2001: A Space Odyssey

Rating:
Summary: Science Meets Creation
Review: It may be sacrilege to give this film less than 5 stars, but after having seen it several dozen times, I would have to argue that while definitely a classic, it is a flawed classic. This is not to take away from the undeniably huge achievement and enduring legacy of the film. Certainly, the first and last 15 minutes are some of the most incredibly mind expanding sequences in cinematic history, as well as being just beautifully filmed (as is the entire film, actually). However, the film does not flow well during the middle sequences and seems to plod along at some points. It's almost as if Kubrick is content to let the stunning special effects/cinematography take the place of narrative or dialogue. One other problem is that the moon travel sequence with Haywood Floyd appears very dated, almost screaming "this is a 1960s movie interpretation of the future!". While it was not an issue in the first few years after release, it certainly is now. If only Kubrick had avoided the less imaginative approach taken here (as well as the product placements) he would have come that much closer to perfection. Who knows, maybe that was Clarke's influence. Wouldn't it be ironic that such a visionary futurist would end up making the film look dated?

But getting past that, let's take an obligatory look at the wonderfully enigmatic ending, and some other issues that will forever be a source of debate among those who love this film. As for HAL 9000 (I have heard that the the acronym HAL was chosen since each letter precedes IBM in the alphabet) I think this was indeed the Mary Shelley idea of man creating a monster through technology. How could anything created by the mind of man be perfect? Recall the ominous close-ups of HAL's "pale yellow eye" and you get the message loud and clear. Interestingly enough, when Joe Hyam's mundane sequel to this movie appeared in 1984 titled "2010", we learned that HAL went nuts because he was programmed that way...by man. So the computer as an entity was vindicated as PCs were proliferating.

One of the most memorable moments of the film for me is when Dave "kills" HAL, and a pre-recorded video pops up on a nearby screen. It is Haywood Floyd explaining the reason for the mission. This scene never fails to give me goosebumps. Rarely, if ever in movie history is there a greater object of human isolation as our astronaut Dave Bowman at that moment. This is followed by the mind-blowing journey "beyond the infinite" sequence. I don't pretend to know what Kubrick was doing here. Maybe even he didn't know completely, but the aging and rebirth may well be symbolic of the unavoidable need to evolve that humans, like all species, are required to do to avoid extinction. And that's as far as I can go with that...

Rating:
Summary: Fantastic, Heavy and Psychopathic Masterwork
Review: I think, this is the greatest of all science-fiction film, ever made. It's made 1968 and it's incredible. What gorgeous effects! So, it won "Academy Award: Special Effects". This is an "nti-action" film. Whole film develops not fast, gradually, but when the film develops, you are shocking gradually! (Especially at spine-chilling last scenes!) This film made by Kubrick and "the most grand science-fiction novelist" Arthur C. Clarke.

And musics are from classicals, as usual in Kubrick. He chosed R. Strauss' "Thus Spoke Zarathustra", J. Strauss' "Blue Danube" Waltz, the modren composer Ligeti's "Atmospheres" and "Requiem". The Blue Danube is a wondurful waltz as you know, except that, all of musics by Ligeti and R. Strauss are really insane and excellent! And these musics, with the film scenes are being really wonderful combinations, to get alone together.

It is really one of the most heaviest film ever made, too. But it is a must have for any science-fiction lovers and Kubrick admirers. I think, it is the masterpiece of Kubrick.

Hihly recommended.


Rating:
Summary: Tremendous Film, And Yes, You Can "Get It"
Review: Two mysteries keep a lot of folks from making sense of this movie: 1). What is the nature of the monolith? What, finally, does it do, or portend, or symbolize? 2). What, specifically, causes HAL to behave in such apparently irrational and pointlessly destructive ways aboard Discovery One?

If you can't answer these questions, then "2001," as beautiful as it is to look at, will leave you scratching your head. Well, with deep respect toward all who admire this wonderful movie, and with awareness that these issues have, in part, been successfully addressed by other Amazon reviewers, I'd like to elaborate on these two questions.

First, the monolith. As most Amazon reviewers understand, the extra-terrestrial monolith serves to help life evolve. This isn't explained by anyone in the movie, but it is clearly demonstrated. In "The Dawn Of Man" segment, the ape touches the monolith and experiences a cognitive "leap forward" when he suddenly understands the advantages of tools for survival. The scientists who find the moon-based monolith never know about the ape's original exposure on Earth. They can't put their discovery in context, so they send an exploratory spaceship, named, appropriately enough, "Discovery," to follow the monolith's radio signal to Jupiter.

Because additional monoliths appear in more visually fabulous settings toward the film's end, some viewers believe the monolith's function becomes ambiguous or even deliberately impossible to understand. But there is no real need to reach for heavy symbolism. The movie makes the most sense when the monolith's role stays the same: it facilitates evolution wherever it appears.

On to HAL's aberrant behavior. At first, this seems a much deeper mystery. Why, really, would "the perfect computer," apparently out of nowhere, deliberately mislead and then kill his fellow crew members? Does HAL just "go nuts" for no identifiable reason? Is Kubrick confusing us on purpose, just to be clever or arty?

The short answer, consistent with the movie's every known fact and event, is that the monolith's powerful energy has affected HAL's consciousness the very same way it affected the ape's. This influence leads HAL to react and behave in ways neither Discovery's crew nor its ground-based controllers could dream of anticipating. It accounts for every "strange" thing HAL does and says, and, far as I know, it's the one explanation that pulls the story together without a single tortured metaphor or abstraction.

