Back in the days of the big screen major movies started with an overture. This was a clue to those getting their popcorn and drinks that it was time to get back to their seats to see the opening.
Sadly, you’re missing the full impact of this movie by watching it on a small screen. If you ever have the chance to see it on a large movie screen I’d highly recommend it.
I was lucky enough to see it once at the Cinerama Dome in Los Angeles where they have a giant screen that partly wraps around. Spectacular. Also saw Laurence of Arabia there.
The reason Dave could not use a simple off switch on HAL because he had to turn off the higher level functions without disabling the more automatic ship maintenance functions.
The confusion at the end was deliberate. When I saw this in the theatre on its first run - the audience just sat there during the closing credits. You didn't have the usual exodus. I left feeling uneasy. And according to the Author Arthur C. Clarke- that was precisely the reaction they wanted.
Once again, a young viewer doesn't know about the overture, which played with the curtain closed, while moviegoers bought their popcorn and made their way to reserved seats. This was among the last of the big time movies to have an overture. It's a shame we're now deprived of that by twenty minutes of ads and trailers.
Among the last yes, but Star Trek The Motion Picture had an overture 11 years later, so there were still a few years to go before overtures became a thing of the past.
The simplest explanation of the ending is that Dave travels through a wormhole to The Builder's homeworld, is placed in a zoo, then his consciousness becomes an overseer of Earth's further development 🤔🤔🤔
Some people keep saying that the wormhole that Dave travels through and the "aliens" he finds are the same ones Ellie (Jodie Foster) encounters the 1985 movie CONTACT. However, I seem to remember back in the 90's seeing an article in Omni Magazine where Carl Sagan said although he loved 2001, there was no intended connection between it and his book/movie.
When this film was in the theater, we would watch it almost every week. Even after it's initial run some theaters would show it at midnight on weekends. Not your fault, but so many young people can't grasp how advanced this was in 1968. No CGI....all practical effects. As with all Kubrick films, it was visually stunning. There are some behind the scenes videos on youtube which are remarkable.
When it was made, TV was tubes. The pad's and laptops did not exist. computers used punch cards. anyone born within the past twenty years might take it for granted, that these technologies were around.
23:53 Good catch that Dave should have been wearing his helmet when he took the pod to retrieve Frank. Dave was wearing a suit during Frank’s eva in case there was some sort of emergency. He almost certainly violated protocol by not wearing the helmet too. The suit is next to useless without the helmet.
In the book the monolith is responsible for jumps in human evolution. In the film its more ambiguous. The monolith could be there to observe key moments in human evolution also works. At the time of filming/writing the book and movie, tool use was a popular separator of Human vs. Animal. In reality animals use tools either instinctually or as learned behavior so this hallmark to the 'dawn of man' lost favor today.
Bowman becomes the Starchild, the next evolutionary step... You should defintively go for "2010: the year we made contact". Not as profound, but still very good.
Also Sprach Zarathustra (thus spake Zarathustra) wasn’t written for this film but has become inextricably identified with it. Kubrick had a movie score composed but ended up deciding that he liked the various classical pieces better.
I saw this in a large screen theater when it first came out. I had no clue what it meant either. Much later I read the book by Aurthor C, Clark and it explained most everything. Stanley Kubrick was definitely experimenting with a new kind of visual "experience". The psychedelics near the end showed David Bowman going into a wormhole and transforming into the next stage of human evolution.
No one understands this movie (especially the end) on first viewing. I've seen it many times, and I still don't fully understand it. There's a sequel (made years later) called "2010" that explains a lot, but I prefer it to be mysterious. It's about incomprehensible forces greater than we are, and explaining too much diminishes that (IMO). "2001: A Space Odyssey" is a slow-moving film. Kubrick trusted the audience to have patience, and I think it's a better movie for it.
@@anathardayaldar I agree, and the fact that Kubrick had no involvement in 2010 indicates that he was not ok with answers served up on a plate. It's something like the age old question "How is there something rather than nothing?". Answer : we just don't know and just serving up an answer just doesn't cut it. Some things we ponder and we'll almost certainly never know for sure.
We have to keep in mind that both the scenario and the novel were written at about the same time. Arthur C. Clarke explored more thoroughly the voyage made by Bowman, and I seem to remember that Kubrick opted for the psychedlic color sequence since he didn't have the technology and/or the money to do what Clarke was devising... And that doesn't take in account the both weren't on the same page for a few things either regarding the script. But, I might be wrong... 😊
BTW, HAL is made up of each letter that is prior to each letter of IBM in the alphabet, IBM had the most advanced mainframe at that time, and people were already predicting a computer master brain takeover. :)
Yep, this was right on the heels of stories like Colossus (the book as the movie, "Colossus: The Forbin Project", was still a couple years out) and "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream". And of course, right before all that, Dune was in a sense a future where the Devil might be a near-forgotten concept but mentioning computers would basically make everybody in the room cross themselves.
@@brandonflorida1092Yep. Another fun fact: the movie correctly showed that a human could remain alive and conscious for several seconds when abruptly exposed to a full vacuum. This was known at the time. However, Dave is shown breathing deeply and holding his breath. This is exactly wrong, he should have exhaled as much as he could. Clarke was aware of this but not around when they filmed this.
@@silikon2 Clarke had wanted to show that exposure to vacuum is not instantly fatal, although I'd probably want to exit it before my blood started to boil.
I was working for IBM when this movie arrived. Not only was H-A-L connected to I-B-M, but the name plate was in IBM’s blue/black/white colours that actually looked like the nameplates on the mainframes I was maintaining. We IBMers were fascinated by this movie and its excellent depiction of possible space travel. Later Star Wars arrived with its better special effects but stupid space ship sound effects ….. there is no sound transmitted across the vacuum. Classical music was a much better accompaniment to what was happening.
I never noticed the monolith-affected apes were standing up until you pointed it out. :O Some little details about the movie that I've learned from reading about it are the 5 odd shapes at 33:27 were going to be the aliens but they left it more ambiguous, and the cut from the bone to the satellite is from one weapon to another as it was an orbiting nuclear weapons platform. If I remember right, in the book, Dave (now as the Starchild) destroys it to help protect Earth.
The Starchild destroyed ALL the nukes in orbit and on earth, blew up the ones in orbit and somehow deactivated the plutonium and uranium in the ones planetside.
