I finally saw 2001: A Space Odyssee

[shmokes]

It's awful.  Good lord.  It was horrible.  I really believe that anybody who says otherwise is either being pretentious or is simply self-conscious/embarrassed cos they feel like they should have liked it. 

[protokatie]

If you had seen it as a kid around the time it first came out I am sure you would have a different opinion. For an example, look at ST:TOS, when I watched the reruns of that as a kid in the 80's it was cool. I watch it now and it is absolutely horrid. I just want to reach into the screen and slap Kirk for being such a douch!

[shmokes]

I watch Star Trek: TOS episodes today and absolutely love them.  They are hilarious.  I don't care when 2001 was made, the story doesn't make sense.  The set pieces are cool, and especially in 1968 or whenever it was made, they probably looked really cool.  But staring at a cool set piece with classical music blasting in the background for 10 minutes is not a movie.  For about 20 minutes when the movie briefly became a horror movie it was really good.  Everything that came before or after is garbage.

[CheffoJeffo]

It's awful.  Good lord.  It was horrible.  I really believe that anybody who says otherwise is either being pretentious or is simply self-conscious/embarrassed cos they feel like they should have liked it. 

How did I know that we wouldn't see eye-to-eye on this one ? I would think that the pinnacle of pretentiousness would be assuming that everybody would have to agree with your opinion.

2001 is one of my favourite movies of all-time and was one of the first movies I re-bought on BluRay.

I'll be the first to admit that the story was a little light (it was based on a old short story after all) and that they ran light on explanations.

The best thing about 2001, however, is that it is a really beautiful move to watch.

Those effects were all done before *I* was born and, to my mind, were among the most ambitious ever attempted in a movie (after you adjust for available technologies). Some people (Mrs. Cheffo for example) aren't impressed with stuff like that, but I sure as hell am.

So which am I ? Pretentious or self-conscious ?

Maybe I just liked it.

[shmokes]

I'll be the first to admit that the story was a little light (it was based on a old short story after all) and that they ran light on explanations.

I'll go with pretentious.

You can't just brush aside what should be damning criticism with a parenthetical like that.  You could say about Twilight: I'll be the first to admit that the story and dialog are bad (it was based on a ---smurfy--- novel after all).

And anyway, what kind of explanation is that?  Shawshank Redemption is based on a short story.  Memento is based on a short story.  Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs is based on a really short story.  Clearly being based on a short story is no kind of excuse to make a bad movie.  You know what's sort of important when you're telling a story?  The story.

Obviously the movie had great effects.  And obviously Kubrick was proud of them since he would show you something and then say, "Pretty cool, huh?  Let's just stare at this for 10 minutes, okay?"  And some of them were just lame.  Right after the mind-numbingly long light-effects scene just after reaching Jupiter we were treated to a mind-numbingly long (and completely nonsensical) series of scrolling negatives of landscapes in goofy colors.  It made no sense whatsoever.  It was decidedly not beautiful.  It wasn't technically impressive.  It was boring as ---fudgesicle---.  

Which of course led to the completely nonsensical ending that was also utterly irrelevant to the rest of the movie and didn't even purport to resolve anything.  Kubrick was just like, "Um . . . I don't really have an ending for this movie, have something random instead.  ART!!!!!"

[CheffoJeffo]

 

Let's see how our two competitors score:

2001: A Space Odyssey

Nominated for 4 Oscars. Won 1.
Nominated for 5 BAFTAs. Won 3.
Nominated for 1 DGA.
Nominated for 1 Hugo. Won 1.

shmokes

... sounds of crickets chirping ...


I absolutely get that you don't like it ... Mrs. Cheffo doesn't like it either ... but they way you just feel like you have to dismiss everybody who might actually have liked it, even when they make allowances for its weaknesses, is just the height of conceit. What makes it worse is that there is compelling evidence, as shown above, that people who actually know something liked it.

If I thought that it would do you help in your appreciation, I would suggest that you have a look into how much we knew about space in the mid 1960s. It wasn't all that much. I don't think we even had a colour picture of the earth like was guessed at and shown in the movie. We'll have to agree to disagree about the impressiveness of the effects given the time that the movie was made.

[shmokes]

A #1, what does that have to do with a malfunctioning HAL 9000?  B #2, Odyssey just means an adventurous journey.  That would apply with or without the completely nonsensical ending.  C #3 the ape part in the beginning was nearly as intolerably bad as the rest of the movie (see: slow mo and soaring music during the "discovery of tools" scene).  D #4, that's simply not what the movie was about.  I watched the movie last night.