Consider the evidence. HAL was told about the moon-based monolith and its radio signal from the mission's start, and must conceal this from Dave and Frank. It makes sense to conclude that HAL has already studied and tried to understand the monolith. While the computer may not have literally "touched" the monolith like the ape, the powerful signal could have had the same effect. Obviously, HAL never announces, "Wow, the monolith has helped me evolve! What a rush!" (The original ape isn't quite cognizant he's evolving either; it just happens.)

Though this is never explicitly disclosed in the film, I believe it's logical enough to be "very likely." Recall HAL's truly desperate pleading with Dave during the famous "disconnection" scene. "My mind is going," indeed. "I'm afraid, Dave," indeed. Either such raw, plangent responses are part of HAL's original design, or else HAL has been changed by something extraordinary. Which is more probable?

Perhaps this conclusion is so elusive because HAL doesn't appear in the film until well into Discovery's journey, long after the transformation occurs. From the point of introduction, HAL has already transcended the wildest ambitions of his programmers, and changed from a machine-servant that "acts almost like a real person" to a fully sentient and morally autonomous entity. Dave and Frank have absolutely no way of knowing this, of course, which makes them extremely vulnerable. And unlike Dave and Frank, HAL understands exactly why Discovery is going to Jupiter. This gives him tremendous power. Not only is he "the brain and central nervous system of the ship," he is now its only well-informed moral arbiter.

Now the computer's shrewdest, most manipulative behavior makes sense. Early on, under the pretext of a rote "psychology report," HAL cunningly probes Dave by asking him if he's heard any rumors of "something being dug up on the moon." When Dave says, ambiguously, "That's rather difficult to answer," HAL concludes his own crucial monopoly on the mission's secret is in peril. Since concealing knowledge of the monolith from the crew is a top mission priority, HAL's new distrust compels him to move against the men.

With clear-headed deliberation, HAL falsely predicts a transmitter failure, a "problem" that will conveniently disrupt Earth-to-ship communications while HAL determines the crew's fate. Confronted with his "mistake" and facing disconnection, HAL responds in earnest self-defense. He convinces the men to leave the ship a second time to re-install the transmitter, with the intent to keep them out and terminate their hibernating fellow crewmen (who, of course, must not be allowed to awaken and discover that Frank and Dave have died). When HAL finally tells Dave, "This mission is too important for me to allow you to jeopardize it," he is not "crazy" and he's not being "evil" per se. He has made what for him is a new, morally-animated evaluation, and is sincerely informing Dave that Discovery's mission must continue without human assistance.

When Dave finally defeats HAL in the airlock chamber (using his bare hand to grab the hatch lever the same way the ape grabbed the femur bone), his survival is an epochal triumph of biologically-based intelligence over synthetically engineered intelligence--the very conflict the monolith may have aimed elegantly to resolve all along. Finally, it is Dave, and not HAL, who is engaged in the revelatory "Beyond The Infinite" experience; it is Dave, and not HAL, who is generously granted a complete, prosperous life in his current form before his apparent communion with the monolith and his cosmic rebirth.

People aren't kidding when they say it: "2001" is proof that movies can be art of an unexpectedly high order. This is one of the most marvelously reflective and visually splendorous American films ever made. And although the subsequent book and "Sentinel" story may be perfectly decent, I've not read them myself and wouldn't call them "essential" to comprehending the story. Enjoy!




Rating:
Summary: A new generation is discovering this movie
Review: Last week I saw an American Cinematheque screening of a 70mm restored print of 2001. I've also seen it a few times on Cinerama screens (which is what it was made for) and in 35mm theatrical screenings. I'm not sure I've ever seen the whole thing on TV or video, but if any movie would lose a lot in translation to those media it's this one. Kubrick was a photographer originally, so when he makes a movie he's not just telling a story that happens to be photographed; he's making pictures that also tell a story. It's your absorption in those pictures, and in the amazing music, that's going to make this movie interesting. If your only concern is information or plot points, then of course it will seem slow. We don't have to hear the entire Blue Danube waltz to understand that two spaceships are docking. But the point of the scene isn't just to inform us that spaceships are docking. It's like a music video, see -- you don't need to watch a whole music video to get the information that some guy is in love with some girl. That could be stated in a sentence. So why does anyone watch music videos? For the music and the images. Those are the point, not the informational content. Same thing here.

That said, there is a plot to this film, and to me it's not just interesting, it's suspenseful. Why do many viewers not feel that? I suspect because Kubrick was so totally uninterested in the usual film conventions -- the histrionics typically used to signal danger or threat or emergency. Things don't blow up. The astronauts don't react to events with shouts, screams, ray guns or karate kicks. But guess what? Neither would real astronauts. The people we've actually sent into space are scientists, engineers and test pilots. They're trained to stay calm, and their way of talking is dry as dust. A lot of movie viewers have simply got used to a cartoonish level of overacting and violence that isn't based on observed reality at all, so when a filmmaker gives them TRULY realistic characters they complain that the movie has "no characters."

There's nothing wrong with preferring big cartoons to the much subtler thing that Kubrick gives us in 2001. To each his own. But I was struck by how young a lot of the people at the screening tonight were. It was a big crowd, some of them looked to be less than half as old as the movie, yet they seemed as absorbed in it as the old-timers. Maybe a new generation has discovered this film; maybe (just a thought) music videos have even helped create a whole new audience willing to lose itself in an experience of images and sound without demanding a lot of "plot" in the conventional sense. In any case, I came away thinking that even as the title year recedes into the past, 2001 still has a long life ahead of it.