Kubrick got into a big argument with his co-writer Clarke because Clarke didn't think HAL reading lips was believable. Decades later, Clarke finally gave Kubrick his flowers.
A common theme of Kubrick's movies is that although there seems to be forward progress in one way, in another way you're just going in circles; and ultimately you wind up back where you started -- which, if I'm not mistaken, is what 'odyssey' truly implies. In 2001, the more we learn about the universe, the more we understand how incompressible it is -- a paradox.
Good choice of movie. Good reaction. Your comprehension of the things you were seeing was much better than most people. BTW, try saying or entering "Open the pod bay doors" to any AI you encounter, such as on your phone. Every one I've ever seen says something back related to the movie. I'll give you a word of explanation. The monolith basically did the same thing to Dave Bowman that the other onw had done to the apes - took him to the next level. The plot with Hal had nothing whatever to do with the monoliths.
@@brandonflorida1092 HAL had already lied to Dave about the chess game and lied about the unit failing before they talked about turning him off. HAL would not have been turned off if he hadn't lied to them.
@@jeffmartin1026 Dave never played chess with Hal. Frank did. HAL tried to kill everyone, as he stated explicitly, because he didn't want to be turned off.
The famous musical score of this movie is so big & epic. The practical sets & cinematography of 2001 were so far ahead of its time. Slow pacing & lack of dialogue is a lot for contemporary audiences. The theme is deep. Of course, there's so much going on in 2001, it's a ton (a TON) to un-pack 1st time. Let the movie sink in - Watch it again - Do 10 mins. on Wikipedia abt it B4 watching 2010. Pace picks up & it answers a lot of what 2001 left on the table.
Besides the sequel “2010” that Kubrick didn’t have any part of (written and filmed in the 1980s), .. the film 2001 was accompanied by Clarke’s book itself a novelization of sci-fi stories he’d published in the 1950s. Kubrick then brought it to “life” with attention to detail. Maybe a spoiler alert, but the super-baby (Starchild) in the book starts destroying orbiting nuclear weapons that you saw at the start of the space sequence (after the ape beat down). Why that wasn’t included in the film is beyond me as it explains a lot. Also the “room” where Dave is transformed would be the extraterrestrial perception of life on earth looking from afar right before (in space time) humans reached the moon monolith. This was so detailed it inspired a young George Lucas to make the first Star Wars almost a decade later. A lot of the spaceship shots are similar.
I was in high school when this came out. The Space Race was going full bore, and we expected to see a man on the moon within the next year (which we did). The US had gone from a 50% rocket launch failure rate to a man on the moon in less than a decade. I absolutely believed that by 2001 we would have a permanent base on the moon, a torus space station with a Howard Johnson's restaurant, and Pan Am business flights in space. But here we are...no moon base no space station...and we don't even have either Howard Johnson's or Pan Am anymore. Bummer. My mates and I sat in the front row to watch this. When the wormhole sequence got going, my stoner buddy (back in 68, every clique had one kid who was a stoner) started screaming at the top of his lungs, "It's blowing my mind! It's blowing my mind!" Practical effects all the way. No computer graphics were possible back then...this was even before pocket calculators. The spinning sets were actually built to full size. The rotating section of the Discovery was like an enclosed ferris wheel, that turned as the astronaut jogged through it. Some of the wormhole effects were drops of oil in water (and vice versa) photographed in black light and reverse processed. We had never before seen such special effects and especially not such realism. Remember the context: We were deep into the Space Race with real space missions doing new things every few months. It was another decade before we saw such spectacular special effects again in Star Wars: A New Hope.
Money and politics killed NASA's future moon ambitions. It was insanely expensive, though compared to what our government spends these days it would be just a drop in the bucket. Realize: in 1962 when the Apollo Program was started, the US government only spent about 10% of it's budget on social programs...welfare, medical, food, etc.....now it's almost 70%. And nowadays NASA runs on a budget that is only less than 5% of what it used to get at the height of the Apollo program in the 1960's.
The long version was just has the opening black screen and music (and also same for intermission). This was to LET the audience have time to SIT DOWN before the actually movie starts in the theater I saw it 3 times in Cinarama (SUPER WIDE SCREEN) at least one of the times on ACID. (along with a fair amount of the audience)
@@carlwilkerson9722 In Detroit Can't remember what the theater was called ..was modern /Dowtown ..Funning thing my mostly absent dad took me (i was 15) because i got caught smoking pot and he thought he should do more ,,,,, MY Acid trip viewings were in the months that followed
Maybe, however the curtain was probably closed, the house lights at half, and the projector light not on. I'd guess the house lights went down and the curtain parted just before Also Sprach Zarathustra. But maybe you're right. Maybe the audience filed in with the curtains open and a blank screen. I used "blank screen" referring to the DVD experience not the 1968 movie palace experience. My parents went first run in San Francisco, I must have had a sitter. Hmm, I saw it at the UC Theater in Berkeley in the early 80s. I don't recall the opening music being integral or .... but that was 40 years ago. If you see a connection between the blank screen and the monolith I'd listen to that argument.
@@floorticket From what I have read you are right about the curtain/projector. With the DVD I think the idea holds water. I also saw it several times on its initial release, but I don't remember the theatre having a curtain, not with that size of a screen.
32:55 I don’t know about techno, but you can watch the 3rd act (Jupiter) synced up with the 23 minute Pink Floyd song Echoes (similar to the Wizard of Oz / Dark Side of the Moon thing). You can search for instructions on when to press play on the movie and music or you can find already synced videos floating around online.
I really like your thought about HAL being affected by the monolith. The story as I know it does not have that twist, but it would make sense if they had written it that way.
The music is old classic pieces; it was not written for the movie. Clarke wrote the novelization and the sequel 2010, in which he explains HAL's actions. Modern space suits also use colors. It is hard to see the face, so colors on the suit identify the occupant.
Don’t make it explicit, but it’s implied that since how knew about the mission and the humans didn’t that he might see his own survival is more important than the humans for the sake of the mission. Exactly what happened to him To make him go, psycho is clearly not fully explained in this movie
{Not shown: Seatback video displays on the surface to orbit shuttle. About 15 years before they actually existed.} Tablets on the table about 40 years before they actually existed Here's an explanation I recorded in 1968. Audio only. Black screen. th-cam.com/video/CpsEhCJioyg/w-d-xo.html
The music is iconic and tied to the movie, but of course it's classical and would be familiar to classical music lovers in any case. The opening is Thus Sprach Zarathrusta by Richard Strauss (inspired by Nietzsche), and the space music is The Blue Danube Waltz by Johann Strauss. The use of classical orchestral music here influenced George Lucas when he created Star Wars; John Williams' score is heavily influenced by The Planets by Holst.
