I finally viewed 2001: A Space Odyssey

[DaveBj]

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SPOILERS:

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This was the most entertaining moment of the thread – you’re giving a spoiler alert on an almost 50-year-old film

I’m not going to comment on the film, because I’m a lousy movie reviewer. I like what I like, and I don’t like what I don’t like, and I don’t always have the best reasons for either opinion. However, I do have a funny story.

The second time I saw 2001 was in mid-1969, at a screening for several hundred students at Syracuse University. During the scene of HAL’s locking Dave and his pod out of the ship, at the point where Hal had cut off comms and Dave was calling “HAL? HAL?”, the arc light in the projector went out. As we say in total darkness, there was a querulous voice from among the attendees: “HAL?”

It was several minutes before the laughter died down.

I lied; I am going to comment on the film. I did like 2001, but then there’s no accounting for my taste.

 

[louisak]

I was responding to others who wrote they did find religious meaning in it.

Oh, I see. Well, there is a lot that is deliberately left vague or unexplained in the film, so I can see why different people would have different interpretations. I read the novel before I saw the film, and the book is much more clear about what is happening, so that has always guided my understanding/interpretation of the movie. The book is quite explicit that there is no supernatural element, the monoliths are just left behind by powerful aliens who are trying to detect other intelligent life in the universe. Well, to do more than just detect it, but I don’t want to get into a detailed discussion of that.

I could do without the attacks on the intelligence and good taste of those of us who don’t like it

Completely agreed.

 

[FollowChrist34]

Definitely one of the most bizarre films I ever watched. I had a hard time getting past the acid-trip colorful landscape scenes and had a hard time understanding the giant space baby at the end.

I give it a B+. I actually love the visuals of the acid-trip space journey. I love the primates in the beginning figuring out how to use the bone as a weapon - the music is fantastic. And then the bone turns into the spaceship…love it. Man’s capacity to manipulate his environment - good and bad. The apes fighting for supremacy. Can’t beat it on a large cinema screen.

Then to the sixties space station - Hal - which again I see as technology as friend/enemy.

I love the mystery of the astronaut getting to the house or whatever and aging - then the monolith appears (mystery of life; God?). It is a feast for the imagination.

The baby I love - I see it as circular - the beginning and end meet in one. All is all - everything regenerates - life has purpose - something like that.

How can you not like 2001? But I have never loved it - it has never been a real favorite of mine. But as movies go, it is far from a waste of time.

I know nothing of the book or what it is all supposed to mean. I think most people who originally viewed it were on acid anyway so maybe it is just what you want it to mean.

 

[edwest2]

At the end of the day, all Hollywood cares about is money. Back then, aside from Star Trek, the spacecraft related designs were primarily a pointy on one end tube spitting fire with some fins. 2001 introduced a non-human main character, the monolith.

But, when I was reading Variety in the 80’s, a veteran of the movie business said the following: “We can spend millions on the film and millions on advertising, but we do not have a formula to guarantee a blockbuster.” That’s still true today. There are only a set number of genres and basic story types you can tell that will draw in a large enough audience.

Sadly, the internet has unbalanced public opinion on almost anything with a high dollar value and certain social issues. As long as there is enough money, there are people who are willing to post anything for cash. And there are companies out there that, for money, will scan the internet for any use of the word or words associated with your product/movie/cause.

I’m not saying the internet cannot be used for good - it is. But it can be manipulated on a global scale now.

My point is, had it not been for pre-internet fans contacting the studios using real names with real addresses, we would not have had the Star Trek movies that followed the end of the original Star Trek.

Yes, there are “cult” followers of a number of movies online today. In the olden days, when the dinosaurs roamed… I mean, before the internet, people put out fanzines that were sent to real names and real addresses. Now, joexyz347 can post - for money - anything about anything. In fact, one website was found to consist of a small number of people that cooked up a scheme where it looked like they had a thousand or more posters. They didn’t.

So, today, unless I see a real name in a real article posted or printed by a real company, I don’t bother with movie reviews at all. There’s nothing on the internet that goes by a fake name that interests me regarding movies.

