2001: A Space Odyssey (1 Viewer)

[Gary Tooze]

Unfortunately I have something to add regarding Bill's question having just watched my new gorgeous 2001 DVD as soon as I got home.

I realize that the 'room' is just an artifice conjured up by the higher beings in order to make Bowman feel 'at home' while he awaits his evolution, but why Victorian?

The room was actually a mix of antiques, but more heavily influenced by Louis XIV style, but one might ask, "Why any "esthetically normal" room at all ?" or simply "Why not ?".
I think you are correct in that the room may be considered an observation "cage" for Bowman to further evolve. It would then be something for his comfort, from his memory, as he appears to prematurely age in front of us. I don't think it is at all necessary to question that particular styling, as it is really a metaphor for the inner workings of his own mind. It is allegorical to his situation in which the process and end product of his stay in the room is more important than the type of wall coverings and furnishings. It did look comfortable to me ! It had a prestine affluence to it.. perhaps Bowman felt this would be how he would like to spend the end stages of his life ?
It did however greatly remind me of the "sanitized" appearance of the court martial room in "Paths of Glory"... very much.
P.S. This DVD is great and has immediately moved into my lengthy list of Recommended Purchases.
Bill I have sent you a private email.
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[Ben Motley]

Bill; Maybe Victorian was a style that Dave had a fondness for, and so perhaps his psyche provided the information for the alien inteligence to play upon. Just a quick theory.
Joe; That Simpsons bit had to have been funny, and I'd like to play that game!
Al; Woof! Where the hell did you find that?? I must say, it was very in depth and well thought out. I must say I agree with most all of it. I would like to add to the following thought though...
"And the first sign of life we see? A sign of death: the sun-bleached skull of a long-dead creature, which is followed by a shot of an array of bones that are recognizably similar to human remains. I'm sure this is deliberate, and a reflection of Kubrick's knack for understanding how we receive and interpret information, as well as his wicked sense of humor. In two quick shots, we understand that this land is indeed populated, because where there is death, there is life. And by implication via his focus on remains, we're able to conclude that this life is a rather harsh one. It's such an inspired choice!"
Could this imagery also not represent the death of mankind as it was known up to that point? Can the skull, and the other bones subsequent to the first shot, not signal the end of what has been? I don't think it is so much an implication that life here is harsh, rather than that life as it was known has ended.
Another thought... The apes saw the cheetah kill, and eat it's kill. Was this the impetus of the apes intellectual growth, and not the presence of the monolith? Could the monolith have arrived because the alien force realized that the apes intellect had been awoken, and sent the monolith to observe, rather than influence?
I have always thought that the monoliths showed up at times of revolutionary human growth to observe, rather than showing up and causing that growth. Until now, I never conciously thought about the kill preceeding the appearance of the monolith, but now, at least in my mind, I realize some proof to my theory.
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M. Hyde

 

[Peter Kline]

If I remember correctly, in the original short story "The Sentinel" or in the novelization of the film, Bowman actually gets younger and younger while in the room, not older as in the film. This would be more consistent with him turning into Jack Briggs, er, I mean the star baby.
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[Ben Motley]

Get it right Peter, Dave is reborn as "The Starchild" a.k.a. Bootsey Collins!!!

He becomes a new millenium Funkateer!

(And if ANYBODY here knows what I'm talkin' about, I will be surprised

, so don't think you're missing anything

)
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M. Hyde

 

[Bill McA]

Guys, I realize that the stylings of the 'room' predate the Victorian era, but not being very knowledgeable about architecture, it was the only word that I could come with

The theories given above concerning the 'room' are all perfectly valid and plausible, however, they remain entirely speculation.
Unlike the other mysteries of 2001, there is nothing in the actual film that will verify or refute these theories.
To me, this is a minor irritant (because I don't know the answer) in a perfect film that is completely self-explanatory through simple observation.
quote: I have always thought that the monoliths showed up at times of revolutionary human growth to observe, rather than showing up and causing that growth.[/quote]
Actually, I believe it's a bit of both. At this point in the film, the apes are just like all the other creatures on the planet...purely instinctive. That night, this soon-to-be extinct band of vegetarian, non-aggressive apes sleeps in hunger.
One ape (listed as 'Moonwatcher' in the credits) does something amazing...he looks up and observes the moon!
This is the revolutionary act that the higher beings have been looking for.
Since the apes cannot touch, smell or eat the moon, looking and thinking about the moon is abstract thinking, an indication of intelligence that is not displayed by other purely instinctive creatures.
Since Moonwatcher cannot properly feed and defend itself, a monolith makes its appearance to provide Moonwatcher the minimum 'nudge' that he needs, to prevent his death from starvation.
Not necessarily causing growth, but protecting a spark of intelligence from extinction.
Of course, Moonwatcher then becomes more assertive, carnivorous, creates his first tool and gains the upper hand against the more primitive second group of apes (ancestors of modern primates).
The monoliths aren't there simply to observe, but to nurture and impart information to intelligent life, when that life faces extinction.
At least, that's the way I see it!
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[Ben Motley]

"Of course, Moonwatcher then becomes more assertive, carnivorous, creates his first tool and gains the upper hand against the more primitive second group of apes (ancestors of modern primates)."
And thus bar-b-que is discovered!! Hooray!!!

