The Starchild waiting in the Sky

Rating: 10/10 (14 September 2019)

As Kubrick himself stated, the ending is not meant to be clear in a conventional way; it is not meant to be grasped or understood, rather than intended to evoke certain emotions. In other words, we don't have to "get" it -we just have to experience it and, just like Odysseus on his way to Ithaka, accept the wisdom that we gathered during our journey.
The concept of God(s) is at the heart of this film, but not in its anthropomorphic state. The monoliths and their creators are impenetrable and incomprehensible. We cannot understand their ways and their motives, we cannot fathom their intelligence or their purpose. In a scene reenacting the famous Michelangelo painting, a dying Bowman reaches out to touch the Monolith, quite like Adam reached out to touch the hand of God. And he does so feeling the most human of all emotions; fear before the unknown.
In my mind, the beauty of the ending lies in its surprising optimism. Man has persuaded the supreme beings that he is ready for his next evolutionary step. He returns to earth as a Starchild, a figure of mysterious powers and proportions. And right there, among the terrifying emptiness of the universe, hides the message of potential. Kubrick reminds us that we 're the universal equivalent of a child gazing into space -but maybe there's much more to it than we had thought.
Maybe this whole journey into space wasn't but a detour -our final destination is still home. The road ahead waits to be walked and Bowie's Starman is dying to meet us.
The problem is, he'd probably blow our minds.