As for those awards, they're all special effects and art direction.  It wasn't even nominated for best picture.  And I already said that the special effects were great.  You know what movie also had great special effects?  Star Wars: Episode 1.  Jar Jar binks was ENTIRELY animated.  It was a first.  It was nominated for Best Sound Effects, Best Visual Effects, and Best Sound.  If The Matrix wasn't released the same year it probably would have won.  But the film was a piece of ---steaming pile of meadow muffin---.  So what?  I never said 2001 didn't have great effects.  I said the opposite.  But the film was a piece of ---steaming pile of meadow muffin---.  So what?

[CheffoJeffo]

As for those awards, they're all special effects and art direction.  It wasn't even nominated for best picture.

You're right ... let's ignore the oscar nominations for Best Screenplay and Best Director and the BAFTA normination for best picture and the Hugo.

As for what the movie was about ... PBJ is correct -- that is EXACTLY what the movie was about.

[t3design]

The great thing about entertainment is that appreciation is in the hands of the entertained. If you like it, watch it. If you don't like it, don't watch it.

I am pretty sure I have seen every movie ever made that even thought about having a zombie in it. Many of them were terrible. I still enjoyed watching them.

Heck, we used to entertain ourselves by drinking every time somebody said Gilligan on Gilligan's Island. Not stellar film for sure, and after a few "Gilligans" none of us cared, but we were VERY entertained.

I enjoyed 2001 when it came out. It definitely changed film production from that point on. I was entertained. Good for me.

Since they didn't take money from me by force to make it, nor did they force me to go see it, nor has anyone EVER penalized me in any way for my opinion of it, I figure it is really no big deal whether I or anyone else does or doesn't like it.

As I tell my kids, "if you like something, you should tell somebody or thank somebody. If you don't like something, you should keep your mouth shut."

[drventure]

Yeah, 2001 is a tough movie to get into.

2010 was much better, IMHO.

But the sound bites from 2001 are classics 

[wp34]

Yeah, 2001 is a tough movie to get into.

2010 was much better, IMHO.

But the sound bites from 2001 are classics 

I just recently re-watched 2010 and it really held up well.  My 15 year-old even liked it and he obviously doesn't get the Cold War storyline. 

[ChadTower]

You can't discount the fact that even today current astronauts watch that movie and say "holy CRAP that looks realistic".  Consider that all of that stuff was done before the technology existed as imagined by the guy who also dreamed up the geostationary satellite.  Most of the awe about the movie was how realistic it looked then before any of that was possible combined with how realistic it looks now after all of that stuff has been created, used, and passed by.

[bishmasterb]

I saw 2001 for the first time around 1980. As a ten year old hyped up on Star Wars fanaticism, I was initially left with a WTF!? impression of 2001. I braved through it again many years later, and have watched it many times since then. It definitely grew on me each time I viewed it. Reading the book much later definitely helped me understand some of the plot points that had left me previously perplexed.

It's definitely cerebral, and not for light viewing, but I think there is a tremendous amount that the film has to say. Yes, it's very slow in parts, but if you let it pull you in it is a very rewarding picture. I'm definitely no film snob, it took several viewings to get to the point of enjoying it, but it was well worth it.

I would relate the experience of slowing falling in love with it to Dune. I hated Dune upon the first viewing, but after several viewings I really began to enjoy it.

[DaOld Man]

I liked 2001.
The book was good too.
2010 answered a lot of the questions left in 2001.
The story is basically an advance life force died out, for no explained reason, but left a calling card for the apes, "helping" them to evolve into humans, then when they were smart enough to make it to jupiter, they were used as building blocks for the old alien race.
It was theorized that HAL may have been an instrument of the aliens, and it was even suggested that HAL was programmed to "mess up" by a government agency.
In a nutshell, what PBJ said.
The movie was very well done for the technology available in those days. And the story had a "Scientology" touch to it, even though I dont think it existed then, but I could be wrong.

[danny_galaga]

Shmokes, you've helped 'out' me. I've watched this several times, hoping i would 'get' it each time. More than once, i actually fell asleep during the lead up to the star child thing.

I think i would watch it again some time, just to enjoy the effects.

@daoldman, Scientology was well established by then. But since Arthur C Clarke had been writing a lot longer than L R Hubbard, you could say that Scientology has an 'Arthur C Clarke' feel about it 

[koz319]

Funny, I was just talking about this movie with a coworker.

Here's a link to an interesting flash explanation of the movie. (Not that it's mean to be 'correct', the authors have stated that the story is supposed to inspire questioning)

http://www.kubrick2001.com/

For what it's worth I like this movie quite a bit, and get a little more out of it each time I see it.

Koz

[Grasshopper]

Shmokes, you are so very very wrong. But I do understand where you're coming from.

I first saw 2001 when I was about 10 or 11 and up until that point the only Sci Fi movies I'd been exposed to were things like Starwars and Startrek.