The talk of every cocktail party in 1968, lol. So far ahead of its time, maybe the best sci fi movie ever. The sequel, 2010, isn't as good but it's worth a look. The discovery and use of tools was a major leap forward in our evolution and survival. This is the weirdest movie you've seen? Oh boy, you haven't even started. One word - "Eraserhead".
Ylva, 2001 is One of the Best/Greatest Sci-Fi Films and Films In General Of All Time. Also, there has been an ongoing Conspiracy Theory regarding this film and of Stanley Kubrick himself. He had been accused of allegedly having produced much of the footage for Apollos 11 and 12’s Moon Landings.
Reminds me of that old joke we used to tell. Stanley Kubrick was unsatisfied with the video NASA gave him so he decided to film the lunar scenes on location instead.
Funny how Ylva with a few other responders think that the last image is of a giant baby. Well, it might be, but I always presumed that we are near the star child looking at the earth from a distance. That was my feeling when I saw it on its original release in Cinerama.
The monoliths show up when there is a quantum change in Humanity. i.e. we learn to use tools, then we begin long range space flight. The monoliths do not affect the change they are just there to witness the change. A rough explanation of the ending. As Dave goes to the monolith he encounters the aliens. Stanley Kubrick didn't really know how to show that given the film technology of the time so that's why you get the weird visuals. Later we see Dave, but he is in a sort of aquarium constructed by the aliens using information from Daves mind, that is why it is a little off, because the aliens don't have the full context to recreate everything correctly. Dave then dies and is reborn as the next step in human evolution, the "Starchild".
Humans were not the apex predator as you said, and the use of tools and intelligence enabled their dominance. After the humans started to use tools, the rapid and predictable development of non-human capabilities lead to AI. The buried monolith on the moon was meant to be found by humans, indicating a state of development that would need a further assist - HAL was indicative of the challenge to human dominance at that stage; the reason humans would need another assist.
Reading the novilation closes many gaps. If you notice the monolith on the moon activates the moment it was hit by the sunlight. Because the lunar day is 28 days long it had been in the dark since it was buried about 1M years prior. It was like a tripwire to signal the Jupiter Monolith (Saturn in the book) that it had been uncovered meaning as you said we had advanced enough to find it. It was all a trail of breadcrumbs left to see if we could follow it with the monoliths being the breadcrumbs and the guide to take us on the journey and see how far we can evolve. At the end of infinity Dave is merged with the monolith (basically a super computer) to make him and the monolith a non-corporeal being unconfined by space, time, and physics, or essentially a living AI hybrid.
Not so much a film as an Experience, Yiva. And a thought-provoking one that stands up very well. I originally saw it over 50 years ago. 🙂 It still has the same impact on me now as it did then. Talk about "Ahead Of It's Time".
This is one of those movies where you really need to read the book to get it. In the book, the 3 main characters have inner monologue. Moon Watcher (the homo erectus), Dr. Floyd and Commander David Bowman have some amount of thoughts that are communicated to the reader. The book is a chronicle of the journey of humanity from Ape man to infantile god. It is implied in the book that the monoliths are sent by ancient aliens to prod us along as we reach certain evolutionary milestones. Hate to nerd out on you…had to read it and watch it for a religious studies class at UNC-Chapel Hill.
No, Hal isn't affected by the monolith, he goes nuts because he's been told to keep the mission secret which goes against his core programming. When he asks Dave if he thinks their mission is connected to what happened on the moon he's throwing him a bone. When Dave doesn't bite he lies about the failure of the antenna to get rid of the crew as he sees them as a threat to the mission. Hal represents AI advancing beyond humans, so the monolith advances Dave to the next stage of evolution so he isn't overtaken by AI. The whole movie is a Freemasonic allegory (Arthur C Clarke and Cubrick were both high level freemasons.) The monolith represents the stone of foundation in freemasonry (the black cube in Masonic lodges, also seen in Judaism and Islam) which propels human intelligence for the initiated (Dave) through the 3 stages of enlightenment (note the three stages of human advancement occur with each encounter) while the unenlightened are left behind, in the case of the apes, to perish.
The only obvious comedy moment in this movie is about the use of a toilet in microgravity. It is a literal moment of toilet humour in such an otherwise very serious movie.
Ummm, now that you've watched it, do you know what it's about? Mind sharing? Lol, ok what I got from the book and movie both reading it and seeing it, and reading the short story that provided the basis (I've also read the sequels but as they are postfacto whether the original intent is being accurately depicted or is hindsight can be questioned). There was a race that originated in the early universe and evolved into a post material being, they wanted companionship. They seeded planets where they saw lifeforms that had potential with the original teaching monoliths. To monitor the progress they left sentinal monoliths (the moon's) to signal when and if a species had made their inial foray into the universe beyond their home planet. They also left another transport monolith (the Jupiter [Saturn in the book] one) to bring the "new" species to learn from the builders of the monoliths to become post material beings like them. Since he had just become a post material being, he was in that sense a "baby". As far as the movie, what is amazing is those are ALL practical effects and they still look pretty damn good. The soundtrack is stellar, Richard Strauss. And the cinematography is breathtaking.
Before you watch "2010" or read any of Arthur C Clarke's novels, invest a few minutes in this very worthy man-made epilogue to "2001," which doesn't fit in with them, but is really excellent: th-cam.com/video/Ok9VZYcKjBs/w-d-xo.htmlsi=FHUBT1t6381yUlI9
I'd suggest watching a video essay on what the hell is going on lol. It doesn't take much, 10 minutes or so, and it all falls into place pretty easily.
My theory is that people did a lot of drugs in the sixties, and came up with these weird hazy ambitious half-baked ideas, which they tricked themselves and others into thinking were amazing high-concept art. To me 2001 is equal parts brilliant groundbreaking film-making way ahead of its time, and over-hyped unsatisfying pretentious nonsense. And that's kind of its charm.
Back in the day, movies had overtures which played as the audience took their seats. They also played music during the intermission. That is the black screen you are seeing.
