Misunderstood masterpiece

Rating: 10/10 (26 June 2005)

The more I read the often very funny derisory comments on this masterpiece the more I began to realise that most great movies are just generational events that only those alive at the time can truly appreciate the context of their creation.
I was 10 when 2001 came out and for some reason the film was classified as an A which at that time meant dragging an adult with me. They didn't "get it" because it wasn't a character driven drama. Neither did I immediately because of the odd structure of the piece and its mysterious ending. However so overwhelmed was I by the look of the film in those long lost pre-digital effects age, that the obscure finale which initially antagonised me, made me think through the entire film. The "plotty" bits I liked but when I realised the film, at a second viewing was about the evolution of all of us, as a species, what happened before and what may come after Man the whole non-verbal experience (Kubrick's phrase) had a profound and lasting affect. The speculation of our relative standing against other life forms in the universe (pretty low if the film is to believed) came as a shock. I came out of the cinema reeling with those images of planetary alignments, Ape men discovering the first weapons, revolving balletic space stations the enigmatic star child and the beauty, awesome emptiness, and silence ( George Lucas please note) of space, forever imprinted on my mind to this very day. It fed my conscious and unconscious mind but like now sparked a furious critical onslaught. Those that hated it demanded clarity where there can only ever be conjecture. You never see the aliens that planted the monoliths and that is just as it should be for that element of mystery to remain. 2010 tried to explain everything and killed the effect stone dead. The elegant pacing and use of classical music irritates the hell out of the Michael Bay / MTV generation of who become fidgety if a shot lasts over a second. Witnessing a fuzzy black and white picture on television shortly afterwards that didn't alter for 30 minutes held me spellbound. That was a TV picture of the leg of the lunar module awaiting Neil Armstrong's one small step on the moon. We were used to waiting then, as long as the payoff justified it. This event like the film gave one time to think.
And there's the rub, my parent's generation didn't get it and neither does the current one but for widely differing reasons. You really had to be around in 1968 to realise what a quantum leap 2001 represented in film, special effects and story telling techniques. Like all Kubrick films it doesn't date.
For me it was a happy accident of time and place, and very grateful I was to be around.