My first reaction was very similar to yours - too slow, minimal plot, underdeveloped characters, clunky dialogue etc. Basically I though WTF! The problem is I came to the movie with many preconceived notions of what to expect from a film.

However, I saw the film again many years later and I really enjoyed it. The difference was that this time I approached it with an open mind because I knew what to expect. Bishmasterb is right. The film definitely gets better on repeat viewings. You start to notice all the little details which were Kubrick's trademark. I've seen it four or five times now and I've come to regard it as a cinematic masterpiece.

Interestingly, several of Stanley Kubrick's other movies also seem to improve each time you watch them. For example Barry Lyndon. Another slow but incredibly beautiful film.

Stanley Kubrick was a genius. But he tended to ignore all the Hollywood conventions. So if you compare his movies with standard Hollywood fare, they tend to come up short. But that's the wrong way to look at it. His films are so unconventional that they have to be judged alone, on their own merits.

A rough analogy would be to imagine someone who has only listened to rock music all his life suddenly hearing a piece of classical music for the first time. His first reaction is likely to be WTF! too slow, where's the beat etc. But that doesn't mean classical music lacks artistic merit, or is inferior to Rock. Far from it. I suppose you could argue that classical music is very bad rock music, or vice versa. But that comparison doesn't really make any sense as they're completely different gentres. It's like comparing apples and oranges.

[ChadTower]

Let's put it this way.  You should read the book.  That's all there really is to this situation.  The movie is like a companion to the book, not necessarily a substitute.

[ChadTower]

I never did see 2010.  My older son and I read through the whole series of books last year, though.  I thought the big disconnect in this movie was the very end.  It was a really, really well articulated sequence of events in the book.  In the movie it was just sort of a bunch of flashes of scenery followed by an image of something that looked like a huge fetus.  There just wasn't enough explanation for people who are no longer dazzled by movie scenery.  The scenery in the ending holds up but the storytelling really doesn't for the most part.

[Loafmeister]

I'm not the biggest fan of 2001 as I did find it a bit slow, but can appreciate why people like it so much. There is depth there if one keeps an open mind. No one has to like it of course, to each their own.

But it really grates me when someone has to insult others for someting they don't like; shows immaturity I judge .

[shmokes]

. . . for the 30 minutes I got through before I went to sleep?

Thank  you.  My thoughts exactly.

Look, say all you want about reading the book.  It's ---That which is odiferous and causeth plants to grow---.  The movie may work as a companion piece to the book, but that's not what it is.  The film is offered as a standalone product.  Neither DVD case nor the movie itself  recommend reading the book first.  I don't even think they mention the existence of the book.  A film that is supposed to stand alone, but actually requires one to go out and read a book in order to appreciate (or even understand) it is not a good film.  It is a bad film.  It is a film that makes no sense, hence the need for supplementary material to try and make any sense of it.  An adaptation that fails to capture its source material is a failure, IMO.

If anyone but Kubrick had made this it would be roundly panned.  Not the effects, of course.  They're great.  But the movie sucks.

[CheffoJeffo]

But the real question is ... are people who like it still pretentious ?

 

[shmokes]

Not necessarily.  They might just have fallen to peer pressure.  It's Kubrick.  You're supposed to like it.  If you don't like it you must not get it.  You must not be sophisticated enough for his genius.

[Hoopz]

I don't think the book is necessary to understand the movie.

But as long as we're playing science fiction confessions around here...

Blade Runner - I've seen every version of it, I've read most of PKD's writing, and I still don't like this movie.  I think each subsequent cut has been worse than the version before it.  The atmosphere and special effects are great, blah blah blah, but I generally tell people "it's not very good but you should watch it once".

2010 - this was a clunker that literally put me to sleep this afternoon.  

I've tried watching Blade Runner about 4 or 5 times.  Haven't been able to finish it yet.  Maybe one day...but I doubt it.

[CheffoJeffo]

Not necessarily.  They might just have fallen to peer pressure.  It's Kubrick.  You're supposed to like it.  If you don't like it you must not get it.  You must not be sophisticated enough for his genius.

The only person who seems to think that there is some mass pressure to "get it" is you.

There are a number of Kubrick films that I don't like, but that doesn't mean that those who do are guilty of anything more than actually liking the film.

[bigred09]

Wanna try something that will make it bearable? Find Pink Floyd's song "Echo". Fast forward to the first frame of Part 3. Play the song and un-pause the movie. Turn the music up and the movie down. Trust me, try it.

[t3design]

Wanna try something that will make it bearable? Find Pink Floyd's song "Echo". Fast forward to the first frame of Part 3. Play the song and un-pause the movie. Turn the music up and the movie down. Trust me, try it.

bigred09,

i did drugs in college too!