The Monolith does not effect HAL. Dosen't fit the movie .... The monolith wants Humans to get there not the ship. Besides in 2010 (book and movie it explains that it is human programing error that cause HAL to become paranoid
You seem smart but I don't think you tried hard enough or took the movie seriously enough. The long overture music at the start is to allow people to take their seats in the cinema. Maybe if you tried again on a larger screen with fewer distractions?
“So the extra ten minutes are a black screen.” I love this film but that could be a review in itself. This is the one film that manages dramatic tedium, not tension, but tedium, right.
People often call the creatures at the beginning monkeys or apes, but they should probably best be referred to as proto-humans. This is the dawn of man, after all. I think Kubrick should have made the costumes just slightly more humanistic, maybe around the jaw and mouth.
LOL. Yes. Confustion ensues. IMO I feel it's very much an artfilm and not really a movie in an entertaining sense. I feel it all could have been editied down to about 45 minutes. But I hope you follow up on this and watch 2010: The Year We Make Contact. It's more of a straight up movie but will offer you some answers. Roy Schider and Helen Mirren are in it along with John Lithgow. This movie has a number of meme from it, like the lines "Open the pod bay doors, Hal" or more used "I'm afraid I can't do that, DAve" for a number of IT people.
In "2001" the aliens tell humans to go to Jupiter. In "2010" the aliens tell humans to leave Jupiter and go back home. "2010" is the worst, most pointless sequel ever made. It doesn't answer any questions, it simply makes hash out of the original film.
@@buffstraw2969 That's not what they said. They just said hands off this one world and stop being shit to each other. I appreciate 2001 for what it is, but find 2010 a lot more enjoyable.
@@artboymoy The aliens guided human evolution for 4 million years. When we uncovered a monolith on the Moon, it sent a powerful radio signal to Jupiter. We followed it there. Once we got there, we found out the aliens were no longer interested in us. In just 9 short years (2001 to 2010), the aliens inexplicably abandoned their 4 million year uplift program. We humans went from being their pet project to unwanted interlopers. What was their reason? Gods don't need a reason, I guess, they're just fickle. What a dumb movie.
@@artboymoy "They just said hands off this one world" Right. "All these other worlds are yours." Worthless, uninhabitable balls of ice and rock. Thanks for nothing. Also, the aliens have turned Jupiter into a small sun, so that we can't have nighttime anymore. Sorry mankind, hope that doesn't interfere with your sleep patterns. Nighty-night.
@@artboymoy "I feel it [2001] is very much an artfilm and not really a movie in an entertaining sense." I beg to differ. I was very much entertained by Kubrick's "artfilm." Isn't cinema an art form? Why does "art" get such a bad rap?
Lady you need to stop patting yourself on the back and acting like a big know-it-all when it comes to this movie. Throughout your viewing of it you seem utterly bored and turned off. Have you ever thought of raising rhinoceroses? You're hilarious 😆
@@grosbeak6130 Oh I love this movie too, I get it. It just seemed a bit mean spirited. Also, it's had to find a good reaction to this film, because everyone has adhd now lol
@@iamamaniaint affirmative. And also where she time and again points out Dave's shortcomings, like I told you so. She seems like a nice enough gal though.
Unpopular Opinions! While 2001 is a fine experience its sequel 2010 is a better story. Also 2001 is vastly improved by completely skipping the Dawn of Man sequence.
Back in the days of the big screen major movies started with an overture. This was a clue to those getting their popcorn and drinks that it was time to get back to their seats to see the opening.
Sadly, you’re missing the full impact of this movie by watching it on a small screen. If you ever have the chance to see it on a large movie screen I’d highly recommend it.
I agree, I saw it when it came out in 1968 and I watched a restoration of the 70mm print IMAX version in 2018.
I was lucky enough to see it once at the Cinerama Dome in Los Angeles where they have a giant screen that partly wraps around. Spectacular. Also saw Laurence of Arabia there.
The reason Dave could not use a simple off switch on HAL because he had to turn off the higher level functions without disabling the more automatic ship maintenance functions.
Fun fact: the little girl in the Video Phone call was Stanley Kubrick's daughter, Vivian, who is now a renowned film producer as well.
The confusion at the end was deliberate. When I saw this in the theatre on its first run - the audience just sat there during the closing credits. You didn't have the usual exodus. I left feeling uneasy. And according to the Author Arthur C. Clarke- that was precisely the reaction they wanted.
Once again, a young viewer doesn't know about the overture, which played with the curtain closed, while moviegoers bought their popcorn and made their way to reserved seats. This was among the last of the big time movies to have an overture. It's a shame we're now deprived of that by twenty minutes of ads and trailers.
Among the last yes, but Star Trek The Motion Picture had an overture 11 years later, so there were still a few years to go before overtures became a thing of the past.
I like the trailers, but could most certainly do without the ads...
The simplest explanation of the ending is that Dave travels through a wormhole to The Builder's homeworld, is placed in a zoo, then his consciousness becomes an overseer of Earth's further development 🤔🤔🤔
EXACTLY right
Some people keep saying that the wormhole that Dave travels through and the "aliens" he finds are the same ones Ellie (Jodie Foster) encounters the 1985 movie CONTACT. However, I seem to remember back in the 90's seeing an article in Omni Magazine where Carl Sagan said although he loved 2001, there was no intended connection between it and his book/movie.
@@8RBrain Contact was made in 1997.
When this film was in the theater, we would watch it almost every week. Even after it's initial run some theaters would show it at midnight on weekends. Not your fault, but so many young people can't grasp how advanced this was in 1968. No CGI....all practical effects. As with all Kubrick films, it was visually stunning. There are some behind the scenes videos on youtube which are remarkable.
When it was made, TV was tubes. The pad's and laptops did not exist. computers used punch cards. anyone born within the past twenty years might take it for granted, that these technologies were around.
The waltz playing during the space ship docking to the station was to show it was like a dance.
Right at the start, Strauss’s “Zarathustra” music summarizes the film by pointing back to Nietzsche and his ape/man/superman idea.
23:53 Good catch that Dave should have been wearing his helmet when he took the pod to retrieve Frank. Dave was wearing a suit during Frank’s eva in case there was some sort of emergency.
He almost certainly violated protocol by not wearing the helmet too. The suit is next to useless without the helmet.
