2001: A Space Odyssey is an influential 1968 science fiction film directed by Stanley Kubrick. The story is based in part on various short stories by co-screenwriter Arthur C. Clarke, most notably "The Sentinel" (1951). Kubrick collaborated with Clarke, and together they first concurrently produced the novel version that was released alongside the film (which eventually grew into the so-called Space Odyssey series of books), and then towards the end Kubrick simultaneously wrote the screenplay. For an elaboration of their collaborative work on this project, see The Lost Worlds of 2001, Arthur C. Clarke, Signet., 1972.
The film is notable for combining episodes contrasting high levels of scientific and technical realism with transcendental mysticism. As Arthur C. Clarke wrote in 1972, "Quite early in the game I went around saying, not very loudly, 'MGM doesn't know this yet, but they're paying for the first $10,000,000 religious movie.'" This film won the Academy Award for visual effects in 1968.
Stanley Kubrick Collection (2001: A Space Odyssey / Dr. Strangelove / A Clockwork Orange / The Shining / Lolita / Barry Lyndon / Full Metal Jacket / Eyes Wide Shut)
Plot Description
In early conversations, director Stanley Kubrick and writer Arthur C. Clarke jokingly called their project How the Solar System Was Won, an allusion to the epic 1962 Cinerama film How the West Was Won, which presents a generation-spanning historical epic told in distinct episodes. Like How the West Was Won, 2001 is composed of distinct episodes. Three of the four major sections are introduced with the use of title cards: the lack of a title card between the first and second sections listed below has been seen by some to imply that Dr. Floyd's trip to the Moon and the discovery of TMA-1 merely continue the action of Moon Watcher's discovery of the monolith in the Dawn of Man sequences, without introducing a new phase in the development of humanity. The four sections are:
The Dawn of Man
Between 15 and 5 million years ago early ape men known as Australopithecus become endowed with their first intelligence after encountering a black monolith.
TMA-1 – (untitled on screen, set in 1999)
Four million years later, a similar monolith is discovered buried beneath the lunar surface.
Jupiter Mission, 18 Months Later (set in 2001)
The American spacecraft DISCOVERY 1 embarks on the first manned attempt to reach Jupiter.
Jupiter and Beyond the Infinite
An experience in another time and dimension.
In the background to the story in the book, an ancient and unseen alien race uses a mechanism with the appearance of a large black monolith to investigate worlds all across the galaxy and, if possible, to encourage the development of intelligent life. The film shows one such monolith appearing briefly in ancient Africa, four million B.C., where it influences a group of hominids to learn how to use weapons, the first tools.
The film then leaps millions of years to the year 1999 (via a startling, widely famous, and much-parodied graphic match) from a murder-weapon thigh bone, tossed high in the air by an ape-man, to an orbital weapons platform circling the Earth. The film then shows humans travelling to an orbiting space station and then on to Clavius base on the Moon to investigate a magnetic anomaly in the Tycho crater, dubbed TMA-1 (Tycho Magnetic Anomaly #1). When excavations there uncover a second monolith and expose it to sunlight, it emits a powerful signal aimed at Jupiter. As Kubrick told interviewer Joseph Gelmis, "you have a second artifact buried deep on the lunar surface and programmed to signal word of man's first baby steps into the universe—a kind of cosmic burglar alarm." The movie then focuses on a manned mission to Jupiter to investigate the signal's receiver, taking place eighteen months later in the year 2001.
The ship is manned by a crew of two astronauts, David Bowman and Frank Poole, and an on-board computer called HAL 9000, designed to function as an artificial intelligence, which sees through multiple distinctive fish-eye cameras located around the spacecraft and speaks with a warm, mannered human-like voice. The three scientists sent to investigate the signal's destination have been placed in suspended animation. The live crew—unlike Mission Control, HAL, and the sleeping scientists—are unaware of the discovery of the Tycho monolith or the nature of their mission.
On the outbound trip, after discussing apparent anomalies in the ship's mission with the ship's captain, David Bowman, HAL reports an unverifiable error in the ship's antenna control system. After the apparently malfunctioning unit is retrieved it is found to be without error suggesting that the fault lies with the onboard HAL 9000.
