I generally like older, slower paced movies. The Bridge over the River Kwai, Lawrence of Arabia, and The Guns of Navarone are all great movies, despite them being very dated in some regards. With that in mind, I decided to give the movie a try, it being a very famous classic and all. Despite that, my expectations weren’t unrealistically high, but the movie still fell very short.
So, it consists of four chapters/acts, basically. The first one (with the monkeys) was very “meh” and could have been shorter, but I didn’t mind it too much because, again, old movie. The second act on the moon was better, but honestly was “OK” in my books. The third act, now that was really good in my opinion. I though; “looks like the story is really taking off now!” And then came act 4…
I thought that, while the beginning wasn’t great, it was still perfectly salvagable if the ending was decent. Here is where it fell really short, in my opinion. It is, in essence, just a light show with music. Now sure, I bet that for the time that was all very advanced, so I want to give them credit. But it didn’t need to last for 15 fucking minutes! Even for that time, that is extremely long. I found myself starting to skip ahead to see if anything else was going to happen. And it did, I guess. Wasn’t exactly blown away though.
Now what I think they were trying to achieve was what we now typically describe as eldritch horror, to see something we simply cannot fathom. And I think they did that very well with the tools that they had. But it was just way too long, and that thoroughly put the nail in the coffin for me.
I’ve always felt the structure and pacing of 2002 to be musical, literally a symphony in four movements. The classical music soundtrack really sells that concept.
The light show at the the end has to be taken in context. It was 1968, the peak of the hippie movement, and one of the most explosively creative moments in popular art in history, partially fueled by hallucinogenics like weed, but also LSD, which was making it’s way across the country. It was already widely available in California, where it was being distributed by associates of the Grateful Dead in San Francisco.
In LA, Kubrick would have been quite familiar with the trend, everyone was, it was being talked about in the media constantly. Would it be that surprising if Kubrick tried what everyone was talking about, and was as blown away as everyone always is, and had to reference it in his movie?
Light shows of various kinds were becoming a standard addition to concerts, using colors, lasers, projections, blobs of colored fluids, etc. Kubrick knew that people would be coming into this movie to trip, and he wanted to give them a big light show to entertain them. If they dropped their tab at the beginning of the movie, they’d probably be reaching a nice peak right around when the light show started, or at least tripping enough to enjoy it.
I’ve always figured that was the reason. If it was any other era, I would doubt it, but this was made in California in 1968, when EVERYTHING was about drugs or the Vietnam War, and this wasn’t about the war.
That would make some sense, yeah. Still, if you are sober and watching something that is considered a classic, it falls short. Either way, it is some nice historical context, so thank you for sharing!
I love the 2001 book (and its sequels) but the movie is outright boring, technically amazing for its time, but its so slow and borders on masturbatory in its execution
It’s weird they spent so much time on act 1 since it was a single chapter in the book. Act 4 was multiple chapters of the book (and just as terrible as the movie).
Act 3 is iconic and just plain good, but act 4 just ruins the entire story for me
2001; A Space Odyssey
I generally like older, slower paced movies. The Bridge over the River Kwai, Lawrence of Arabia, and The Guns of Navarone are all great movies, despite them being very dated in some regards. With that in mind, I decided to give the movie a try, it being a very famous classic and all. Despite that, my expectations weren’t unrealistically high, but the movie still fell very short.
So, it consists of four chapters/acts, basically. The first one (with the monkeys) was very “meh” and could have been shorter, but I didn’t mind it too much because, again, old movie. The second act on the moon was better, but honestly was “OK” in my books. The third act, now that was really good in my opinion. I though; “looks like the story is really taking off now!” And then came act 4…
I thought that, while the beginning wasn’t great, it was still perfectly salvagable if the ending was decent. Here is where it fell really short, in my opinion. It is, in essence, just a light show with music. Now sure, I bet that for the time that was all very advanced, so I want to give them credit. But it didn’t need to last for 15 fucking minutes! Even for that time, that is extremely long. I found myself starting to skip ahead to see if anything else was going to happen. And it did, I guess. Wasn’t exactly blown away though.
Now what I think they were trying to achieve was what we now typically describe as eldritch horror, to see something we simply cannot fathom. And I think they did that very well with the tools that they had. But it was just way too long, and that thoroughly put the nail in the coffin for me.
I’ve always felt the structure and pacing of 2002 to be musical, literally a symphony in four movements. The classical music soundtrack really sells that concept.
The light show at the the end has to be taken in context. It was 1968, the peak of the hippie movement, and one of the most explosively creative moments in popular art in history, partially fueled by hallucinogenics like weed, but also LSD, which was making it’s way across the country. It was already widely available in California, where it was being distributed by associates of the Grateful Dead in San Francisco.
In LA, Kubrick would have been quite familiar with the trend, everyone was, it was being talked about in the media constantly. Would it be that surprising if Kubrick tried what everyone was talking about, and was as blown away as everyone always is, and had to reference it in his movie?
Light shows of various kinds were becoming a standard addition to concerts, using colors, lasers, projections, blobs of colored fluids, etc. Kubrick knew that people would be coming into this movie to trip, and he wanted to give them a big light show to entertain them. If they dropped their tab at the beginning of the movie, they’d probably be reaching a nice peak right around when the light show started, or at least tripping enough to enjoy it.
I’ve always figured that was the reason. If it was any other era, I would doubt it, but this was made in California in 1968, when EVERYTHING was about drugs or the Vietnam War, and this wasn’t about the war.
That would make some sense, yeah. Still, if you are sober and watching something that is considered a classic, it falls short. Either way, it is some nice historical context, so thank you for sharing!
I might be in the minority, but I enjoy every minute of that movie. Yea, it’s masturbatory pleasure, but uuh… Yea I’ll take it.
I completely agree. You also never hear anyone talk about the fourth act. It’s basically a weird post-credits scene.
I love the 2001 book (and its sequels) but the movie is outright boring, technically amazing for its time, but its so slow and borders on masturbatory in its execution
OK, I thought I was missing something, but cause I’ve tried to watch it so many times and its just blah
It’s weird they spent so much time on act 1 since it was a single chapter in the book. Act 4 was multiple chapters of the book (and just as terrible as the movie).
Act 3 is iconic and just plain good, but act 4 just ruins the entire story for me