Revisiting 2001: A Space Odyssey for the AFI Project

From August 20, 2008:

What's the AFI Project, you ask? For more information, or if you just enjoy my bemused ramblings, read here: http://www.spout.com/blogs/pippin06/archive/2008/3/1/25756.aspx

2001: A Space Odyssey is on the following AFI lists:

The Original Top 100 (#22)
100 Most Heart-Pounding Movies (#40)
100 Years...100 Heroes and Villans (HAL 9000 is the #13 villain)
100 Movie Quotes (#78 - David Bowman: "Open the pod bay doors, HAL.")
100 Most Inspiring Movies (#47)
The Revised Top 100 (#15)
10 Top 10's (#1 Science Fiction)

Ah 2001. It's one of the weirdest and most wonderful movies in the whole world. It's so wonderful partly because it is so weird. I own this film (test = pass); I bought it for this project, but it's been on my wish list a long time.

This is one of the rare films that I suggest people watch for its artistic value only. As entertainment, it's long and slow and surreal and, well, at first blush, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. To be sure, I didn't like it at first because of those reasons. Plus, I had seen its "sequel," 2010: The Year We Make Contact, first, and since that was a film made purely for entertainment - which I will wax on in a minute - 2001 seemed a little too high falutin' on first viewing. So, when I watched it a second time, and concentrated more on what was being portrayed and what I was looking at in a film made in 1968, I was able to get a better sense of why this movie is considered such a masterpiece, and why I feel the same way about it.

There really is very little in the way of plot; this movie is skin-thin on anything that could be called a story. It's told in four acts: first, the Dawn of Man, which makes subtle commentary on the theories of evolution and the nature of man and introduces the viewer to the ubiquitous and mysterious monolith. The second act finds us accompanying Dr. Heywood Floyd (William Sylvester) to the moon, where futuristic technology as imagined by 1968 creators is showcased, and where investigators have found a monolith, buried deep below the surface of the moon. It emits a high-pitched noise that pierces the eyes, ears, and minds of the investigators. The third act brings the viewer to Jupiter, and the spaceship Discovery, where seemingly impassive astronauts David Bowman (Keir Dullea) and Frank Poole (Gary Lockwood) share a mission to seek the monolith with three hibernating astronauts and their onboard computer, the HAL 9000. "HAL" is humanistic himself, man-made but with vocal inflections that sound almost emotional. He has control over the whole ship and enjoys "stimulating" relationships with the crew of Bowman and Poole. HAL malfunctions, however, and he begins taking drastic actions to cover up his error, as his brand of computer has never before made a mistake. The fourth act finds Bowman chasing the monolith toward Jupiter and the "Infinite Beyond," in what is probably the most surreal portion of the film.

I view 2001 the same way I view a painting in an art museum. Stanley Kubrick, esteemed director, used visual symbols and impressions to lay down an intriguing mystery, and I think it's for the viewer to take away what s/he wants from it. The most mysterious aspect of the film is the monolith - what it is, what it represents, and what impressions the viewer is supposed to form. The film itself is something you have to look at more than once to digest the magnitude and point of it all and to catch all the nuances you likely missed the first time.

The photography and the depictions of space are what is so impressive about this film. It is obvious that 2001 influenced so many renderings of space in future science fiction films, including Star Wars. I don't know how it was done, and perhaps I should watch the DVD extras, but the photography of the planets, the spaceships, the monolith, were all , well, really cool, and they still feel fresh and are kind of breathtaking today.

The sound in this movie is also sorely underrated. Kubrick used sound effectively in creating something of a thriller, particularly in the last two acts, including Bowman's heavy breathing in fear of HAL and his great trip to the infinite. The absence of sound was also an effective technique - there's simply a tangible-ness to the quiet that really draws the viewer in and makes him/her wonder what will happen next. I've seen 2001 a few times, and it still works on me, because I can never remember the order of the events. I spend more time puzzling over what I'm looking at, especially in the fourth act, and wondering what's about to happen.

Agreeably, the fourth act is the most tedious, between the psychidelic colors of substances that remind me of melted chocolate, and the score in that act is also kind of annoying. The last scene, in what looks to be a futuristic place equipped with antique furniture and Bowman at various stages of life, is probably the most cryptic aspect of the film, though I have long since made up my own mind on what I see.

Still, the whole experience is something that works its way into your brain through sight and sound, and I think that achievement is what makes 2001 so great. If you watch it expecting an entertaining thrill ride, you will be sorely disappointed (except in act three). I guess act three is what put 2001 on the thrillers list because the rest of the film is not really thrilling, at least not in a heart-pounding way.

If you're looking for entertainment, I recommend 2010. Ok, Kubrick hardliners, hear me out: I don't view it strictly as an inferior sequel to Kubrick's version. I know it's dated, imagining a future from a period when the Cold War was still in full force. I don't look at it as undermining 2001's vision. What 2010 does, however, is attempt to answer some of the more superficial mysteries of 2001 in a way that the less-than-interested 2001 viewer might appreciate. Without providing definite solutions to the mysteries, 2010 is a spooky story that posits theories about the monolith. The acting is good, the photography is also excellent (focusing on Jupiter and its moons), and some of the themes about the nature of man, especially as it relates to the construction of the HAL 9000, are revisited. It's also an uplifting film in its way. I'm the rare 2001 fan who likes both films, but if you want entertainment, 2010 is the place to go. That film is not about the Space Odyssey - it's about the monolith and the concept of life beyond ours. Not as intricate or laden with symbolism, but intriguing nonetheless.

As for 2001, it's a masterpiece of film artistry, so I give it a 10. If I looked at it as a film that should be entertaining too, it would probably get an 8 or so because it is long and slow. That's why I suggest revising expectations and revisiting the film. The magic of 2001 is in appreciating the whole visual picture as painted by a director ahead of his time.