Oh certainly, I think the monoliths presence piques the curiosity of the apes, but I look at is as more a by-product of it's presence, and not it's purpose. Not disagreeing, just contemplating.
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M. Hyde

 

[Rob Gillespie]

In the book there is a lot more exposition give on the apes' relationship with the cheetah. Personally I don't think it comes across that clearly in the film.
The cheetah is a creature for which the apes harbour an unprecedented fear. It takes many of the tribe and they are constantly hiding from it.
When Moonwatcher finds that bones make a handy weapon, several of the tribe attack the cheetah and kill it. Now they are at the top of the food chain.
Also the monolith in the book gives the apes (or at least Moonwatcher) visions of a more comfortable existence where they don't live in fear and are not constantly scavaging for scraps of food (I seem to remember one passage referring to Moonwatcher's stomach being padded with fat instead of thin). It is the visions that kick the curiosity.
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"One does not simply walk into Mordor."
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[Brian Harnish]

Wow. I'm amazed at how deep a film that 2001 is (never realized it would spark so much discussion until I read these forums). I'll rewatch it again this weekend (if I get the time) and will post my own comments regarding it here.
- Brian

 

[Rich Malloy]

quote: I have always thought that the monoliths showed up at times of revolutionary human growth to observe, rather than showing up and causing that growth.[/quote]
Imagine living in a world where the only things are of a natural origin. Suddenly, an object appears right in the middle of your living space. It is different somehow, quite unlike anything else you've ever seen. It is a single color of deepest black, nearly a void. It consists of perfect right angles. It seems constructed. It is, essentially, a mathematical construct. Constructed by an intelligence. An intelligence that has planted it right beneath your nose without your awareness. When you approach it, it reflects your own image. When you touch it, it is cold and smooth, unlike anything you've ever touched. You don't understand it, but you know it is a discovery unlike anything you've ever discovered before. But it doesn't seem to want to hurt you. It doesn't seem threatening. So you begin to think about it, to ponder its existence, to question why it has appeared here in the very midst of your tribe's living place.
You have begun to reflect on yourself and your environment in a way that you never have before. Your curiosity is piqued. Your imagination is engaged. Your mind begins to work in ways it never did before. Suddenly, even the simplest objects take on new meanings. You begin to look at everything in a new way... even the moon beckons to you.
Maybe it was always in you, this capacity to learn and grow; but perhaps it is triggered now by the sudden, inexplicable appearance of this object. An object that seems to have been fashioned by an intelligence beyond your own and deliberately placed where you couldn't help but find it.
You don't sleep that night. Not from fear of predators, but simply because you wish to contemplate the moon.

 

[Jay Taylor]

Some of you may find this interview with Kubrick interesting from a previous thread on 2001. It was found by Jack Briggs somewhere on the Internet & I found it so interesting that I saved it.
quote: Why does 2001 seem so affirmative and religious a film? What has happened to the tough, disillusioned, cynical director of The Killing, Spartacus, Paths of Glory, and Lolita, and the sardonic black humorist of Dr. Strangelove?
Kubrick: The God concept is at the heart of this film. It's unavoidable that it would be, once you believe that the universe is seething with advanced forms of intelligent life. Just think about it for a moment. There are a hundred billion stars in the galaxy and a hundred billion galaxies in the visible universe. Each star is a sun, like our own, probably with planets around them. The evolution of life, it is widely believed, comes as an inevitable consequence of a certain amount of time on a planet in a stable orbit which is not too hot or too cold. First comes chemical evolution -- chance rearrangements of basic matter, then biological evolution.
Think of the kind of life that may have evolved on those planets over the millennia, and think, too, what relatively giant technological strides man has made on earth in the six thousand years of his recorded civilization -- a period that is less than a single grain of sand in the cosmic hourglass.
At a time when man's distant evolutionary ancestors were just crawling out of the primordial ooze, there must have been civilizations in the universe sending out their starships to explore the farthest reaches of the cosmos and conquering all the secrets of nature. Such cosmic intelligences, growing in knowledge over the aeons, would be as far removed from man as we are from the ants. They could be in instantaneous telepathic communication throughout the universe; they might have achieved total mastery over matter so that they can telekinetically transport themselves instantly across billions of light years of space; in their ultimate form they might shed the corporeal shell entirely and exist as a disembodied immortal consciousness throughout the universe.
Once you begin discussing such possibilities, you realize that the religious implications are inevitable, because all the essential attributes of such extraterrestrial intelligences are the attributes we give to God. What we're really dealing with here is, in fact, a scientific definition of God. And if these beings of pure intelligence ever did intervene in the affairs of man, so far removed would their powers be from our own understanding.
How would a sentient ant view the foot that crushes his anthill -- as the action of another being on a higher evolutionary scale than itself? Or as the divinely terrible intercession of God?
[/quote]
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"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Arthur C. Clarke

