[alexander_busek]

Consider the typical sci-fi films of the 50s and 60s: Monsters in rubber costumes, rocketships suspended on marginally visible wires "whooshing" audibly through space, rayguns, musical scores dominated by theramins, space stations manned by square-jawed jocks named "Steve" and "Bill" wearing gray-flannel spacesuits and making condescending remarks about the "four-eyed female scientist," overly earnest narrators making pronouncements about the "far-flung year of 1975" - and then consider "2001: A Space Odyssey." The only other films that came close to it were "The Day the Earth Stood Still" and "Forbidden Planet." The opening credits, alone - with the alignment of the Moon, Earth, and Sun to the overture of Richard Strauss's "Also Sprach Zarathustra" - surpassed anything which the genre had offered up till then.

I concede that, if you were expecting and demanded a traditional story with a plot that was wrapped up neatly by the end, it wasn't the movie for you. But please allow at least that it was in a class by itself.

Regards,

[Mellonkronos]

The original “Day the Earth Stood Still” as well as “Forbidden Planet” were really great science fiction movies from the pre-2001 days. Interesting stories. “Forbidden Planet” was from Shakespeare’s “The Tempest.”

The remake of “Day” was really leftist nonsense. Klaatu was more like a robot. But the worst thing is he wanted to kill all humans because we were polluting or exploiting the Earth. In other words, a planet without humans where weeds could not have their rights violated would be worth killing ever baby and other person on the planet. I didn’t see many reviewers pointing this out. Must have all been Al Gore lovers.