Ed

 

[edwest2]

I give it a B+. I actually love the visuals of the acid-trip space journey. I love the primates in the beginning figuring out how to use the bone as a weapon - the music is fantastic. And then the bone turns into the spaceship…love it. Man’s capacity to manipulate his environment - good and bad. The apes fighting for supremacy. Can’t beat it on a large cinema screen.

Then to the sixties space station - Hal - which again I see as technology as friend/enemy.

I love the mystery of the astronaut getting to the house or whatever and aging - then the monolith appears (mystery of life; God?). It is a feast for the imagination.

The baby I love - I see it as circular - the beginning and end meet in one. All is all - everything regenerates - life has purpose - something like that.

How can you not like 2001? But I have never loved it - it has never been a real favorite of mine. But as movies go, it is far from a waste of time.

I know nothing of the book or what it is all supposed to mean. I think most people who originally viewed it were on acid anyway so maybe it is just what you want it to mean.

LSD - a highly dangerous hallucinogen dubbed “acid” by Hippies and Anarchists. I was part of a relatively large geek (before the word was invented) community at the time. The end of the movie was purposely done to, in some ways, resemble what some LSD users experienced so it was compared to an LSD hallucination sequence or “trip.” A trip that could cause long-lasting psychological issues and even physical harm. It’s sad the since the late 1960s, LSD or acid, sill has anything positive or cool associated with it. It’s not.

Ed

 

[Della]

LSD - a highly dangerous hallucinogen dubbed “acid” by Hippies and Anarchists. I was part of a relatively large geek (before the word was invented) community at the time. The end of the movie was purposely done to, in some ways, resemble what some LSD users experienced so it was compared to an LSD hallucination sequence or “trip.” A trip that could cause long-lasting psychological issues and even physical harm. It’s sad the since the late 1960s, LSD or acid, sill has anything positive or cool associated with it. It’s not.

Ed

That was my thought, as well, that the whole thing, especially the last part of the film, seemed like an acid trip–a good one in some ways, like dreams that are disconnected in reality but seem logical when having it, but still it’s disturbing and deceptive. Humankind wasn’t and is not going to be spurred on by an alien race of beings whose motives we cannot know. Nor are we going to pull ourselves up by our own boot straps. In part, I see it as demonic. For, when has the devil ever told his victims that what he tempts them to do will lead to their ruin? The age old dream of man as the his own savior is a false one, spawned by the devil and fallen human ego.

 

[FollowChrist34]

LSD - a highly dangerous hallucinogen dubbed “acid” by Hippies and Anarchists. I was part of a relatively large geek (before the word was invented) community at the time. The end of the movie was purposely done to, in some ways, resemble what some LSD users experienced so it was compared to an LSD hallucination sequence or “trip.” A trip that could cause long-lasting psychological issues and even physical harm. It’s sad the since the late 1960s, LSD or acid, sill has anything positive or cool associated with it. It’s not.

Ed

I agree that the movie was tailored to fit the times or perhaps even reflect them, specifically in terms of the use of psychedelic hallucinogens, but I think Kubrick’s talent as a filmmaker reaches beyond that. Yes, the film is tainted by the 60s mentality, but there is enough vision in it that it stands up creatively today. Clockwork Orange is much more of a throwaway film - because of the violence and distortion of Burgess’ message. I can respect 2001 - and do enjoy it. (Oh… and I had hippy parents for four or five years - you’re preaching to the choir on the destructiveness of the acid counterculture. But it wasn’t all bad - much like 2001 come to think of it. That generation had imagination; they were searching, very lost but searching. Since then we’ve just become convinced there is nothing to search for, so we just live in ourselves. Counterculture ideas and culture today lack originality, courage; they actually reflect a much bleaker, smaller vision - we’ve gone from 2001 to gay marriage .)

 

[CompSciGuy]

So far 4 pages of discussion–I’m surprised, but pleased.

Some of the points raised: That those of us who do not care for the film must be adrenaline junkies, comic book readers, unable to get the concepts in the film, we have to enjoy a long, dull film merely because it’s an “art” piece.