 

[Jack Briggs]

I've been away from HTF since Friday, and, of course, a 2001 discussion gets started in my absence. But I see you fellas are doing nicely without me. A fifth wheel, I am.
One thing, though: Isn't it amazing the emotions this film engenders to this day, some thirty-three years after its release? I was there when the arguments began back in 1968. The tenor and intensity of the discussions since remain much the same.
To you 2001 freshmen and other newbies: Do not go into this expecting conventional cinema. As Roger Ebert has noted many a time, 2001 is very much an experimental film. But everything one needs to "understand" it is contained within the film.
We have this discussion about four times a year here at HTF. Always fun--and always frustrating. Specifically: Remember that not liking a film doesn't make the film less than good. It may be a masterpiece that you simply don't cotton to. And 2001 is undeniably among cinema's greatest achievements.
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[Peter Kline]

You'd think by now they would have finished construction on the damn thing!

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingcr1.htm

 

[Ben Motley]

Al, I'm not questioning the fact that the monolith instilled a great force upon Moonwatcher and his buds. What I am questioning is the alien intelligences original intentions for sending the monolith. Is their original intent and the monoliths original purpose to nudge the species, or just to observe? I do not think that that is specified in the movie. Keep pointing out the sequences and their implications, they make perfect sense, but we still do not know the original intent of the alien intelligence. Are they following Captain Kirk and the Federation's Prime Directive, or are they mentoring us? I don't believe the answer to that is established in the movie. Sorry.
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M. Hyde

 

[Rich Malloy]

I gotcha, Ben!
And that's certainly a valid interpretation. You make a good point that the second monolith that was found seems nothing more than a beacon - something left behind to monitor the progess of the species and point us toward our next rendezvous.
But I don't think that quite explains the first appearance, though I like your suggestion that the simple act of Moonwatcher's regarding the moon (perhaps in a way that expanded and rearranged his sense of the universe and his place in it) somehow 'called' the monolith - that was your suggestion, right?
It's almost a theological question (a slight stretch here, I admit): have we been left to evolve on our own (deism, essentially), or is there the guiding hand of a creator/overseer personally involved in our development (theism, more or less)?

 

[Ben Motley]

Unfortuneately Al, I cannot lay claim to the observation about Moonwatcher discovering the moon, and I'm too lazy to go back and find just whose obsevarion it was. However I think it is a very valid point. My question is did he notice the moon after the appearance of the monolith? It's my assumption that he did, but I can't remember that particular sequence of events. Was it the segue cut to the future when Moonwatcher looked up? If so, then that certainly explains the edit. I always liked the segue, but the idea that it represented the birth of the apes abstract awareness, hence evolution, never occurred to me. Very cool indeed.
Also, you bring up theology. Well, let's not piss anybody off, but why can't the monoliths represent God, or godly beings otherwise? Are Kubrick's monoliths actually there, in all there rectangular, 3-D physical reality, or are they just symbolic manifestations of miraculous events?
And let's take it a step further, and further humanize the events in 2001. Could the monoliths be nothing more than sybolic representations of man's own individual, independant psychological milestones? The room, the furniture, the acid trip lights; all just in Daves head. No God, no alien, just strict by the book evolution and psychology. Excuse me a moment while I slip into my flamesuit.

So, I see three plausible theories for the relationship presented in 2001...
Man and Alien (widely accepted)
Man and God (haven't even heard anyone else mention that before)
Man and Man's own psyche (I don't expect to make any friends with this one!

)
I think arguments could be made in each scenario, but I know that the popular concensus will most likely always go with the Man and Alien scenario.
Man, I sure feel like I should be reading Plato and Socrates after all this

!!
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M. Hyde

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

And as I have stated before, I think Kubrick was on the deist track and Clarke was on the theist track. Since it's Kubrick's film, not Clarke's, Kubrick wins. Clarke joins a long distinguised group of authors who are upset by what Kubrick did with "their" material.
Clarke may have viewed the monolith as a phone booth for ET to call home, but I don't think that's what Kubrick took from it. I think Kubrick intended the monolith to be a symbolic representation of the "unknown". Man evolves by banging his head against the unknown.
Kubrick wanted to show man evolving by his own true grit, not by being spoon-fed by outsiders. This is similar to the Zoroastrian feeling towards the flame - the symbol of enlightenment. Isn't there something about that in the film????
When the monolith appears, we hear the music "Thus spake Zarathustra" - the prophet of Zoroastrianism. I doubt that Kubrick picked this music at random out of 2000 years of classical music.

