This is a movie that the great American director Stanley Kubrick released in 1968.
I went to see it with my Dad and at least 1 sister soon after release, in the huge Auckland cinema known as the Cinerama (since obliterated from Queen Street).
Over the years I saw this movie in the cinema 14 times, and of course am now the proud owner of the dvd.
Why does it have such a strong appeal for me, and why am I writing about it NOW??
First of all, it was and remains an absolutely convincing "reconstruction" of Outer Space - the stars, one could almost swear, are all exactly in the right place - so well-researched is the movie that astronauts, yet to swet foot on the moon, watched with awe and wonder as Kubrick showed them what to expect when they got there.
Secondly, the light (go see any Kubrick movie and marvel at his use of light and space) and the music (using music by both Johann and Richard Strauss, Kubrick conjures both the beauty of space travel and the almost religious solemnity of mankind's movement through the solar system/universe).
Finally though the thing that has struck me upon my most recent viewing of the movie (in a hospital ward with the lights off and the headphones plugged in and the epidural taking me in and out of consciousness) is the concept of moving beyond this solar system, this universe, this life...into the infinite...
Because this is where we are all heading, sooner or later (some of us sooner)...and, as in the movie, the astronaut heads into this final destination ALONE (and is reborn!)...
So, Kubrick has given us a wonderful taste/preview/interpretation of what is to come, and this makes the movie well worth at least ONE visit.
I could go on, but realise that I may already have lost some non-Kubrick-buffs.
See it for yourselves and let me know!!'
Luv,
G.
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That's interesting. I looked up 3001 (sic) on Wikipedia earlier today.
ReplyDelete2001 is really quite good but the psychedelic bit at the end is just too trippy for me - the drug scene of the 1960s was before my time so it seems quite pointless, and I'm not about to watch it while toking something harmful. But I thought that 2001 didn't have any stars in most of it - they realised that they would get completely overwhelmed by brightly lit foreground objects. I guess I will have to watch it again. I'm quite sure that at our next port of call we won't arrive as babies. No, we'll be straight into whatever we have lined up for us.
I see you're now following your own blog.
Open the pod bay doors, HAL.
ReplyDeleteLoved the movie, and the music, one of those movies that you must have in your collection.
Ian, the penultimate section, where Dave goes through the star gate and out beyond the universe, was created using chemical processes (non-hallucinatory)- remember, thi was done in the pre-digital era and is all the more impressive for this. Not only is the journey literally psychedelic, it also bends our perception of dimensions - sometimes we are above the surface, sometimes, beneath, and sometimes the whole perspective turns on its side. I think you havea point about the stars...
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