, the Overseer seems to be a pimp or something. He apparently has sex with two women whom he later pimps out to a couple of guys who end up beating them. Meanwhile, a couple of NASA agents (who may or may not have been the same guys who beat the women, I didn't really notice) kidnap Sun Ra and interrogate him about his method of travel (music). But a couple of guys follow them and end up freeing Sun Ra. Then he goes and performs a concert. After that, several Black people are somehow like teleported onto his spaceship, and they leave Earth behind.

The story seemed pretty disjointed and I don't really understand the scoring system for the game. I think the cards Ra and the Overseer played influenced what happened on Earth, though I have no idea how, nor do I know how anything that happened amounted to points for either one of them. Most of the time, the Overseer is winning the game, but I never would have known that if he hadn't kept saying he was winning. In the end, of course, Ra wins. Which is good news for him and a few select people who join him, but bad news for everyone else on Earth (which explodes after they leave). In any event... despite understanding almost nothing of what was going on throughout the film, I found it interesting. Beyond that, I have no idea how to feel about it. I can't help but wonder how much that has to do with my being white, how much has to do with it being made in the '70s, and how much is just objectively bizarre writing and editing. But I am glad I've finally seen it, and I'd like to see (or hear, or read) more works of Afrofuturism (as well as Africanfuturism, of which I've seen at least a couple of things). I'm sure a lot of it must be easier to follow than this, but that's not to say this isn't a good movie. I think it is exactly what it's meant to be.