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Stanley Kubrick masterfully employed sparseness in his sci-fi film, “2001: A Space Odyssey,” which shows the true brilliance of the piece. The artist in question shows remarkable self-confidence; never does he include a shot just to grab our attention. He allows himself to look at each shot as an essence and allows it to linger for long enough for us to engage with it in our imagination. With “2001,” the audience is not thrilled with the movie unlike most sci-fi movies, but rather inspired by its grandeur.
Alongside the visuals of the film, the music also has profound effects on the thoughts of the listeners. Even though Kubrick hired Alex North to compose an original score, North’s classical recordings are what the audience received. This was a crucial decision that North himself was always wrong for. His score which is available for recording does a good job of elevating the film and successfully setting the intended mood. However, it would have been inappropriate for “2001,” because, as with all scores, he tried to emphasize the action and provide emotional cues. The classical music selected by Kubrick separates itself from the action. It adores the pillars; it craves to be triumphant and, in turn, brings a serious feeling and transcendence to the visuals.
Take two examples. The Johann Strauss Waltz, “The Blue Danube”, that accompanies the docking of the space shuttle and the space station is choreographed to be slow. So is the action. The docking procedure is indeed one that has to be executed with a great deal of care (which we now know from experience), but some other directors might have thought the space ballet too slow, and added some thrilling music to it. That would have been wrong.
In this case, the task allocated to us is to reflect on the process, to remain in space and contemplate. We are used to the music. Indeed, it carries out the course. So, through some bizarre logic, the movement of the spacecraft is executed at a slow pace because it matches the tempo of the waltz. At the same time, the music has an exaltation on top that allows us to feel the majesty of the process.
Now think of Kubrick’s famous use of Richard Strauss “Thus Spake Zarathustra.” It is powerful, and more than a bit eerie, and offers in the five bold opening notes startling life its inspiration in the words of Nietzsche for so many men. So many of the boldest heights reserved only for the gods is the wonderfully terrifying promise of the five opening notes. It is most certainly an awe inspiring piece.
This is another mesmerizing story that has been told to us through the usage of the classical music. The film commences with the dawn of human awareness and concludes with the emergence of a child among the stars. When classical music is used with pop art, it, more often than not, is a mockery at best. We all know the “William Tell Overture,” but how many people actually listen to it without picturing the iconic figure of “the Lone Ranger.” The film ‘2001’ stands out among films for the reason that they use music in a completely different context than is traditionally accepted.
In 1968, I went to the premiere of the film at Pantages Theater in Los Angeles. I don’t think I am able to explain how anxious the crowd was. We all knew Kubrick had been working on editing it and that he had been collaborating with famous authors and special effects experts like Douglas Trumbull Arthur C. Clarke. Clarke had even helped him with the details of the imaginary future he was trying to depict in the film, like the design of space stations, logos, and corporations. Even the editing was quite the journey; he sailed on the Queen Elizabeth ship to England and continued to make changes during a train ride. Now, it was finally ready for viewing.
It would be incorrect to say that the first screening was a disaster because many of those who stayed until the end were certain that they had just witnessed one of the best films ever created. Unfortunately, a lot of people chose to leave early. Rock Hudson stormed down the aisle saying “Will someone tell me what the hell this is about?”. Along with him, there were numerous other people leaving, and a few people in the crowd seemed agitated due to the slow pace of the film (This is why Kubrick had to get rid of 17 minutes worth of pods and sequences that were too repetitive.)
The story of the film was neither clear nor did it entertain the viewers in any way, which left a lot to be desired. The closing parts where the astronaut’s character leaps into a bedroom somewhere beyond Jupiter was even more puzzling. In the morning, the word in Hollywood was that Kubrick had gone off the rails; that was his obsession with effects and set pieces, he did not make a movie.
In actuality, he had made the statement about the place of a man in universe using pictures instead of words, music or even prayer. He made that statement in a way that allows pondering, and not through experiencing entertainment, which is generally the case in science fiction films. Instead of experiencing it the way a good science fiction film does, he tried to make us consider it the way a philosopher would.