In the book the monolith is responsible for jumps in human evolution. In the film its more ambiguous. The monolith could be there to observe key moments in human evolution also works.
At the time of filming/writing the book and movie, tool use was a popular separator of Human vs. Animal. In reality animals use tools either instinctually or as learned behavior so this hallmark to the 'dawn of man' lost favor today.
You can imagine this being _the_ space film to see. A serious effort by a serious director. Then 8 years later Star Wars hits the theaters.
Bowman becomes the Starchild, the next evolutionary step... You should defintively go for "2010: the year we made contact". Not as profound, but still very good.
Also Sprach Zarathustra (thus spake Zarathustra) wasn’t written for this film but has become inextricably identified with it. Kubrick had a movie score composed but ended up deciding that he liked the various classical pieces better.
I saw this in a large screen theater when it first came out. I had no clue what it meant either. Much later I read the book by Aurthor C, Clark and it explained most everything. Stanley Kubrick was definitely experimenting with a new kind of visual "experience". The psychedelics near the end showed David Bowman going into a wormhole and transforming into the next stage of human evolution.
No one understands this movie (especially the end) on first viewing. I've seen it many times, and I still don't fully understand it. There's a sequel (made years later) called "2010" that explains a lot, but I prefer it to be mysterious. It's about incomprehensible forces greater than we are, and explaining too much diminishes that (IMO).
"2001: A Space Odyssey" is a slow-moving film. Kubrick trusted the audience to have patience, and I think it's a better movie for it.
I think Kubrick intentionally wanted to have no one singular interpretation. So all our attempts to figure out what he meant are pointless.
@@anathardayaldar I agree, and the fact that Kubrick had no involvement in 2010 indicates that he was not ok with answers served up on a plate. It's something like the age old question "How is there something rather than nothing?". Answer : we just don't know and just serving up an answer just doesn't cut it. Some things we ponder and we'll almost certainly never know for sure.
We have to keep in mind that both the scenario and the novel were written at about the same time. Arthur C. Clarke explored more thoroughly the voyage made by Bowman, and I seem to remember that Kubrick opted for the psychedlic color sequence since he didn't have the technology and/or the money to do what Clarke was devising... And that doesn't take in account the both weren't on the same page for a few things either regarding the script. But, I might be wrong... 😊
Concur. While I liked 2010 I didn't buy into a lot of it.
Basically the movie is about the evolution of man, but guided by alien intelligence (I think)
BTW, HAL is made up of each letter that is prior to each letter of IBM in the alphabet, IBM had the most advanced mainframe at that time, and people were already predicting a computer master brain takeover. :)
Yep, this was right on the heels of stories like Colossus (the book as the movie, "Colossus: The Forbin Project", was still a couple years out) and "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream". And of course, right before all that, Dune was in a sense a future where the Devil might be a near-forgotten concept but mentioning computers would basically make everybody in the room cross themselves.
Arthur C. Clarke insisted that the IBM thing had never been in his mind and he only became aware of it when it was shown to him.
@@brandonflorida1092Yep. Another fun fact: the movie correctly showed that a human could remain alive and conscious for several seconds when abruptly exposed to a full vacuum. This was known at the time.
However, Dave is shown breathing deeply and holding his breath. This is exactly wrong, he should have exhaled as much as he could. Clarke was aware of this but not around when they filmed this.
@@silikon2 Clarke had wanted to show that exposure to vacuum is not instantly fatal, although I'd probably want to exit it before my blood started to boil.
I was working for IBM when this movie arrived. Not only was H-A-L connected to I-B-M, but the name plate was in IBM’s blue/black/white colours that actually looked like the nameplates on the mainframes I was maintaining. We IBMers were fascinated by this movie and its excellent depiction of possible space travel. Later Star Wars arrived with its better special effects but stupid space ship sound effects ….. there is no sound transmitted across the vacuum. Classical music was a much better accompaniment to what was happening.
I never noticed the monolith-affected apes were standing up until you pointed it out. :O Some little details about the movie that I've learned from reading about it are the 5 odd shapes at 33:27 were going to be the aliens but they left it more ambiguous, and the cut from the bone to the satellite is from one weapon to another as it was an orbiting nuclear weapons platform. If I remember right, in the book, Dave (now as the Starchild) destroys it to help protect Earth.
The Starchild destroyed ALL the nukes in orbit and on earth, blew up the ones in orbit and somehow deactivated the plutonium and uranium in the ones planetside.
@@montylc2001 Ah nice, it's been a while since I read it. :D
@@montylc2001 Reportedly that was the intended end to the movie but it was removed because it would be too similar to Kubrick’s Dr Strangelove.
You MUST watch 2010 Space Odyssey. It answers 90% of your questions.
Kubrick got into a big argument with his co-writer Clarke because Clarke didn't think HAL reading lips was believable. Decades later, Clarke finally gave Kubrick his flowers.
Reborn into a more sentient being in the next life cycle. Earth being you.
A common theme of Kubrick's movies is that although there seems to be forward progress in one way, in another way you're just going in circles; and ultimately you wind up back where you started -- which, if I'm not mistaken, is what 'odyssey' truly implies.
In 2001, the more we learn about the universe, the more we understand how incompressible it is -- a paradox.
Good choice of movie. Good reaction. Your comprehension of the things you were seeing was much better than most people.
BTW, try saying or entering "Open the pod bay doors" to any AI you encounter, such as on your phone. Every one I've ever seen says something back related to the movie.
I'll give you a word of explanation. The monolith basically did the same thing to Dave Bowman that the other onw had done to the apes - took him to the next level. The plot with Hal had nothing whatever to do with the monoliths.
Knowledge of the monolith is why HAL decides that the humans are not capable in dealing with it.
@@jeffmartin1026 No, Hal did what he did because he didn't want to be turned off.
@@brandonflorida1092 HAL had already lied to Dave about the chess game and lied about the unit failing before they talked about turning him off. HAL would not have been turned off if he hadn't lied to them.
@@jeffmartin1026 Dave never played chess with Hal. Frank did. HAL tried to kill everyone, as he stated explicitly, because he didn't want to be turned off.
@@brandonflorida1092 Hal lied about the game. He lied about the failure. He felt the mission was too important to be left to humans.
You have to see this movie on the very big screen at 70mm per frame, as it's meant to be seen. On the big screen, this movie is visually spectacular!
The concept of an Ipad was far fetch thinking in the 1960's.