[shmokes]

. . . actually liking the film.

 

[danny_galaga]

Interestingly, several of Stanley Kubrick's other movies also seem to improve each time you watch them. For example Barry Lyndon. Another slow but incredibly beautiful film.

Dunno, I've only seen Barry Lyndon once and i really enjoyed it without having to see it again. But Clockwork Orange i couldn't get into at all 

[SNAAKE]

its good for something that came out over 40 years ago. it was awesome first time I saw it last year.

I don't care when 2001 was made, the story doesn't make sense.  

its not supposed to..........
"leave it to your imagination" kinda deal. not into sci-fi much??

not all kubrick movies are totally awesome. I thought  "eyes wide shut" kinda failed. wasnt necessarily a bad movie but not GOOD one either. at least not compared to his other hits like 2001, shinning, clockwork, heavy metal jacket.

[shmokes]

its good for something that came out over 40 years ago. it was awesome first time I saw it last year.

Once again, this only applies to the special effects.  At least, I hope that's all you're talking about.  God knows there were A LOT of good movies 40 years ago.  Hitchcock did most of his best work in the 50's.  Casablanca, The Wizard of Oz and Gone with the Wind were all made about 70 years ago.  Hell, The Godfather was made 38 years ago.  It's not like people generally didn't know how to make good movies 40 years ago and Kubrick came along and showed them with 2001: A Space Odyssey.

[Grasshopper]

Dunno, I've only seen Barry Lyndon once and i really enjoyed it without having to see it again. But Clockwork Orange i couldn't get into at all 

I agree with you about Clockwork Orange. I can see why it was controversial at the time but it now looks horribly dated.

[Grasshopper]

 It's not like people generally didn't know how to make good movies 40 years ago and Kubrick came along and showed them with 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Yes but how many good Sci Fi movies had been made before 2001? Off the top of my head I can only think of three or four and none of them had decent special effects. Probably the best in special effects terms was Forbidden Planet and that was pitiful compared with 2001.

I think you're wrong to gloss over the importance of special effects. Special effects matter. Just imagine if Star Wars had been made with the standard of special effects that we had before 2001. It would have been almost unwatchable.

[Ginsu Victim]

But as long as we're playing science fiction confessions around here...

Blade Runner - I've seen every version of it, I've read most of PKD's writing, and I still don't like this movie.  I think each subsequent cut has been worse than the version before it.  The atmosphere and special effects are great, blah blah blah, but I generally tell people "it's not very good but you should watch it once".

I love the look and style of Blade Runner. It's brilliant.

The rest of it, though, bores the hell out of me. I've fallen asleep watching it once.

It's one of those you're supposed to like, but I don't know why.

[Ginsu Victim]

Dunno, I've only seen Barry Lyndon once and i really enjoyed it without having to see it again. But Clockwork Orange i couldn't get into at all 

I agree with you about Clockwork Orange. I can see why it was controversial at the time but it now looks horribly dated.

A Clockwork Orange is great, though the older I get, the less I enjoy it.

[ChadTower]

The only person who seems to think that there is some mass pressure to "get it" is you.

There are a number of Kubrick films that I don't like, but that doesn't mean that those who do are guilty of anything more than actually liking the film.

+1

This may be the only Kubrick film I like.

shmokes seems to lack the ability to judge things by anything other than narrowly defined current standards.

I saw the Wizard of Oz the other day.  What a crapfest.  Why didn't they just bust out 3D Studio instead of all those creepy midgets?  I mean come on man.   

[shmokes]

I think you're wrong to gloss over the importance of special effects. Special effects matter.

Without question.  Effects are critical.  Bad effects can ruin an otherwise good movie.  All I'm saying is that great effects probably can't save an otherwise bad movie and at the very least they did not do so in the case of 2001: A Space Odyssey.  

[shmokes]

I saw the Wizard of Oz the other day.  What a crapfest.  Why didn't they just bust out 3D Studio instead of all those creepy midgets?  I mean come on man.   

I've said over and over again that the effects in 2001 were great.  Obviously if that movie was made today you'd be laughing at most the effects.  I've got no problem taking into account when the film was made.  40 years ago plot and dialogue and narrative mattered at least as much as they do today.

[ChadTower]

40 years ago plot and dialogue and narrative mattered at least as much as they do today.

Plot and dialog actually don't mean jack crap now.  The average blockbuster today has all the acting charisma of a Chuck Norris movie.

[shmokes]

Ok, whatever.  Regardless, they mattered then and they matter now (for a movie to be good, not necessarily for a movie to be a financial success).  Notice that I never said that 2001: A Space Odyssey was not successful.  I just said that it's a bad movie.