An earth-based HAL 9000 also disagreed with the onboard HAL 9000's conclusion meaning that one (or both) could be in error. Bowman and Poole discuss the possibility that HAL might be malfunctioning and should therefore have his higher mental functions disabled. Despite the fact that Poole and Bowman take special precautions to discuss HAL's fate in a sealed pod where HAL can not hear them, HAL is able to read their lips through the pod window and discovers their plans. Realizing the threat of disconnection from the crew members, coupled with the contradictions in his mission plans and directives, HAL decides to eliminate all the humans on board. Kubrick explained, "In the specific case of HAL, he had an acute emotional crisis because he could not accept evidence of his own fallibility... Such a machine could eventually become as incomprehensible as a human being, and could, of course, have a nervous breakdown— as HAL did in the film."
To this end, HAL first kills Frank Poole by teleoperating a space-pod whilst Poole is on extra-vehicular activity to replace the communications unit. While Bowman attempts to recover Poole's body, HAL kills the hibernating crew by shutting down their life support systems and then refuses to allow Bowman back into the ship.
These events gave rise to the catch phrases "Open the pod bay doors, please, HAL" and "I'm sorry, Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that", when Bowman requests that HAL open the ship.
Bowman manages to outwit HAL and regains entry to the ship, and proceeds to shut down HAL's mental faculties one by one. HAL's gradual shutdown triggers an incremental regression into his 'childhood': he plaintively informs Bowman that he can feel his mind 'going', and, eventually, he is reduced to singing the music hall song Daisy Bell, which he was taught by his instructor, Doctor Langley. (Dr. Chandra in the novelization of 2001 and in the novel and film versions of 2010; "Dr. Sivasubramian Chandrasegampilali" in full, per the novel 2010: Odyssey Two.)
HAL´s disconnection triggers a pre-recorded video informing Bowman of the truth about the mission. Months later, he proceeds to complete it in one of the most memorable film conclusions ever. In a special-effects-laden sequence he travels through a stargate and arrives in what appears to be a hotel room.
Kubrick explained, "When the surviving astronaut, Bowman, ultimately reaches Jupiter, this artifact sweeps him into a force field or star gate that hurls him on a journey through inner and outer space and finally transports him to another part of the galaxy, where he's placed in a human zoo approximating a hospital terrestrial environment drawn out of his own dreams and imagination. In a timeless state, his life passes from middle age to senescence to death."
The creators are never seen directly: Bowman arrives in the hotel room, which has since become a science fiction cliché for situations where a vastly powerful being must construct a benign environment for a human. He undergoes a transcendence, ending the story as a "star child" with some of the godlike powers of the monolith creators. According to Kubrick, "He is reborn, an enhanced being, a star child, an angel, a superman, if you like, and returns to earth prepared for the next leap forward of man's evolutionary destiny."
However, many interpret the imagery towards the end of the film as ambiguous and metaphoric, ignoring the literal account in Clarke's novelization. [top]
Critics' Opinions
Upon release, 2001 received mostly positive reviews, and quickly gained a cult following (its psychedelic visual imagery was quickly embraced by the counterculture). Roger Ebert gave the film four stars in his original review, believing the film "succeeds magnificently on a cosmic scale" [1] Yet the movie also had its detractors. Critic Pauline Kael said it was "a monumentally unimaginative movie"[2], and Stanley Kauffmann of The New Republic called it "a film that is so dull, it even dulls our interest in the technical ingenuity for the sake of which Kubrick has allowed it to become dull"[3].
2001 earned one Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. It was nominated for Best Art Direction, Best Director (Kubrick), and Original Screenplay (Kubrick, Clarke). The film was not nominated, however, for Costume Design, despite the fact that Planet of the Apes did receive a nomination for its ape suits, which are generally considered less convincing than those in 2001. 2001: A Space Odyssey is consistently on the Internet Movie Database's list of top 250 films, was number 22 on AFI's 100 Years, 100 Movies, number 40 on its 100 Years, 100 Thrills included on its 100 Years, 100 Quotes ("Open the pod bay doors, HAL."), and been deemed "culturally significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry. [top]
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