Salome's Last Dance

I love this film! But, it seems to evoke strong reactions from people. I've recommended it to friends who absolutely hated it. Oh well. Look for the scene where Salome tries to convince John the Baptist to kiss her. "Kiss me with your lips, John the Baptist." It's a beautiful poem and so perfectly done.

There's too much to say about this film. I'll just highly recommend it and leave it at that.

Oscar Wilde, who wrote the stage play "Salome", was one of the greatest wits of his time, but lived a lifestyle that created continuous controversy in the society in which he lived. Today he is perhaps best known for authorship of "The Ballard of Reading Jail", which was written during one of the times when he was in prison following a direct confrontation with the government of the time. When he wrote "Salome" it was banned for a time by the English stage censorship and, even though it can be a most rewarding performance to watch, stage productions of it are still relatively infrequent. Consequently many people today are more familiar with the bowdlerised opera which was based on the play and was composed by Richard Strauss. The opera has been filmed by at least two major directors, but for the cinematographic enthusiast there is also this very noteworthy film, directed by Ken Russell, which is much more closely based on Wilde's play. In my opinion this film is dramatically far superior to the rather pathetic opera, and is very worth while seeking out by anyone interested. Basically it exploits the psychological tensions which may have existed in King Herod's court, and which could have accounted for the demand by Salome for the head of John the Baptist on a platter; the story that is so baldly reported in the Bible.

The scenario of this film is set in a brothel where Oscar Wilde is treated to an illegal birthday performance of his play, acted by friends who include some of the employees of the host establishment. This choice of venue has upset many critics but it is totally irrelevant to the play - it is helpful for a modern viewer to remember that, at the time in which this film is set, Oscar Wilde and his literary friends would meet regularly to present impromptu performances of works they had written, basically as a quality control procedure for the final product they eventually published; and this film simply exploits the practice. It is essentially a film of a play, with the story associated with the presentation of the play added to maintain cinematographic interest.

Ken Russell is a controversial director but although the film is not without faults, the overall quality is outstanding, the cast is superb, and there are particularly memorable performances by Glenda Jackson as Queen Herodias and by Imogen Millais-Scott (who shows the capability of looking any age between thirteen and thirty) as Princess Salome. Both the play and the film effectively capture the decadence, which was characteristic of the royal courts of petty despots at this point in history, better than any other works I have seen. It should be a must for anyone who has the opportunity to see it.

This film is actually an Oscar Wilde's stage play adaptation on film, so it won't appeal easily to ordinary film-buffs. This plus its controversial subject matter (commentary on religions, naughty humour, study of seducing, nudity), the old-fashioned style & dialogues will propably turn down many. Their loss. Ken Russel is for once more intelligent and even though a bit unreasonably obsessive with some key-phrases of Salome, his trademark visual style are still evident in this one as well.

So, this ain't only for Ken Russel's fans, but also to any lover of true cinema. In these years of Hollywood films, it's not violence or nudity itself that offends. It's the way they are presented. In a typical Hollywood flick nudity (female, of course) as well as violence is shown to make the viewer feel better. In 'Salome's last dance', this is not the case, because its way is not something you're used to.

Salome's Last Dance is one of those films that will fascinate people or repulse them very like director Ken Russell's directorial style. First viewing I disliked it, seeing it again in a better mood just recently it was much better than remembered, though for me one of Russell's weaker films. A few things stop it from being a masterpiece. Russell does go overboard with the excess at times- not unusual for Russell- and some of those excessive images are disgustingly ugly, especially with Salome licking saliva off her face. Russell also writes himself in an acting role as a photographer and is rather embarrassingly bad and in a somewhat creepy way. Imogen Millais-Scott I had mixed feelings on, she is gorgeous, seductive and age-appropriate, though with a tendency to mug. Even with the excess, Salome's Last Dance does maintain the spirit of Oscar Wilde's play Salome with its beauty and ability to shock. The film is expertly filmed and the production values are a mix of the hypnotisingly beautiful and the decadent, which is hardly inappropriate(Strauss' opera Salome, which I personally love, has those qualities too). The music is a hodgepodge of classical music, and a wonderful hodgepodge at that, Rimsky-Korsakov and especially Debussy the prime composers and they further add to the beautiful yet shocking atmosphere. They are performed very well and mostly fit within the film. The script is witty and uproarious, Herodias has some truly hilarious lines, and the story is interestingly structured with a good touch of the theatrical and the cinematic. You cannot take your eyes away from the dance scene either. Most of the acting is better than its given credit, Glenda Jackson and Stratford Johns especially. Jackson is a little bizarre but also very regal and authoritative and Johns is suitably wry and mischievous, making a potentially tiresome character interesting. Nickolas Grace is a witty Oscar Wilde and Douglas Hodge a mostly effectively warning John the Baptist though he does over-compensate a bit. Overall, easy to see why people will dislike it, it's far from perfect but has interest points and entertainment value. 6.5/10 Bethany Cox

In the latter years of his career is was obvious that Ken Russell had to work under conditions and budgetary constraints that forced him to scale back on the wild style his exalted in with his previous films. But even a scaled down Ken Russell was oftentimes better than other directors are their best. However Salome's Last Dance is among his weakest films and you can literally feel the straitjacket limiting his creativity. Being set in a single setting as the play is performed for Oscar Wilde himself it feels very stilted and never allowed to grow. It was only recently that I discovered that the young actress playing Salome was stricken blind by an illness just before filming was to begin but Ken Russell kept her in the part. The first time I watched the film in '88 I felt that there was something peculiar about her eyes that I could not quite define. It is not a bad film by any means but within his filmography it might rank low among his best works. It has moments of silliness that cannot be mistaken for any other director. Those who are fans and familiar with his style will be more forgiving of these moments. Ken Russell is a fascinating character and, for good or ill, he made films his way and never conformed to any modern trends. He is missed.