First Time Seeing 2010 (1 Viewer)

[Rain]

The attempt to seperate 2001 and 2010 as unlike works and with no relation to another simply doesn't hold water.

Yes it does. 2001 is primarily Kubrick's vision, as Jack has already pointed out. Kubrick was not involved with 2010 in any way.

 

[TonyD]

quote:

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The attempt to seperate 2001 and 2010 as unlike works and with no relation to another simply doesn't hold water.

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Yes it does. 2001 is primarily Kubrick's vision, as Jack has already pointed out. Kubrick was not involved with 2010 in any way.

Sorry to get off the main point of the header but if a sequel is made and it isn't made by the same people as the first movie, does that mean it has no relation to the first movie.

some examples ...

GODFATHER 1,2 AND 3 same crew so all are in relation.

JAWS 1 AND 2 different director no relation.

both bill and ted movies dif dir so in no relation to each other.

all 3 screams directed by wes craven so all in relation.

all of these movie series continue and follow through on the first movie.

some are good and some not so good but does that change if these movies are related in anyway?

 

[Ivan Lindenfeld]

Tony, thank you for making the only proper response to Rain's theorem. It's proper because I agree.
I feel bad for a fan like Rain since Mr. Kubrick has died and will produce no more films. I am being sincere. You obviously have a well thought out appreciation for 2001 and Kubrick's abilities in general. I can respect that. I stand in disagreement and since we both made arguments it bodes no purpose to keep the argument going.

 

[Edwin-S]

I am still waiting for Childhood's End to be movie-ized but I will have to live with the "Rendezvous with Rama" that we are getting next year. (I think I just jumped authors but genre remains the same.)

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Nope. Same genre and same author. Another book of his I would like to see as a movie is "The Fountains of Paradise".

 

[Charles Guajardo]

some examples ...

GODFATHER 1,2 AND 3 same crew so all are in relation.

JAWS 1 AND 2 different director no relation.

both bill and ted movies dif dir so in no relation to each other.

all 3 screams directed by wes craven so all in relation.

all of these movie series continue and follow through on the first movie.

some are good and some not so good but does that change if these movies are related in anyway?

The relation is not in who directed, but in the naming scheme, thus:

if 2010 was actually named 2010: 2001 II, or 2010: The Return of HAL then it could be considered related. Otherwise, its a pretty bad scifi movie compared to 2001, Silent Running, or Solaris. Its pretty good when put up against Mission to Mars or Wing Commander.

-chuck

 

[TheoGB]

The relation is not in who directed, but in the naming scheme, thus: if 2010 was actually named 2010: 2001 II, or 2010: The Return of HAL then it could be considered related

I guess Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi and The Phantom Menace aren't related then?

Sorry to be facetious but in his commentary Coppola explicitly states that Godfather Part II was the first time that a film sequel had been so-named. However, there were countless other 'related' movies beforehand.

I much prefer movies named without numbers personally. That's why I always felt Alien and then Aliens was really cool but the refusal to call it Alien³ but Alien 3 was a mistake: To me (shite thought it is) it will always be Alien Cubed.

2010 has not aged all that well, I'd imagine (due to the whole loss of the Soviet Union) but it's still a reasonable movie. I like it. It's just a shame it's made as a sequel to such a brilliant movie so it will always be in its shadow and be given a much harder time (similarly with Godfather III).

 

[Jack Briggs]

The only relation the Hyams thing bears to the 1968 Stanley Kubrick film is that it borrows the same subject matter simply because it is based on that 1982 novel by Arthur C. Clarke. Stanley Kubrick, in a conversation with the lesser director, simply said to him, "Make your own film."

For that reason, it is not accurate to call it a "sequel" to 2001: A Space Odyssey.

About its not having aged that well, note some of the basic things: In Mr. Kubrick's audacious vision, he had the foresight to include flat-panel, widescreen monitors for many of the display screens found on the various spacecraft and the space station.

In that 1984 movie, the flat-panel displays had been replaced by curved-panel, 4:3 cathod-ray tubes. And the depiction of computer graphics in general is sooo 1984.

Whereas Mr. Kubrick was painstaking in his attention to detail, Hyams only paid lip service to it. Even the opening of that movie starts what becomes a train of inexcusable gaffes. Early on, for example, we are told (when the Hyams version of "Heywood R. Floyd" is typing his mission report) that the lunar Black Monolith was located at "Tranquility Base." Sorry, but the Monolith dubbed "TMA-1" was discovered about 800 miles west of the Mare Tranquilitatis. In fact, its name, TMA-1, is from the location of its discovery: Tycho Magnetic Anomoly 1. That is, the crater Tycho.

And don't get me started on the use of sound in space and the myriad internal inconsistencies.

 

[Rich Malloy]

2010 is as good a movie as ST:TMP

No argument here.

 

[Jack Briggs]

"...The original stands alone and is only cheapened by this comparison..."

Agreed--though I might suggest that it is our perception of the 1968 film that is cheapened by comparisons to that thing from 1984. Nothing can shake 2001: A Space Odyssey off its pedestal.

