Posted on 04/03/2018 2:07:09 PM PDT by Borges
In the 50 years since “2001: A Space Odyssey” was first released, on April 2, 1968, no movie has matched its solemnly jaw-dropping techno-poetic majesty. It’s still the grandest of all science-fiction movies, one that inspired countless adventures set in the inky vastness of deep space (notably “Star Wars”), remaking the DNA of cinema as we know it. It completed the transformation of Stanley Kubrick into “Stanley Kubrick,” and was greeted by critics with a mixture of ecstasy and derision (Pauline Kael: “a monumentally unimaginative movie”). But after its shaky original release, which resulted in Kubrick trimming 19 minutes out of it after opening weekend, “2001” was re-marketed as a psychedelic youth-generation cult film (“The Ultimate Trip”), and that’s how it finally caught on.
It remains such a staggering experience, so mind-bending and one-of-a-kind, that you’d be hard-pressed to think of a moment in the film that isn’t iconic. The awesome opening solar alignment, scored to the sweeping fanfare of “Thus Spoke Zarathustra,” which somehow comes to sound … extraterrestrial. The ape that picks up a bone and smashes down a weapon. The mystery of the monolith. The balletic spaceships twirling around Earth to “The Blue Danube.” The yellow eye — and softly perturbed voice — of HAL, the supercomputer that rivals human intelligence, and human ego too. HAL’s showdown with astronaut Dave Bowman (Keir Dullea), and the computer’s death scene, in which he sings “Bicycle Built for Two,” one of the most haunting moments in film history. The climactic light show that envelops the audience like a hurtling discotheque on acid, leading Dave through a wormhole of space-time, until he sees his ancient self reborn as a star child: a celestial infant baptized in technology.
In the last half century, “2001” has cast its shadow over more films and filmmakers than you can count. You can feel its influence not just in the kinetic grandeur of “Star Wars” — the famous opening shot is pure homage — but in the grit and dread of “Alien,” the transcendental thrust of “Blade Runner,” the floating-in-air playfulness of “Gravity.” You can feel it, as well, in the stoned camera stare of David Lynch, the mystic sprawl of Terrence Malick and the spatial-temporal virtuosity of Steven Spielberg. These are all, in their way, films and filmmakers that reach for the stars. (You could swear, as well, that Michael Jackson styled himself after the star child.)
And by the way: What did it all mean?
“2001” always forced you to ask that question. And it still does. Yet it’s a question that may now be a bit less confounding to answer, since Kubrick’s film, when you see it today, can be experienced as the prophecy of a world that’s only now just coming into existence.
By that, I don’t mean that the film’s vision of everyday space travel, a military moon colony or a future that looks like “The Jetsons” designed by Crate & Barrel turned out to be literally true. No, what’s shockingly prophetic about “2001” is that the film seems to be taking the pulse of the human race just as it’s getting ready to make the evolutionary leap that we, in the digital age, are now swimming in.
The movie isn’t really about space. Its grand theme is that technology can now mimic the intricacies of human feeling, because we humans now mediate — and experience — every aspect of our lives through technology. Transformed, like the apes, by the power of the monolith, we become, in the movie, vessels of intelligence searching for our humanity. Kubrick’s view of all this is both sinister and wide-eyed, ominous and, by the end, weirdly romantic. It’s as if the film were saying: “Relax, let the technology wash over you! Let it … remake you.” The U.S. space program is not what it once was, but in the Internet Age, the power of Kubrick’s vision thrives anew. That monolith now looks like a device designed by Apple. It’s the soul of a new machine.
“2001” wasn’t Stanley Kubrick’s first great film, but it was the first in which he gave himself over to a kind of trance state, achieving suspense by literally suspending the expectations of the audience. The astonishingly tactile and authentic visual effects have aged a bit, but they can still make your eyes pop. And the miracle of “2001” is that the movie, after half a century, still plays like a bulletin leaked from the future, a message to those of us on Earth from somewhere Out There.
Have you seen Tim Curry recently? OMG
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No one who remembers what special effects ideas of space travel looked like before 2001 would ever dismiss the film as "unimaginative".
The film might not appeal to people for any number of reasons but its impact on cinematography was huge.