 

[Bill McA]

Is their original intent and the monoliths original
purpose to nudge the species, or just to observe? I do not think that that is specified in the movie. Keep pointing out the sequences and their implications, they make perfect sense, but we still do not know the original intent of the alien intelligence.

If the monoliths are simply there to observe, why then do they NOT observe the cheetah, the pigs or the rival ape tribe?
From what we can see in the film, the cats are at the top of the food chain, the most successful of all the creatures. Would that not make them more worthy of observation, rather than Moonwatcher and his dying tribe?
Why not observe the more agressive rival tribe of apes?
What are the monoliths 'observing' by watching a dying tribe?
If they are there simply to observe, why do they make themselves so conspicuously visible?
They are there not to observe, but to be observed!
It's simple logic!
Yes, the scene directly before the discovery of the first monolith is that of Moonwatcher looking at the moon, just as the tribe goes to sleep. This is the abstract thought that directly triggers the monoliths appearance and that is also why the monolith does not present itself to the other creatures (BTW - that was my idea, thanks!)
That is why the monolith is on the moon and not some other planet, the monolith is on the moon as a direct result of Moonwatcher's spark of intelligence.
"You're thinking of the moon...great, we'll check back when you get there. In the meantime, here's a little help!"
To me, the monoliths are simply tools of the higher beings, after all, one of them is buried beneath the moon's surface for millions of years simply to act as a beacon!
The first monolith functions as a how-to book, the third and fourth function as gateways to an existence outside of our own.

 

[Seth Paxton]

Look, Clarke and he worked together on it, BUT the film was still Kubrick's vision of what the 2 had worked on rather than some film version of what Clarke had cooked up.
If you can view the Criterion LD of 2001, you can read through the VERY EXTENSIVE notes that Clarke took during their sessions. From those you can see that the story had all sorts of potential directions along the way and was being invented along the way far more than it was simple expanding on "The Sentinal".
2nd, if you have not read Also Spach Zarathustra then you haven't seen 2001 completely yet, IMHO. There is a reason that Kubrick chose that music composition inspired by Nietzsche's work (that famous Dummmm...Dummmm...Dummmm...De-Dum), and that is that much of the film is influenced by that book. In fact I would say at this point that the film wanders very close to being an artistic interpretation of not only that book, but several other bits of Nietzsche's work.
The whole concept of ape to man to overman, each stage being a major evolution. The idea of time being a ring and coming back on yourself, which is apparently what Bowman experiences at the end where he sees himself at all points of existence at once, that all time exists at the same time. Straight out of Nietzsche. His awareness of this existance is part of becoming the overman, the star child. The obilisk is the device of evolution from ape to man to overman.
I found my familiarity with 2001 very helpful when I first studied FN. BTW, besides Zarathustra it would be good to read The Gay Science and Beyond Good and Evil.
(edit this in here) - speaking of the God concepts in the film, keep in mind that Nietzsche's Will to Power philosophy embraced atheism and expressed "God is dead". That is while maintaining the concept of endless time and the evolution to the overman. FN wanted mankind to focus on itself and it's time on Earth rather than the escapism of religious philosophies.
So while we may think it's all about Man and God, I would suggest that Kubrick is following FN's philosophies much closer than that in which there is no God, but rather nature itself. The monolith can been seen as NATURE's device for the evolution of man, rather than an agent of aliens or God. Keep in mind that we can't mix in Clarke's follow-up philosophies with what Kubrick first put on film, so there is no guarantee that aliens are involved, no hint in the film as to such a thing.
Dennis,

I think Kubrick intended the monolith to be a symbolic representation of the "unknown". Man evolves by banging his head against the unknown.

I 100% agree on this one.

 

[Seth Paxton]

And Ben, does that make HAL the Mothership Connection?

"Flashlight"
Oh, also regarding the Victorian style. I've always taken that to be Kubrick's personal taste for the room, not a literal usage. With the point being for it to provide a human, yet stoic environment. Thus the spartan treatment on the room decorations too.
I mean it's key to consider the artist when thinking about the art. If the artist wants to convey a feeling, he will show something that he thinks gives that feeling, and that choice will usually be made based on what images give himself that feeling. So anytime a film drifts from a strongly literal stream of images you will start to see things/scenes that are more closely tied to and telling about the artist than with the film's literal story.

 

[Seth Paxton]

You'd think by now they would have finished construction on the damn thing!

Blame Luke, that's station number 2 thanks to that uppity little bastard.