 

[Ivan Lindenfeld]

OK, Al, ya got me. Caught me being PC. What I really meant was that I felt there is no point in arguing any more with Rain since his opinion is so high of 2001 and so set in stone that I would be wasting characters to try to debate. I don't begrudge him for his opinion, I just chose to not argue with it.
In a broader sense, I thought the discussion had evolved into "Kubrick vs. any other sci-fi director."
On another note, I personally question the use of the term "dated" when discussing cinema. Fans of great cinema do not hold it against D.W. Griffith for being a product of his time and geography when he made "The Birth of a Nation." It is still great filmmaking no matter how unrelated to our time the setting or set design is. Pardon the extreme example. I think it's apropo.

 

[Richard Kim]

The relation is not in who directed, but in the naming scheme, thus: if 2010 was actually named 2010: 2001 II, or 2010: The Return of HAL then it could be considered related
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I guess Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi and The Phantom Menace aren't related then?

They are, they all have the Episode number header at the beginning of the film.

 

[TheoGB]

Not originally. The episode number only appears in the title now. The only Star Wars concession was the use of the name in the poster art bounding the title.

 

[Grant B]

not sure where I read it but it was Kubricks reaction to 2010. He basically said after watching it, he had no questions, thoughts etc. Movie over done with it period.

True for myself; Not another thought about it until it came out on DVD (should I buy or rent???)

Forgot the movie entirely..

Few people can say that about 2001..saw it when I was 7 and it rolled around in my head until I saw it again when I was 20.

The only question is will I break down and go to a movie theater and see the new 70mmm print at the Castro playing this week.

 

[Rain]

The only question is will I break down and go to a movie theater and see the new 70mmm print at the Castro playing this week.

How can you possibly not go?

 

[Grant B]

It's amazing how acustom you get to hitting the pause button.

Generally, that's frowned apound by projectionists.

Last time I was there was for the 75th annversery of Looney tunes... never realized how great they looked Widescreen on a huge screen

 

[Rich Malloy]

On another note, I personally question the use of the term "dated" when discussing cinema. Fans of great cinema do not hold it against D.W. Griffith for being a product of his time and geography when he made "The Birth of a Nation." It is still great filmmaking no matter how unrelated to our time the setting or set design is. Pardon the extreme example. I think it's apropo.

I understand your point and I think the vast majority of people would agree with you.

But I don't.

To me, great cinema isn't just about technical brilliance or contributions to film grammar. It's not just about introducing new camera techniques and narrative forms. Like all art, it's ultimately about ideas.

And Griffith's ideas may well have been the majority view at the time, but they weren't the only view. There were many artists in a wide variety of endeavors whose ideas on such subjects were far more complex, nuanced, humanistic - indeed, modern - than Griffith's. And so I hold his pedestrian, lowest common denominator, utterly philistine opinions against him and his film.

Technical mastery and contributions in this area are important only to the extent that they provide a mode of expression for the insights and ideas of great artists. If cinema is ever going to become an art on-par with the other arts, it must do so not solely on technical elements, but also on the basis of the ideas it propogates, the emotions it elicits, and its insight into the human condition. This, after all, is what art is all about. I give Griffith credit for his efforts to expand cinematic grammar, but I can't overlook the fact that he used that grammar to express some rather low ideas. His inability to rise above the din of the most common and coarse greatly diminishes his status as an "artist".

I understand that this is a rather large can of worms - and there are certainly artists and works that I admire that contain some very questionable elements. None, however, as completely detestable as Birth of a Nation. But my basic assertion is merely that one cannot utterly divorce the ideas expressed in a work of art from consideration of that work's ultimate value.

 

[Jack Briggs]

Well, to add to that point:

Great films hold up as great art no matter what. When it comes to something that might be called "science fiction," even a film that has dated yet is otherwise excellent when all other filmmaking parameters are factored in, we can forgive its having dated.

The Day the Earth Stood Still has the virtue of being set in its own time period. Forbidden Planet definitely has that '50s look, yet it scores so well story-wise, we forgive its look.

2001 is an altogether different animal, in that it was intended, among many other things, as a well-researched extrapolation on what the world of 2001 would be like. We can forgive Mr. Kubrick, workaholic that he was, for not having paid enough attention to the social upheaval around him that was working against the very future he was portraying. 2001 is something that could have arrived by 2001--or most of it, at least--had the politics permitted.

No matter what, 2001 is, to this day, some thirty-three years later, one of the super-rare SF films that still manages to look "futuristic." It has the look of believability. Never mind, therefore, that the future it portrays is still some thirty or more years away.

The Hyams thing, on the other hand, given the director's apathy regarding accuracy and internal consistency, looked dated upon arrival. Within four years it was almost unwatchable.

And to see all the usual Hollywood shortcomings, vis. the plausibility of a science-fiction story, shot to the wind in that thing makes it unworthy of any sort of comparison to the artwork that made its existence possible.

Rain's opinions are those of a 2001 aficianado. Read all his posts in this thread. His theme is consistent, as is Al's: Comparing the Hyams thing to Stanley Kubrick's vision only serves to cheapen our perception of a great work of art.