2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY: AN INTERPRETATIVE REMINISCENCE

On March 29th, 1968, Stanley Kubrick presented his original version of 2001:A Space Odyssey for the staff of Life magazine. It was the film's first outing after going through years of pre- production, production, and final last minute editing. It tested in a few key cities, before Kubrick decided to omit 19 minutes of footage before launching the film fully into the public's anticipatory jaws. That was on April 6th, 1968.

Have any of us who first saw that film on the Cinerama screen ever been the same?

Probably not. After all, this was not just 'another movie.' I was among the many who had the privilege to witness the truly awesome spectacle of 2001: A Space Odyssey in its proper setting. As a star- struck nine year old ( not movie star, but astronomical star), being in that audience in downtown Detroit was my first true watershed. I recall the massive publicity telegraphing the film's arrival, the huge full- page spreadsheet advertisements in the Detroit Free Press and Detroit News, and the forever- long drive it took for us to arrive at the theatre.

I was a cub- scout when I first witnessed the huge opening credits along the bottom of the screen; in fact, my entire blue and yellow pack was taken downtown that day to see the mighty wonder of 2001. In the lobby, under glass, were reproductions of the various space- ships used in the film. The entire floor was ablaze with poster art and memorabilia, and this was in the days when a lobby was a LOBBY, and not some narrow test- tube waiting station in the local mall- nightmare. After we came out that afternoon, there was non- stop conversation. The adults scratched their heads and their children giggled.

It was, for all practical purposes, an event.

The event

Movies have never been the same, and 2001 is the greatest home- movie ever made. Home movie, you say? Well, yes, in a figurative way. Kubrick brought his nearly eleven- million dollar budget to its new studio home, and proceeded to make his movie his way. He truly had a hand in every aspect of the massively complicated affair known as 2001, and it shows. What we saw was a vision of the most perfected kind, owing a debt to nothing before it, and having had nothing since to call its equal or near- equal. That the film was released as the 60's were on their way out has only added to its legend. And even though the actual moon landing a little more than a year after the film's general release generally provided us with a more 'realistic' portrait of the lunar surface, Kubrick's moon has always remained more important to me. Call it fuzzy nostalgia, call it whatever you want, 2001 turned me into the thinker I've become today. Period.

Over the long years I've probably seen the movie close to a hundred times, and the paperback book The Making of Kubrick's 2001 was the first book I ever owned that literally fell apart from overuse. It had been given to me by one of my relatives who owned a bookstore in Detroit, and that year, while my family vacationed in sunny Florida, I devoured it. Over time, it became little more than pulp in my hand, eventually falling apart altogether. Then it went out of print. Long years were spent trying to locate a copy...and last month I finally struck gold through Amazon.com. It took the good people there over two years of digging to unearth a copy. When it arrived in my mail- box wrapped in the priority package, I jumped for joy. Literally!

And having become something of a film historian over the years as well, I can say that, although some wonderful films have been made in the last thirty- one years, nothing has compared with the tremendous knock- out punch 2001 delivered in 1968. Nothing. Not Star Wars, or Star Trek, or Alien; nothing has dealt us such a staggering blow as 2001. One is bound to wonder why, too, why a film seen so long ago by someone so young would have had such a profound effect on him. I've wrestled with that question for the better part of my life.

Simple proposition

It is no secret that the film was better received by the younger crowd when first released. Adult patrons accustomed to traditional narratives and too old to bend with the changes in perception demanded by the film ultimately found it an unpleasent experience. They simply weren't prepared to sit back and allow themselves to be exposed to nearly three hours of pure, visual stimulation. The younger patrons, however, were more than well prepared. After all, they'd been roller- coasting in free- fall for eight years during the closing decade's unending spiral of op- art, psychedelic art, shock art, etc., and they loved it. Culturally, this is nothing new, of course. Any generation's youth is more apt to embrace those elements which, by their very nature, alienate the same generation's older population. This is the gift of being young. And no better example of this can be found outside the 1960's.

Like I mentioned above, you really had to have been there to fully appreciate the impact 2001 had on people. It wasn't uncommon for patrons to walk out after the film broke for intermission. This was, after all, and contrary to years of misinterpretation, not a film that demanded much thinking from its audience; no. Instead, 2001 expected its viewers to drop the real world outside the theatre for nearly three hours and go along for the ride. A very simple proposition.

Too bad it didn't turn out that way.

Walk-out

Granted, every time we enter the darkened world of a theatre, we are expected to check the baggage of the real world outside the lobby for a few hours; even the most mundane and predictable film requires this. And it almost always works. Sometimes a film is so awful we even walk out, but usually for the same reason: "this film stinks." 2001, however, was the first American film to insult its audience with simplicity. People didn't leave 2001 because it was unbelievable, or shabby, or just plain bad; they left because they couldn't get a handle on visual enjoyment.

