#18 - 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY
Open the pod bay doors, HAL.
2001: A Space Odyssey
1968
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Starring: Keir Dullea, Gary Lockwood, William Sylvester
What a wonderfully inscrutable painting is 2001. It's apes banging on bones, it's unexplained plot jumps, it's interminably painstaking space sequences, it's psychedelic dimension traveling... this is one weird movie. And yet - for all it's pretension, for all it's confusion, for all it's inexplicability - I love this film.
This film excites me. This film turns me on. It makes me think, it gets me thinking about stuff I don't normally think about. Yes, some of that stuff is "what the heck is going on at the end of this movie?" but it also gets me thinking about "our place in the universe," as incredibly trite as that sounds. The beyond gorgeous space ballet sequence is just jaw dropping and one of the most contemplative of the entire film.
I love the slow dance of the spaceships and the station. I love the elegant rotation through the nothingness that surrounds you. Precious few space movies actually give you the impression of being IN SPACE; this sequence from 2001 almost makes me feel weightless. I get a sense of suspension, that these gigantic pieces of machinery are literally adrift in the universe, existing in a precarious balance of human control that could be lost at any moment, with any tiny malfunction.
The "story," such as it is, is divided into four unique acts. The first involves the evolution of early man. There is no dialogue, just lots of apes running around. A mysterious black monolith suddenly appears, and inspires one band of apes to begin wielding objects. We slowly realize we are watching the evolution of man when this group learns to use weapons in order to subdue their enemies. In possibly the most famous match cut in movie history, we move onto act two, where, after the gorgeous space ballet sequence above, we join Dr. Heywood Floyd on a spacestation as he learns that a mysterious black monolith has been unearthed on the moon. We travel with him as he approaches the monolith. Jump to act three, where we join Dave Bowman and Frank Poole who are on a spaceship traveling to the outer reaches of Jupiter for a top secret mission. Their onboard computer, HAL, is running the ship. In the clearest narrative arc of the film, we witness the gradual debilitation of HAL, who reacts violently when his abilities are questioned, culminating in a breathless standoff between Dave and HAL. Dave carries on the mission on his own, which brings him into contact with a floating black monolith. The final act, and the most inscrutable one, witnesses Dave's psychedelic voyage throughout time and space as he is ultimately reborn as a starchild. At least, that's what I think is going on.
I first saw this movie in 11th grade, and I had very little idea what was going on. Like most, I latched on to the third act the best, caught up in the tension between Dave and HAL, loving the scene where HAL reads lips and intercept's Dave's plot to shut him down. Then I was utterly baffled by the end. I still don't quite get it, but I have this feeling that I'm not really supposed to, either. Kubrick didn't want this to be clear cut, he wanted to inspire people and to make them think. This film certainly achieves that.
I'm a huge fan of Kubrick. I adore his shot composition, his love of bright fluorescent white lights (rarely seen in films), his use of color, his unbelievably canny use of music, his slow and steady tracking shots, his use of parallax lenses, creating a seemingly wider widescreen, his languorous pacing and tone... I never tire of it. His style excites me - put five minutes of a Kubrick film on, and I'll be giddy as a schoolgirl, gleefully extolling all the aspects I love.
This film is strange but beautiful, thought-provoking and confusing.
And, oh yeah, it has the best opening credit sequence. Ever.
2001: A Space Odyssey
1968
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Starring: Keir Dullea, Gary Lockwood, William Sylvester
What a wonderfully inscrutable painting is 2001. It's apes banging on bones, it's unexplained plot jumps, it's interminably painstaking space sequences, it's psychedelic dimension traveling... this is one weird movie. And yet - for all it's pretension, for all it's confusion, for all it's inexplicability - I love this film.
This film excites me. This film turns me on. It makes me think, it gets me thinking about stuff I don't normally think about. Yes, some of that stuff is "what the heck is going on at the end of this movie?" but it also gets me thinking about "our place in the universe," as incredibly trite as that sounds. The beyond gorgeous space ballet sequence is just jaw dropping and one of the most contemplative of the entire film.
I love the slow dance of the spaceships and the station. I love the elegant rotation through the nothingness that surrounds you. Precious few space movies actually give you the impression of being IN SPACE; this sequence from 2001 almost makes me feel weightless. I get a sense of suspension, that these gigantic pieces of machinery are literally adrift in the universe, existing in a precarious balance of human control that could be lost at any moment, with any tiny malfunction.
The "story," such as it is, is divided into four unique acts. The first involves the evolution of early man. There is no dialogue, just lots of apes running around. A mysterious black monolith suddenly appears, and inspires one band of apes to begin wielding objects. We slowly realize we are watching the evolution of man when this group learns to use weapons in order to subdue their enemies. In possibly the most famous match cut in movie history, we move onto act two, where, after the gorgeous space ballet sequence above, we join Dr. Heywood Floyd on a spacestation as he learns that a mysterious black monolith has been unearthed on the moon. We travel with him as he approaches the monolith. Jump to act three, where we join Dave Bowman and Frank Poole who are on a spaceship traveling to the outer reaches of Jupiter for a top secret mission. Their onboard computer, HAL, is running the ship. In the clearest narrative arc of the film, we witness the gradual debilitation of HAL, who reacts violently when his abilities are questioned, culminating in a breathless standoff between Dave and HAL. Dave carries on the mission on his own, which brings him into contact with a floating black monolith. The final act, and the most inscrutable one, witnesses Dave's psychedelic voyage throughout time and space as he is ultimately reborn as a starchild. At least, that's what I think is going on.
I first saw this movie in 11th grade, and I had very little idea what was going on. Like most, I latched on to the third act the best, caught up in the tension between Dave and HAL, loving the scene where HAL reads lips and intercept's Dave's plot to shut him down. Then I was utterly baffled by the end. I still don't quite get it, but I have this feeling that I'm not really supposed to, either. Kubrick didn't want this to be clear cut, he wanted to inspire people and to make them think. This film certainly achieves that.
I'm a huge fan of Kubrick. I adore his shot composition, his love of bright fluorescent white lights (rarely seen in films), his use of color, his unbelievably canny use of music, his slow and steady tracking shots, his use of parallax lenses, creating a seemingly wider widescreen, his languorous pacing and tone... I never tire of it. His style excites me - put five minutes of a Kubrick film on, and I'll be giddy as a schoolgirl, gleefully extolling all the aspects I love.
This film is strange but beautiful, thought-provoking and confusing.
And, oh yeah, it has the best opening credit sequence. Ever.