You could say the inventors of IPads were unspired/copied this movie.
@@carlossaraiva8213 I heard Apple was suing Samsung for copying their idea. Samsung showed a clip of this movie in court.
Star Trek did in 1966.
The famous musical score of this movie is so big & epic. The practical sets & cinematography of 2001 were so far ahead of its time. Slow pacing & lack of dialogue is a lot for contemporary audiences. The theme is deep. Of course, there's so much going on in 2001, it's a ton (a TON) to un-pack 1st time. Let the movie sink in - Watch it again - Do 10 mins. on Wikipedia abt it B4 watching 2010. Pace picks up & it answers a lot of what 2001 left on the table.
The two main score musics are classical - Also Sprach Zarathrustra by Richard Struss and The Blue Danube by Johann Strauss
The ONLY correct reaction to after watching 2001 A SPACE ODDYSSEY is to be confused. If you are not then you didnt get the movie.
Yes, the depiction of the Navigator robot in Wall-E was a nod to this film ♥️🤟😎♥️
Besides the sequel “2010” that Kubrick didn’t have any part of (written and filmed in the 1980s), .. the film 2001 was accompanied by Clarke’s book itself a novelization of sci-fi stories he’d published in the 1950s. Kubrick then brought it to “life” with attention to detail. Maybe a spoiler alert, but the super-baby (Starchild) in the book starts destroying orbiting nuclear weapons that you saw at the start of the space sequence (after the ape beat down). Why that wasn’t included in the film is beyond me as it explains a lot. Also the “room” where Dave is transformed would be the extraterrestrial perception of life on earth looking from afar right before (in space time) humans reached the moon monolith.
This was so detailed it inspired a young George Lucas to make the first Star Wars almost a decade later. A lot of the spaceship shots are similar.
This might be one of the most influential scifi films ever made.
I was in high school when this came out. The Space Race was going full bore, and we expected to see a man on the moon within the next year (which we did). The US had gone from a 50% rocket launch failure rate to a man on the moon in less than a decade. I absolutely believed that by 2001 we would have a permanent base on the moon, a torus space station with a Howard Johnson's restaurant, and Pan Am business flights in space. But here we are...no moon base no space station...and we don't even have either Howard Johnson's or Pan Am anymore. Bummer.
My mates and I sat in the front row to watch this. When the wormhole sequence got going, my stoner buddy (back in 68, every clique had one kid who was a stoner) started screaming at the top of his lungs, "It's blowing my mind! It's blowing my mind!"
Practical effects all the way. No computer graphics were possible back then...this was even before pocket calculators. The spinning sets were actually built to full size. The rotating section of the Discovery was like an enclosed ferris wheel, that turned as the astronaut jogged through it. Some of the wormhole effects were drops of oil in water (and vice versa) photographed in black light and reverse processed. We had never before seen such special effects and especially not such realism. Remember the context: We were deep into the Space Race with real space missions doing new things every few months. It was another decade before we saw such spectacular special effects again in Star Wars: A New Hope.
Money and politics killed NASA's future moon ambitions. It was insanely expensive, though compared to what our government spends these days it would be just a drop in the bucket. Realize: in 1962 when the Apollo Program was started, the US government only spent about 10% of it's budget on social programs...welfare, medical, food, etc.....now it's almost 70%. And nowadays NASA runs on a budget that is only less than 5% of what it used to get at the height of the Apollo program in the 1960's.
The idea that the monolith is somehow influencing HAL is kinda brilliant.
The long version was just has the opening black screen and music (and also same for intermission). This was to LET the audience have time to SIT DOWN before the actually movie starts in the theater I saw it 3 times in Cinarama (SUPER WIDE SCREEN) at least one of the times on ACID. (along with a fair amount of the audience)
Where did you see it in Cinerama? In particular, was it the Cinerama Dome on the Sunset Strip?
@@carlwilkerson9722 In Detroit Can't remember what the theater was called ..was modern /Dowtown ..Funning thing my mostly absent dad took me (i was 15) because i got caught smoking pot and he thought he should do more ,,,,, MY Acid trip viewings were in the months that followed
The opening music with the blank screen was a cue to the audience to find their seats.
It is also horizontal, like the monolith when Dave meets it at Jupiter. It shows you are about to have an unknown experience.
Maybe, however the curtain was probably closed, the house lights at half, and the projector light not on. I'd guess the house lights went down and the curtain parted just before Also Sprach Zarathustra. But maybe you're right. Maybe the audience filed in with the curtains open and a blank screen. I used "blank screen" referring to the DVD experience not the 1968 movie palace experience. My parents went first run in San Francisco, I must have had a sitter. Hmm, I saw it at the UC Theater in Berkeley in the early 80s. I don't recall the opening music being integral or .... but that was 40 years ago. If you see a connection between the blank screen and the monolith I'd listen to that argument.
@@floorticket From what I have read you are right about the curtain/projector. With the DVD I think the idea holds water. I also saw it several times on its initial release, but I don't remember the theatre having a curtain, not with that size of a screen.
It's classical music used as a score--- it existed before, independently of the movie.
Coincidence or not , the letters HAL are each one letter ahead of IBM , the main computer company at the time.
32:55 I don’t know about techno, but you can watch the 3rd act (Jupiter) synced up with the 23 minute Pink Floyd song Echoes (similar to the Wizard of Oz / Dark Side of the Moon thing).
You can search for instructions on when to press play on the movie and music or you can find already synced videos floating around online.
Hey! Ylva Really and enjoyed your 2001 Space Odyssy reaction video!. The Ending still give me goosebumps U rock 🤘🤘🤘 Always Ylva!!
I really like your thought about HAL being affected by the monolith. The story as I know it does not have that twist, but it would make sense if they had written it that way.
I watch all the reviews of this movie.
The music is old classic pieces; it was not written for the movie.
Clarke wrote the novelization and the sequel 2010, in which he explains HAL's actions.
Modern space suits also use colors. It is hard to see the face, so colors on the suit identify the occupant.
Not all music used in this movie is old. The music by Georgy Ligeri used in this movie were, at most, only 20 years old.
Please watch 2010.
My brains not smart enough for 2001. I enjoyed 2010 more.
this is my favorite movie of all time.
This is among my 3 favorite movies of all time. The other two sre Blade Runner and Apocalypse Now.
