"Its origin and purpose still a total mystery"

Rating: 10/10 (6 December 2007)

Beauty is an often-overlooked component of modern film-making. We are often so overwhelmed by complex story lines and fast-paced action that we forget to simply sit back and admire the sheer beauty of celluloid. Engineered with intricate precision by passionate, experienced hands, a film can transcend the boundaries of simply being a film. It can become a work of art. '2001: A Space Odyssey' is not a film to be watched by one in any hurry. To the unprepared viewer, the leisurely pace of the narrative may first come across as "slow" or "tedious." However, to those lucky enough to be able to appreciate its brilliance, the film is a relaxing, meditative journey that you can't expect to forget any time soon. The film relies, not on dialogue, but on stunning visual imagery and an eerily appropriate classical score, to explore its themes and advance the limited plot. In fact, the first spoken word appears almost thirty minutes into the film, and, in total, less than forty minutes of dialogue constitutes the total running time.
Following the enormous success of his classic apocalyptic black comedy, 'Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964),' director Stanley Kubrick became enthralled by the possibility of extraterrestrial life, and so collaborated with noted English sci-fi author Arthur C. Clarke to create "the proverbial good science fiction movie." The two decided to adapt and expand Clarke's early short story, "The Sentinel," written in 1948 and first published in 1951. In a nutshell, and at its most literal level, '2001: A Space Odyssey' tells the story of Mankind's evolution, either prompted or surveilled by ominous black Monoliths, the tools of an unseen advanced extraterrestrial civilisation. Through the coldly-sinister HAL9000 computer (chillingly voiced by Douglas Rain), Kubrick also explores the expanding role that technology will play in the future, and whether or not our complete dependence upon it will inevitably result in our own destruction {also an important theme in 'Dr. Strangelove'}.
Many of the film's detractors often complain that the story poses complex questions about Mankind's origin and place in the Universe, but without offering any answers of any kind. I can see how the film's "open-endedness" might be infuriating to those who are eager for a neatly-packaged explanation, but I wouldn't have it any other way. Though one might miss it on first viewing, Kubrick has plenty to say about the way he views humanity. For example, the opening "Dawn of Man" sequence depicts the crumbling society of the early hominids, as they attempt futilely to scrounge out an existence in the arid landscape. The inexplicable arrival of the Monolith (accompanied by György Ligeti's endlessly-creepy "Requiem") precipitates a profound change in the mental capabilities of the Apemen  they are now able to exploit tools to stay alive. That famed match-cut from the soaring bone to the orbiting spacecraft four million years later is so simple, and yet it conveys so much about the human race. Worth noting is that Kubrick originally intended those spacecraft to be orbiting nuclear weapons {the Cold War being at its peak around the time of the film's production}. The cut is a way of enforcing that, given his intelligence, Man will always use it to develop ways to destroy himself (remembering that the bone was used to kill the leader of an enemy tribe).
Another sequence that remains hotly-debated almost four decades after the film's release is the controversial ending, a psychedelic wormhole of colour produced by effects supervisor Douglas Trumbull using slit-scan photography. Following his journey through the "Stargate"  a breathtaking trip across the bizarre expanses of the Universe  Dave Bowman is deposited in a sort of fourth-dimensional observational chamber, its classical decorations both familiar and alien, where the greater beings who engineered the Monoliths can keep an invisible eye on him. In this room, having finally defeated his tools, Man must face one final challenge: his own death. Throughout history, human evolution depended so much upon its technology/tools that it almost replaced us. In the end, it tried to destroy us (i.e. HAL). Now, just moments from the death of Mankind, separated from his tools, what do we have left? The final act of a dying Dave is to reach out his withered hand towards the Monolith that stands before him. This image of 'reaching out' with an extended finger was directly borrowed by Kubrick from the famous painting found in Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel artwork -- of Man extending his finger to touch God's hand. Note how, following Dave's epic transformation/rebirth into a Starchild, Kubrick juxtaposes the Earth's razor-thin atmosphere with the frail fetus in its womb, stressing the fragility, preciousness and vulnerability of the planet on which we dwell.
There's really no adequate way to explain why '2001' is such a magnificent and special film to me. It is, above all else, a motion picture that appeals to our emotions, and the feelings of awe, wonderment and terror that overcome me are simply indescribable. In judging films, I prefer to reserve the term "masterpiece" for the films capable of completely drawing me into their world, of making me forget that I'm watching a movie. I want to feel as though I am there. Shortly put, '2001' achieves this more effectively than any other film I have ever experienced. If you need any further explanation of why I value this film so greatly, then consider my experiences with one particular sequence: Dave Bowman, in order to re-access the Discovery and disconnect HAL, must enter the spaceship through the emergency airlock, exposing himself to a total vacuum for an extended period of time. As the breathable air finally began to fill Dave's surroundings, I found myself taking a breath for the first time in almost half a minute. I was there.