My response: I’m quite sedentary–too sedentary, actually, although I do my Tai Chi form every day. I haven’t read a comic book since I was a kid. I only go the Marvel movies because my dh likes them. I do get the film’s ideas I simply violently disagree with them. I love many film genres and have a large DVD collection which is not composed solely of Disney films (although I do have a few of those). And since art is subjective, I have every right to dislike any piece of art I see.

The story is thin with no heart (I know it doesn’t have to have heart, but I don’t usually enjoy such films unless there is some redeeming quality to compensate for this), there are plot holes that have to be explained away, it’s deeply atheistic–rooted in Dawwinian evolution, and the filmmaking is pretentious–taking one outside the story so much it’s annoying (like Citizen Kane which I studied in film school).

I can’t warm up to it and have no need to view it over and over in order to see how great it really is. It’s just another movie to me–one which I am free to like or dislike, watch or not watch, and yes, I did get the meaning. I saw nothing of religious value in it, except the negation of true religion in favor of a false religion centered in man.

Those who like it, appreciate it, and find it fascinating blessings on you. It’s not my thing and I’m free to say so–at least for now I am. God help us if the future Clarke envisions comes about. The elites are working hard to make it a man-centered one as it is. The trouble with the whole thing is it won’t be space ships serenely gliding through the cosmos and finding our true inner selves–it’ll end in persecution, concentration camps, and war.

Of course you have every right to dislike the film… I agree with your opinion of the movie although I think that you got more understanding out of it than I; I was just kind of baffled by it. I think people’s assessments are unfair. I also do not meet the description you gave, I am not an adrenaline junkie, I personally hate comic book movies and michael bay style action movies because I think they are all the same and all boring. Like you I like movies that have substance to them. Although I sometimes tend to like feel-good movies which I guess some may find shallow.

You are right about art being subjective. My wife and I have discussed this before (she majored in art in college). In our opinions it is better that art have an aesthetic in order to really find beauty in it. We went to an art show once where a guy was basically taking pieces of junk and putting it on boards in a warehouse; he explained that he wanted his art to be made of refuse, of the unwanted and discarded materials that nobody cares about or wants to look at. My wife and I thought that this was kind of dull. We got where he was coming from but we both agreed that it would have made more sense if he had arranged them in some way to make them into something bigger/better or beautiful instead of just taking garbage and putting it there in front of you and saying “look, art!”

In short… all I can say to you is, don’t mind the snobs. They have a right to their opinion but their opinion doesn’t make them better, smarter or more deep-thinking than you.

 

[Tim_D]

I’m not sure what you mean by “every scene.” In the first fifteen minutes, as far as I recall, there are only two scenes:

1. Some extras in gorilla suits discover a cardboard “monolith”
2. A bored passenger arrives at a space station

Yeah, and the Mona Lisa is just a few dabs of paint on a piece of poplar wood.

You show really stop before you get farther behind.

 

[edwest2]

I agree that the movie was tailored to fit the times or perhaps even reflect them, specifically in terms of the use of psychedelic hallucinogens, but I think Kubrick’s talent as a filmmaker reaches beyond that. Yes, the film is tainted by the 60s mentality, but there is enough vision in it that it stands up creatively today. Clockwork Orange is much more of a throwaway film - because of the violence and distortion of Burgess’ message. I can respect 2001 - and do enjoy it. (Oh… and I had hippy parents for four or five years - you’re preaching to the choir on the destructiveness of the acid counterculture. But it wasn’t all bad - much like 2001 come to think of it. That generation had imagination; they were searching, very lost but searching. Since then we’ve just become convinced there is nothing to search for, so we just live in ourselves. Counterculture ideas and culture today lack originality, courage; they actually reflect a much bleaker, smaller vision - we’ve gone from 2001 to gay marriage .)

You know, I don’t look at any filmmaker today as having this or that. He just makes films that make money or he doesn’t. I like his films but don’t feel the need to know anything about him personally.

“That generation had imagination…”? No, not at all.