@@carlossaraiva8213 Apocalypse Now is in my top 10. I have still never seen Blade Runner. Strange since I like the director.
@@frankducky6130 Treat yourself, see it.
All the music existed before the movie, but some is now pretty strongly associated with the movie.
Don’t make it explicit, but it’s implied that since how knew about the mission and the humans didn’t that he might see his own survival is more important than the humans for the sake of the mission. Exactly what happened to him To make him go, psycho is clearly not fully explained in this movie
{Not shown: Seatback video displays on the surface to orbit shuttle. About 15 years before they actually existed.}
Tablets on the table about 40 years before they actually existed
Here's an explanation I recorded in 1968. Audio only. Black screen. th-cam.com/video/CpsEhCJioyg/w-d-xo.html
Of note; it took 3 episodes of The Expanse to express similar concepts of space travel 🤔😯🤣
A little bit of the Berlin Philharmonic there at the beginning. 🙂
The music is iconic and tied to the movie, but of course it's classical and would be familiar to classical music lovers in any case.
The opening is Thus Sprach Zarathrusta by Richard Strauss (inspired by Nietzsche), and the space music is The Blue Danube Waltz by Johann Strauss. The use of classical orchestral music here influenced George Lucas when he created Star Wars; John Williams' score is heavily influenced by The Planets by Holst.
The talk of every cocktail party in 1968, lol. So far ahead of its time, maybe the best sci fi movie ever. The sequel, 2010, isn't as good but it's worth a look. The discovery and use of tools was a major leap forward in our evolution and survival. This is the weirdest movie you've seen? Oh boy, you haven't even started. One word - "Eraserhead".
Or "Mulholland Drive"
The shape of the screen during the overture is important.
Ylva, 2001 is One of the Best/Greatest Sci-Fi Films and Films In General Of All Time.
Also, there has been an ongoing Conspiracy Theory regarding this film and of Stanley Kubrick himself. He had been accused of allegedly having produced much of the footage for Apollos 11 and 12’s Moon Landings.
Reminds me of that old joke we used to tell. Stanley Kubrick was unsatisfied with the video NASA gave him so he decided to film the lunar scenes on location instead.
Funny how Ylva with a few other responders think that the last image is of a giant baby. Well, it might be, but I always presumed that we are near the star child looking at the earth from a distance. That was my feeling when I saw it on its original release in Cinerama.
The monoliths show up when there is a quantum change in Humanity. i.e. we learn to use tools, then we begin long range space flight. The monoliths do not affect the change they are just there to witness the change.
A rough explanation of the ending. As Dave goes to the monolith he encounters the aliens. Stanley Kubrick didn't really know how to show that given the film technology of the time so that's why you get the weird visuals. Later we see Dave, but he is in a sort of aquarium constructed by the aliens using information from Daves mind, that is why it is a little off, because the aliens don't have the full context to recreate everything correctly. Dave then dies and is reborn as the next step in human evolution, the "Starchild".
My favorite film of all time. Thank you.
Humans were not the apex predator as you said, and the use of tools and intelligence enabled their dominance. After the humans started to use tools, the rapid and predictable development of non-human capabilities lead to AI. The buried monolith on the moon was meant to be found by humans, indicating a state of development that would need a further assist - HAL was indicative of the challenge to human dominance at that stage; the reason humans would need another assist.
Reading the novilation closes many gaps. If you notice the monolith on the moon activates the moment it was hit by the sunlight. Because the lunar day is 28 days long it had been in the dark since it was buried about 1M years prior. It was like a tripwire to signal the Jupiter Monolith (Saturn in the book) that it had been uncovered meaning as you said we had advanced enough to find it. It was all a trail of breadcrumbs left to see if we could follow it with the monoliths being the breadcrumbs and the guide to take us on the journey and see how far we can evolve. At the end of infinity Dave is merged with the monolith (basically a super computer) to make him and the monolith a non-corporeal being unconfined by space, time, and physics, or essentially a living AI hybrid.
Will you be 😱 next time you see a RED light or dot ? 😮😮😮
Yes WALL-E has a lot of references to this movie.
Not so much a film as an Experience, Yiva. And a thought-provoking one that stands up very well. I originally saw it over 50 years ago. 🙂 It still has the same impact on me now as it did then. Talk about "Ahead Of It's Time".
Please watch the sequel 2010, it's not an art piece like this movie, or slow, and it gives some answers about WTF is/was going on.
I appreciate your flag. My daughter would appreciate it as well.
This is one of those movies where you really need to read the book to get it. In the book, the 3 main characters have inner monologue. Moon Watcher (the homo erectus), Dr. Floyd and Commander David Bowman have some amount of thoughts that are communicated to the reader. The book is a chronicle of the journey of humanity from Ape man to infantile god. It is implied in the book that the monoliths are sent by ancient aliens to prod us along as we reach certain evolutionary milestones. Hate to nerd out on you…had to read it and watch it for a religious studies class at UNC-Chapel Hill.
The point of this movie is not to "get it" but to experiencing it.
No, Hal isn't affected by the monolith, he goes nuts because he's been told to keep the mission secret which goes against his core programming. When he asks Dave if he thinks their mission is connected to what happened on the moon he's throwing him a bone. When Dave doesn't bite he lies about the failure of the antenna to get rid of the crew as he sees them as a threat to the mission.
Hal represents AI advancing beyond humans, so the monolith advances Dave to the next stage of evolution so he isn't overtaken by AI.
The whole movie is a Freemasonic allegory (Arthur C Clarke and Cubrick were both high level freemasons.) The monolith represents the stone of foundation in freemasonry (the black cube in Masonic lodges, also seen in Judaism and Islam) which propels human intelligence for the initiated (Dave) through the 3 stages of enlightenment (note the three stages of human advancement occur with each encounter) while the unenlightened are left behind, in the case of the apes, to perish.
Are cats aware of the story going on on the screen?
I don't think I've ever seen cats stare at a monitor like dogs have done.
All cats were gods in Egypt long ago.
The only obvious comedy moment in this movie is about the use of a toilet in microgravity. It is a literal moment of toilet humour in such an otherwise very serious movie.
There was a series of monolith hoaxes the last couple years ;-)
Yay! Sundowners on the West Coast of South Africa. Cheers! 🌅🥃🇿🇦
Due hit of LSD and watch again. With the light on. 20’ screen
That's how I went to the theater in 1968 to watch it. Bought the record for the sound track and have been listening to classical music ever since.