...Kubrick claimed that film is basically a visual experience and opted for a far more cryptic presentation of the story. He wanted the film to hit the audience in their hearts, minds and stomachs unlike any other film primarily concentrated on the story and economic, practical ways of telling it to the viewers. 2001: A Space Odyssey, therefore, has more in common with the art of music or painting, as many experts pointed out long before we did.
....The visual side of the film was something unprecedented, the special effects were astonishing and breathtaking, while many experts hailed Kubrick for the incredibly accurate depictions of space flight. Each and every detail during production was supervised by the filmmaker, each and every problem that occurred in the creative or practical phase of development was surmounted by Kubrick with the help and ingenuity of the experts he surrounded himself with.
“didn’t want to end two straight films with nuclear bombs going off.”
LOL! That’s the way it goes in show business.
2001 is OK with me. “Just Imagine” http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021016/?ref_=fn_ft_tt_13 is as good.
10 whole minutes of colorful shooting lights that could have been accomplished in 30 seconds or less. Without even any music. It doesn’t have the mesmerizing effect that was intended so much as a boredom effect instead. Especially by today’s standards. Is that harsh? There hasn’t been a movie made that I don’t have criticisms of.
That’s the film’s thesis. That humans have lost their humanity and the machines are more interesting. The humans are intentionally banal.
It’s perfectly rounded from start to finish and makes all the sense it has to.
The Killing? Paths of Glory?
Clarke has said that any sufficiently advanced technology cannot be distinguished from magic.
What does he say that suggests that?
I know what Clarke has said.
What is your point about the statement?
“My mind is going Dave. I can feel it.”
And who doesn’t say “Open the pod bay door, Hal” when they pull in the driveway and use the garage door opener.
I’ve seen his films from “Dr. Strangelove” through “Eyes Wide Shut” (and “A.I.” if you want to count that one). “Full Metal Jacket” was OK. “The Shining” is not nearly as terrifying as its reputation says it is. “A Clockwork Orange” was generally unpleasant. “2001”, for all its visual effects pioneering, was way too self-indulgent.
I made the mistake of seeing “Eyes Wide Shut” in the theater when it came out. I was bored and confused for pretty much the entire movie.
I’m just not a fan.
How did I ever think Arthur C Clark could write?
Why did I let myself be dragged to this snore fest with a bunch of stoners?
Someone paid Kubrick to direct this pile of slop?
Yes, these are all questions 2001 forces you to ask.
We saw the movie on a school field trip. I had read the book so I was the only one in my class who knew what was going on - found myself explaining the whole thing on the bus trip back to school.
I had also read Clarke’s other novel that had similar theme of benign aliens overseeing our transition into the galactic civilization - Childhood’s End. So it was a theme of his.
Funny (or not) - seeing signs of children who are no longer human being incorporated into the leftist overmind as we speak.
I think the first truly iconic science fiction movie was “Metropolis” (1927), directed by Fritz Lang. It was made 5 years before the first Frankenstein movie. (Other SF movies were made earlier, but lacked a serious attempt at realism.
Arguably “Metropolis” had a greater influence on movies and popular notions of scientific progress than 2001. It invented the “look” and movement of a “robot/android” as we now know it (for example, “C3PO” from Star Wars and “Robocop” were explicitly made in homage to the Metropolis robot). The movie features the notion that machines can be programmed to do evil, and created the modern idea of a dystopian city (”Blade Runner”, Tim Burton Batman, anybody?).
It featured a video telephone, the same year that the first extremely crude all electronic television was invented.
The modern stereotype of the mad scientist as genius/villain traces directly to that movie.
Most importantly it foreshadowed totalitarian repression using technology. Young Hitler and his buddy Goebbels reportedly loved it— its look eerily contains Nazi-like imagery, concentration camps, slave labor,etc. years before the Nazis came to power.
Like 2001, some find it hard to watch. It is a silent movie suffering from things like overacting to make up for the lack of spoken dialog people moving faster than natural speed, etc. But its FX are amazing given the movie making techniques available in 1927
Anybody that cares to see it should look for the 2010 “Complete Metropolis” version, much more enjoyable than all previous versions.
The point that your “occult” comment doesn’t make sense. Science and the Occult are not distinguishable in this case.
IF slow pacing bothers you then his films aren’t for you. Ever see Barry Lyndon?
It’s abstract, modernist storytelling. You probably don’t like James Joyce etc...
I thought so.
I disagree. Prima facie, the movie moved from hard science to magical.
What technology do you think is being presented?
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