The Queen of Sheba Meets the Atom Man

The Queen of Sheba Meets the Atom Man. Photomontage from: RareFilm.Net.

US 1963. P+D+SC: Ron Rice. Starring: Winifred Bryan (The Queen of Sheba), Taylor Mead (The Atom Man), Jack Smith. Unfinished. 16 mm, b&w, sepmag sound.
    This version 87 min, the sound of the separate magnetic tapes played back from cd, no credit titles.
    New American Cinema Revisited.
    Screened at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 30 March 2008.

Of all the New American Cinema Revisited films in the programme this film had the technically best sound, thanks to the magnetic tape, the playlist including in playing order: The Kinks: "Sunny Afternoon"; Nina Simone: "Tomorrow Is My Turn"; Nina Simone: "Ne me quitte pas"; The Beatles: "Eleanor Rigby"; The Kinks: "I'm Not Like Everybody Else"; The Kinks: "When I See That Girl Of Mine"; The Beatles: "Yellow Submarine"; John Coltrane: "Greensleeves"; Nina Simone: "Take Care Of Business"; Nina Simone: "I Put A Spell On You"; Nina Simone: "You've Got To Learn"; The Rolling Stones: "Satisfaction"; Nina Simone: "One September Day"; Nina Simone: "Gimme Some"; The Kinks: "Sunny Afternoon"; Cilla Black: "Anyone Who Had A Heart"; The Kinks: "I'm Not Like Everybody Else"; The Kinks: "When I See That Girl Of Mine".
    Plus great jazz, protest jazz, such as: Bobby Timmons: "This Here", "Dat Dere"; John Coltrane: "Africa/Brass"; Eric Dolphy; Charlie Mingus: "Fables of Faubus"; Archie Shepp; Miles Davis. (Thanks to Sisko Ramsay and J. O. Mallander for the jazz identification).

Because of the presence of the 1965 Nina Simone album I Put A Spell On You and the 1966 Beatles songs one can tell that this soundtrack version has been compiled after the death of Ron Rice (1935–1964).

Taylor Mead appears as a deeply disturbed alien comic personality, something like Charlie Chaplin on acid.

Winifred Bryan plays an alcoholic odalisque, way beyond the Bessie Smith stage, desolately abandoning any sense of dignity in her nudity and sexual display.

This film still has shock value, and it also makes the viewer uneasy as one would like to know if the performers were in a presence of mind to give their consent to be displayed this way.