I last saw 2001: A Space Odyssey the best part of 20 years ago. Back then I wasn't anywhere near as into film and cinema-as-art as I am nowadays, but even then I was aware that I was watching a masterpiece. It's a film about big concepts, like the evolution of mankind and the emergence of new forms of life. It's about concepts that are meant to be barely comprehensible by our mortal minds, all bound up in the presence of the brutally alien monolith, the true intentions of which remain unknown throughout the film and remain open to interpretation. Its mysteriousness rams home the idea that the next step in human evolution will be as incomprehensible to us as a space station is to a pre-humanoid ape holding a bone.
Everything in the film is based on a scientific grounding, and like most of Arthur C Clarke's work - it's less about the characters, and all about the concepts. In fact, the film's most memorable character is a computer - the HAL9000 computer who tries to kill the crew of the ship when he realises that they plan to disconnect him. This is the one plot point of the film that makes no sense, HAL makes one small mistake and the crew decide the solution is disconnection. If we all decided to throw our machines away when they made one mistake, we would need a lot more computers. Anyway, the point is about evolution as a concept, conflict between competing groups for survival, and when a new intelligence emerges, there is necessarily a conflict to see who remains on top.
Some may criticise its lack of pace, its overly long use of shots of ships flying around, the barmy 5 minutes of flashing colours that represent Dave Bowman's journey through the infinite, the simple characterisation or a multitude of other things. But this film is one of the purest hard science fiction experiences ever committed to celluloid. The film's use of classical music keeps the tempo up during what might have turned into tedious sequences of space flight. Kubrick's intention here is to demonstrate how far humanity has come, to make us marvel at that the things we have come to take for granted. It's a film that has a stark aesthetic too, the sets are flawlessly designed and colours are used contrastingly to make everything feel disconnected and confusing. It helps us feel even more uneasy about the presence of the monolith and what it represents.
To some, the last 10 minutes are too confounding to be anything other than a boring mess. There is hopefully a majority out there who understand what Kubrick was trying to do, but think he took it too far into the world of the abstract. For me though, this sequence stands out in science fiction cinema as a perfect way to end. The monolith appears in the film at the start to usher in a new age of humanity, and then again at the end to do the same. We as post-modern Homo Sapiens cannot comprehend the confusion of the pre-human apes who see the monolith for the first time and are inspired to use tools. Perhaps our confusion as we follow Dave Bowman though his accelerated lifespan is as close as we can get to theirs. Kubrick's use of cuts to show us Dave's ageing and his own disorientation at the passing of time is flawless. The film ends on Dave Bowman being reborn as a child and returned to look over earth from a protective bubble. Interpret this as you will. Have the aliens delivered us a god? Has humanity evolved again as it did when our ancestors picked up the first bone and wielded it as a club? Is future conflict inevitable in the future as it was in the past?
To be honest, I probably would have paid my £10 just to experience this on the big screen with surround sound. 2001: A Space Odyssey is a landmark in the history of science fiction in film. It's a film that changed cinema, and I am very glad to have finally seen it on the big screen.
I appreciate that I am showing my age, when I reveal that I first saw 2001 at the cinema back in the early 1970's. Around that time I also read the book, plus Arthur C Clarke's novel: The Sentinal.
ReplyDelete2001 is a genuine masterpiece. It made me think about my own place in the universe and, humanity.
It is an evocative film, the like of which is rare.
I also read ( and watched the film) 2010; certainly worth a look. But 2001 is untouchable, a cinematic masterpiece.
Every time I watch it I reconsider my first conclusions. Did I miss something? Did I get it wrong about Hal? Just what does that black monolith represent?
On a personal level the black monolith did, and still does represent those religious texts that have so corrupted and stifled humanity's development. If I was Kubrick, that is what I would have intended!
I'm not sure I agree that the monolith has a religious context. To me, it simply represents something utterly unknowable. The beings who created it are so far outside of our comprehension that the only way they can be understood to us is via the simplest of mechanisms - i.e. a single geometric shape in monochrome matt black.
ReplyDeleteFor me, the point of HAL is that he represents the evolution of a new form of life. It's interesting that in the scenes between HAL and the crew, the humans seem lifeless and robotic, whereas HAL has deeply human qualities, fearful for his life and tearfully singing a song as he dies. The emergence of HAL represents that evolution implies conflict - in the same way that the apes at the start of the film evolve through conflict. What if HAL had successfully killed the crew, then can we assume that would HAL would have arrived at the monolith on Jupiter? Perhaps the monolith would have recognised HAL as the natural evolution of life from earth and elevated him as the star child?