George Harrison recounts how he went to Haight-Ashbury to discover a supposed burst of talent, something new, something worthwhile. Instead, he found squalor. Stoned Hippies living with their girlfriends and preaching the joy of dope but doing little in the way of creativity. He took his bottle of acid and threw it into a trash container, disappointed.

The “psychedelic art” of the period was stylism, and preached to the choir: lots of immoral sex, weird, drug trip images and perversion in general. It quickly faded and left behind immoral sex and illegal drug use.

We never got the visionary Woodstock Nation we were promised. My fresh out of Hippie Boot Camp friend (prior to that he looked and acted like anybody else), had the regulation length hair, the regulation clothing and spoke Hippie-speak. He rejected Christianity and morality. “I don’t need no piece uh paper tuh live with my old lady.” He smoked dope regularly. He described fornication as “performing natural acts.” He was a modified pagan in other words. He looked different, but that was the only real difference.

The counterculture today still revolves around paganism and distorted ideas about human sexuality. I recently watched a video that had a young lady who described herself as a Pagan and a Wiccan. Man has become god within the context of some very old ideas that have been repackaged into the New Age, or some just live within themselves.

Ed

 

[FollowChrist34]

You know, I don’t look at any filmmaker today as having this or that. He just makes films that make money or he doesn’t. I like his films but don’t feel the need to know anything about him personally.

“That generation had imagination…”? No, not at all.

George Harrison recounts how he went to Haight-Ashbury to discover a supposed burst of talent, something new, something worthwhile. Instead, he found squalor. Stoned Hippies living with their girlfriends and preaching the joy of dope but doing little in the way of creativity. He took his bottle of acid and threw it into a trash container, disappointed.

The “psychedelic art” of the period was stylism, and preached to the choir: lots of immoral sex, weird, drug trip images and perversion in general. It quickly faded and left behind immoral sex and illegal drug use.

We never got the visionary Woodstock Nation we were promised. My fresh out of Hippie Boot Camp friend (prior to that he looked and acted like anybody else), had the regulation length hair, the regulation clothing and spoke Hippie-speak. He rejected Christianity and morality. “I don’t need no piece uh paper tuh live with my old lady.” He smoked dope regularly. He described fornication as “performing natural acts.” He was a modified pagan in other words. He looked different, but that was the only real difference.

The counterculture today still revolves around paganism and distorted ideas about human sexuality. I recently watched a video that had a young lady who described herself as a Pagan and a Wiccan. Man has become god within the context of some very old ideas that have been repackaged into the New Age, or some just live within themselves.

Ed

I am not defending the sixties - I am just saying that I will take Quadrophenia and 2001 (et al.) over Kim Kardashian and Caitlyn Jenner any day of the week. The problem with the 60s generation has roots in the 50s anyway. How did 50s America so completely fail a generation - turn them into such rebels? Perhaps because American life after WWII was empty and materialistic and superficially Christian long before I Want to Hold Your Hand hit the airwaves? Probably.

 

[edwest2]

I am not defending the sixties - I am just saying that I will take Quadrophenia and 2001 (et al.) over Kim Kardashian and Caitlyn Jenner any day of the week. The problem with the 60s generation has roots in the 50s anyway. How did 50s America so completely fail a generation - turn them into such rebels? Perhaps because American life after WWII was empty and materialistic and superficially Christian long before I Want to Hold Your Hand hit the airwaves? Probably.

Definitely not. Those who survived World War II had been through hell. My father was one of them. He and his vet buddies believed in God, country, hard work and raising families. Certain identified groups inside and outside the Church engineered the changes. Trust me, America was a lot more Christian during the 1950s than now. It was all planned out.

Ed

 

[louisak]

Definitely not. Those who survived World War II had been through hell. My father was one of them. He and his vet buddies believed in God, country, hard work and raising families. Certain identified groups inside and outside the Church engineered the changes. Trust me, America was a lot more Christian during the 1950s than now. It was all planned out. Ed

This thread has gotten way off-topic. I’m not specifically blaming you Ed, yours just happened to be the last post. The sarcastic put-downs of people who don’t happen to enjoy the movie are even worse. Can we please put this thread out of its misery now, unless somebody really has something new to say on the question?