Ummm, now that you've watched it, do you know what it's about? Mind sharing?
Lol, ok what I got from the book and movie both reading it and seeing it, and reading the short story that provided the basis (I've also read the sequels but as they are postfacto whether the original intent is being accurately depicted or is hindsight can be questioned). There was a race that originated in the early universe and evolved into a post material being, they wanted companionship. They seeded planets where they saw lifeforms that had potential with the original teaching monoliths. To monitor the progress they left sentinal monoliths (the moon's) to signal when and if a species had made their inial foray into the universe beyond their home planet. They also left another transport monolith (the Jupiter [Saturn in the book] one) to bring the "new" species to learn from the builders of the monoliths to become post material beings like them. Since he had just become a post material being, he was in that sense a "baby".
As far as the movie, what is amazing is those are ALL practical effects and they still look pretty damn good. The soundtrack is stellar, Richard Strauss. And the cinematography is breathtaking.
The 'Daisy' Song is a reference to this th-cam.com/video/yIwhx3NQSLg/w-d-xo.html , created by IBM in 1961.
Before you watch "2010" or read any of Arthur C Clarke's novels, invest a few minutes in this very worthy man-made epilogue to "2001," which doesn't fit in with them, but is really excellent:
th-cam.com/video/Ok9VZYcKjBs/w-d-xo.htmlsi=FHUBT1t6381yUlI9
Giant baby or baby much closer to the viewer than the earth? He wasn't giant when he's on the bed.
oh no...that flag...im out.
It was the flippant and irreverent attitude that got me. It all fits.
@jamesfrench7299 bingo.
0:06 You still won't know after it's finished.
9 years later...
"2010 The year we make contact " answers a lot of your questions about 2001. It's also a much more watchable movie.
The monolith is a movie screen.
I'd suggest watching a video essay on what the hell is going on lol. It doesn't take much, 10 minutes or so, and it all falls into place pretty easily.
My theory is that people did a lot of drugs in the sixties, and came up with these weird hazy ambitious half-baked ideas, which they tricked themselves and others into thinking were amazing high-concept art. To me 2001 is equal parts brilliant groundbreaking film-making way ahead of its time, and over-hyped unsatisfying pretentious nonsense. And that's kind of its charm.
lol, “is this this a door r just some lame monolith?”
Read the novels for explanation.
Why is everybody saying you should do this reaction naked while wearing a dunce cap?
Should have been a musical
Back in the day, movies had overtures which played as the audience took their seats. They also played music during the intermission. That is the black screen you are seeing.
The Monolith does not effect HAL. Dosen't fit the movie .... The monolith wants Humans to get there not the ship. Besides in 2010 (book and movie it explains that it is human programing error that cause HAL to become paranoid
This is more of an experience and less of a movie 🤔😯
yayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
You seem smart but I don't think you tried hard enough or took the movie seriously enough. The long overture music at the start is to allow people to take their seats in the cinema. Maybe if you tried again on a larger screen with fewer distractions?
😢😢😢😮
"It's a door. Knock knock. WHo's there? Door. Door who? Door-e-mi!
Forced evolution. 😊
“So the extra ten minutes are a black screen.” I love this film but that could be a review in itself. This is the one film that manages dramatic tedium, not tension, but tedium, right.
People often call the creatures at the beginning monkeys or apes, but they should probably best be referred to as proto-humans. This is the dawn of man, after all. I think Kubrick should have made the costumes just slightly more humanistic, maybe around the jaw and mouth.
LOL. Yes. Confustion ensues. IMO I feel it's very much an artfilm and not really a movie in an entertaining sense. I feel it all could have been editied down to about 45 minutes. But I hope you follow up on this and watch 2010: The Year We Make Contact. It's more of a straight up movie but will offer you some answers. Roy Schider and Helen Mirren are in it along with John Lithgow. This movie has a number of meme from it, like the lines "Open the pod bay doors, Hal" or more used "I'm afraid I can't do that, DAve" for a number of IT people.
In "2001" the aliens tell humans to go to Jupiter.
In "2010" the aliens tell humans to leave Jupiter and go back home.
"2010" is the worst, most pointless sequel ever made. It doesn't answer any questions, it simply makes hash out of the original film.
@@buffstraw2969 That's not what they said. They just said hands off this one world and stop being shit to each other. I appreciate 2001 for what it is, but find 2010 a lot more enjoyable.
@@artboymoy The aliens guided human evolution for 4 million years. When we uncovered a monolith on the Moon, it sent a powerful radio signal to Jupiter. We followed it there. Once we got there, we found out the aliens were no longer interested in us. In just 9 short years (2001 to 2010), the aliens inexplicably abandoned their 4 million year uplift program. We humans went from being their pet project to unwanted interlopers. What was their reason? Gods don't need a reason, I guess, they're just fickle. What a dumb movie.
@@artboymoy "They just said hands off this one world"
Right. "All these other worlds are yours." Worthless, uninhabitable balls of ice and rock. Thanks for nothing. Also, the aliens have turned Jupiter into a small sun, so that we can't have nighttime anymore. Sorry mankind, hope that doesn't interfere with your sleep patterns. Nighty-night.
@@artboymoy "I feel it [2001] is very much an artfilm and not really a movie in an entertaining sense."
I beg to differ. I was very much entertained by Kubrick's "artfilm." Isn't cinema an art form? Why does "art" get such a bad rap?
Lady you need to stop patting yourself on the back and acting like a big know-it-all when it comes to this movie. Throughout your viewing of it you seem utterly bored and turned off. Have you ever thought of raising rhinoceroses? You're hilarious 😆
What a rude comment. You alright over there?
@iamamaniaint she just appeared to me rather disinterested and bored. So that's why I mentioned raising rhinoceroses. No biggie here.
@@grosbeak6130 Oh I love this movie too, I get it.
It just seemed a bit mean spirited.
Also, it's had to find a good reaction to this film, because everyone has adhd now lol
@@iamamaniaint affirmative. And also where she time and again points out Dave's shortcomings, like I told you so. She seems like a nice enough gal though.
Unpopular Opinions! While 2001 is a fine experience its sequel 2010 is a better story. Also 2001 is vastly improved by completely skipping the Dawn of Man sequence.
Blasphemy!
Yes that is a bad opinion