Judging by decor and costumes, Salome could be set on twenty-first-century Mars as easily as in first-century Galilee. The Aubrey Beardsley illustrations-reportedly disliked by Wilde-from the play's first edition are the basis for Rambova's handiwork. But a science fiction element is also noticeable: form-fitting rubberized sheaths, flame-spouting helmets, tunics that might have been worn in the following year's Aelita. Rambova cast her net wide: other influences include eighteenth-century France, samurai regalia, and modern dance. An independent film in every sense, the avant-garde $350,000 production is a two-woman show. Producer-star-scenarist and putative director Nazimova makes a boyish rather than vampish temptress. (She and Rambova may have shared designer Erté's vision of Salome as a boy for his costumes for the operatic version.) After her brief, turbulent film career, Rambova opened a successful couture house in New York and occasionally designed for the theater.-Lee Amazonas