 

[JimG]

For those who would like to nitpick the technology of 2001 ASO, there is this.

 

[Della]

For those who would like to nitpick the technology of 2001 ASO, there is this.

Thanks for posting the article. Yes, the gravity issue was the one I noticed the most–not that I noticed much else, I’m not that observant, I’m afraid. Mythbusters did an episode on the veracity of the moon landings. One of the objections they tackled was how real people move in a weightless environment. It was pretty clear that weighless human beings whole appearance and movement is quite different from that of a gravity-bound ones. Still, as the article states, Kubrick didn’t want to peter pan the actors and his solutions were innovative if no longer convincing to those of us who have seen real astronauts in real space capsules.

 

[Tim_D]

The problem with the 60s generation has roots in the 50s anyway. How did 50s America so completely fail a generation - turn them into such rebels? Perhaps because American life after WWII was empty and materialistic and superficially Christian long before I Want to Hold Your Hand hit the airwaves? Probably.

Oh, how so true.

I remember reading how someone compared the supposed “golden age” of the Church in America during the 1950s as a Christmas ornament; beautiful and shiny on the outside and hollow and empty on the inside.

I’ve always wondered how things supposedly just went off the deep end in 1964.

 

[Exiled_Child]

I am not defending the sixties - I am just saying that I will take Quadrophenia and 2001 (et al.) over Kim Kardashian and Caitlyn Jenner any day of the week.

:thumbsupefinitely. Any day of the week.

 

[JimG]

I liked the movie, pretty much just because of the science fiction elements which were portrayed in as accurate a way as possible at the time. I saw it 3 or 4 times in the wide-screen format. It may actually have premiered in Cinerama, not sure about that.

But then, I was a kid who liked to watch the TV coverage of all the Apollo flights from beginning to end, and it always irritated me that the TV news didn’t actually cover them from beginning to end. I didn’t want to hear any commentary; I just wanted to here the actual communication to and from mission control without missing a word.

(A few years ago someone gave me the book “Digital Apollo,” which I loved. It’s interesting that today’s dumbest smart phone has much more computing power than the Apollo navigational computers. (There was no GPS. Nothing but inertial navigation, until the LEM got to a few thousand feet above the lunar surface—then it could use radar to confirm its altitude. Apollo 11 touched down with about 17 seconds of fuel remaining.)

As for the sixties, I don’t know what went wrong. The hippies and radicals won the war, and the educational establishment went over to their side, often with most people not even realizing it.

 

[colliric]

I found it to be a flawed masterpiece. The book is better, but the film does a great job of approximating it. I disagree with most views on the length of the film. I felt it could have actually been longer to allow for more exposition like that found in the novel. I think if it was remade today the ending would essentially be the same, but the portrayal of the Stargate Sequence would probably be vastly different and would make it clear he’s on a space train-line as per the book’s descriptions of stations, junctions and routes.

I was a little dissatisfied with 2010 as I felt the production values had a significant drop off in the sequel. A young Helen Mirren and that Russian actor from Spiderman 2/3 were the main highlights to me. I felt Roy Schneider didn’t fit this film very well as the lead. The plot was compelling though, and it’s nice to know the story does continue abiet with noticably lower production values.

 

[Tim_D]

Something obviously goes wrong with HAL which causes it to kill crew members and not obey Dave. This is a huge turning point in the story and the reasons/motivations for HAL doing this are never explained. This is a huge turn of events for the characters and no reason or explanation is given.

I think you missed the point that Kubrick deliberately left certain issues ambiguous and, instead, relies upon the viewers own intellectual theories and ideas to fill in the gaps. While I’m not certain that I’m using this word correctly, I think that 2001: ASO is an “impressionistic” work. It relies on the viewer to make up their own minds about what they are seeing. I suppose in this sense the movie fails as a work of art if the viewer needs to have every element of it spelled out for them.