The film unfolds in several parts. In the first part, we see prehistoric apes learning that bones can be used as tools to combat a mysterious black monolith. The monolith triggers them to start using their intelligence. I have long believed that the surface and the right angles of the monolith, indicating that it was made by an intelligent being, taught the apes that it is possible to utilize the surrounding world to shape the objects within it.
The bone is thrown into the air and subsequently vanishes, transitioning (this has been referred to as the longest flash-forward in the history of the cinema) into a space shuttle. Now, Dr. Heywood Floyd (William Sylvester) appears as he heads towards the moon and a space station. This section is deliberately anti-narrative; characters do not speak engagingly through dialogue to his mission. Rather, we are shown the minutiae of the flight: cabin design, in-flight service decor, and the effects of zero gravity.
Then comes the docking sequence, with its dance, and for a short while, even the most restless in the audience are quieted, I presume, by the pure amazement of the visuals. We see onboard brand names we know, take part in an obscure conference of scientists from a few nations, and observe such novelties as videophones and even a zero-gravity toilet.
The sequence on the moon, which looks as real as the actual tape of the moon landing a year later, is a rehash of the film’s opening sequence. A man is faced with a monolith, just as the apes were, and is compelled to reach the same conclusion: This is an artifact. And just like the first monolith led on to the discovery of tools, this second one leads on to the use of man’s most sophisticated tool: The spaceship Discovery, which Mars, in cooperation with the artificial intelligence of the onboard computer, affectionately called HAL 9000.
Life on the Discovery is treated like a long, dull cycle of exercise, maintenance tasks, and chess with HAL. A bit of tension arises when the astronauts dread that HAL’s programming has gone awry. Somehow, their challenge is to outsmart HAL, who has been programmed to think: “This mission is so vital that I cannot let you put it in danger.” Their struggle leads to one of great shots in cinema as the men try to have a private conversation in a space pod while HAL lip reads. The way in which Kubrick edits this scene so that we can understand what HAL is doing is impressive in its restraint, he makes it clear without forcing the issue. He does not impose but instead trusts our intelligence.
The renowned “star gate” part of the film follows. It is a light and sound journey taken by astronaut Dave Bowman (Keir Dullea) where he travels through seemingly what is a wormhole. At the end of the journey, he is trapped in a comfortable bedroom suite where he grows older, eats quietly, naps, and lives the life of a zoo animal. And then, the Star Child.
Much like with the monoliths, there is never any explanation for the other race that presumably left behind the gates and the bedroom. “2001” myths suggest that Kubrick and Clarke tired and failed to produce convincing aliens. This is just as well. The alien race is, through a more poignant reflection, brought to existence through the negative – the method of portraying a void. Such an obscured portrayal allows us to react more strongly than what is possible to any actual depiction.
In a range of ways, the film “2001: A Space Odyssey” feels like a silent movie. Very few conversations take place that could not simply be allocated through title cards. Much of the dialogue exists only to show people talking to one another, without much regard to content, such as at the conference on the space station. Ironically, the most passionate speech is the one issued by HAL, while HAL sings : “Daisy” and begs for his “life.”
The film conveys its effects mainly through visuals and music. It is a kind of lucid daydream. It does not pamper us, but rather aims at inspiring and enlarging us. Close to thirty years after its making, it has not dated in any significant detail. Even though special effects have become more sophisticated in the computer age, Trumbull’s work continues to impress, perhaps because it is more convincing than more sophisticated effects in later movies… because it is more believable, more like footage from a documentary than elements of a film.
Here are a selected few films that delve much deeper like music or magic do to our minds and imaginations. The rest of the movies are usually about people having some goal in mind, they go through some struggles, be it comical or dramatic, and then they reach it. Unlike other films, “2001: A Space Odyssey” does not focus on achieving a particular goal. Instead, the movie revolves around a person’s quest and necessity. Its impact is not reliant on particular plot points and unlike many films, there is no requirement to relate to any character, for example, Dave Bowman. The movie conveys a clear message: we became men when we learned how to think. Our intelligence has enabled us to comprehend our surroundings and existence. The time has now come for us to grasp that our surroundings are not solely limited to a planet; instead, we live among the stars and our existence is not defined by flesh, but by pure intelligence.
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