America had grown accustomed to big budget adventure and action films by 1968 (not much has changed, has it ) overloaded with thirty- foot movie stars who defied death or made passionate love at every turn. When 2001 came along, most thought that this was going to be another one of the same; yes, they'd read that the film was different and that the film was unique and on and on and on, but until they'd sat themselves down into the theatre seats and initiated the personal experience 2001 was always meant to be... until they did that, they'd never known how difficult a movie could be. There were no stars, no level plot lines, none of the everything all their previous years of filmgoing had conditioned them to accept and expect. And they became frustrated, just as a child who cannot fit the square peg into the round hole becomes frustated.

And they threw their own equivalent of a temper tantrum. They walked out.

Educational value

They walked out because, for all its simplicity, 2001 is an experience in visual and auditory intimidation. Unlike everything that had been seen before, this movie simply stuck us into the depths of space and told us that things are not really that good and certainly not what they seem. Did he really mean to imply that God didn't create man? Or was that huge black something supposed to be God? Religous people began to grow restless. But, along the opposite side of the fence, the National Catholic Office for Motion Pictures gave it their 1968 Award for Best Film of Educational Value. That one really got me! This film stuck its claws into everthing we'd come to expect from a big budget motion picture, and then shredded the sacred cow of Hollywood mercilessly. I remember so well the party discussions, things like "just what is this damned movie supposed to about, anyway?" Adults stood in circles around basement bars while ice- cubes clinked in their highballs of whiskey and gin, and the concerned conversations were repeated over and over. "My kid loved it but I don't know what it was about." Oh, well.

New meaning

Yes, we've grown older now, most of us who saw it then for the first time are either married or have been married at least once, and some have children who have grown up without the world of 2001. I'm still a single man. Sometimes I think that 2001 may have been instrumental in carving me out, so. It's a good sculpture, too. The film did a certain something to me that has been impossible to define. Others who were there when it all began have expressed similar feelings to me. My father actually liked it, though my mother, as I recall, had the more traditional view. Not a bad split though, 50/50. Whenever I hear the now famous opening theme music of 'Zarathusra,' I'm taken fairly rigid. It has become something of a millstone around our neck over the years, used by everyone from Elvis to the lowly television commercial; but once upon a time it was fresh with new meaning. And the closing image of the star- child hanging above the earth... nothing has ever moved me in such a way since.

2001: A Space Odyssey will undoubtedly remain one of our great puzzles long into infinity. And yes, over the decades many of the adults who initially panned the film have switched over to the other side. The movie has a way of doing that to people.

Like anything shocking and wonderful at the same time, 2001 has had to settle deep in some to be fully appreciated.

I've been sleeping soundly for the last thirty- one years.

Mark's email address is: greengold@earthlink.net

When Stanley Changed The Rules by Virginia Smith

The "Showcase" page came into being after an early respondent mentioned that she had written a paper based on "2001", exploring some of the issues it raised in relation, not only to "2001" itself, but also to science- fiction films in general. She kindly agreed to allow me to publish her paper here. Click on the image at left for: "When Stanley Changed the Rules" (completed August 3, 1993).

The Midrash Process and the Interpretation of 2001 by David Jonathan Cooper

Such open- ended plots and gaps of explanation are usually the province of non- popular literature or poetry. Consider James Joyce or Samuel Becket. Kubrick's true credit is that he used two popular motifs -- the Sci Fi film and the odyssey- story -- to do this. In doing so he provoked millions of people, immediately.

But actually, there is a popular literature that is open- ended and that invites filling in the gaps with the murmurings of your soul: the Bible. In fact a whole literature, very similar in tone and process to this discussion, was developed to deal with the gaps and inexplicabilities in the Biblical text. That literature is called "Midrash." For the orthodox Jew, God is given the credit of drafting the Bible to elicit a midrashic response. From the perspective of modern scholarship which I share, the gaps, inconsistencies and inexplicabilities arise out the quilt- like nature of the Biblical text: sewn together from bits and pieces of the religious (and secular) literature of different parts of the Jewish tradition (written by different authors at different times for different purposes). These sewn bits contain stories that end abruptly, or begin in the middle, or repeat with a changed element, or... In short, the quilt has breaks in its pattern and even missing pieces which invite mending. Midrashic literature (mostly developed and written from about 100 CE or A.D., to about 600 CE or A.D.) was the product of several generations' attempts to fill in the gaps.

What I like about the process here in this Web site, and what I like about the Midrashic literature is that rather than each explainer jumping in with an ultimate explanation which he or she treats as THE sole correct solution, each explanation is treated as valuable, even if it were impossible that each midrash was correct (since most of them would be contradictory to each other).

So embrace the inconsistencies, the contradictions and the gaps. Consistency murders creativity.

HAL and the "Golem Test"

In some of the material from this web site someone pointed out that Kubrick and Clark in the movie 2001 attempted a super accurate portrayal of probable technological changes that would occur by the year 2001. This super accuracy in technology was contrasted to those plot items that were improbable but necessary for the plot, such as the presence of monolith-planting aliens.

The HAL 9000 computer then is viewed as part of Kubrick and Clark's attempt to portray probable technological developments. Once you perceive it this way, then what follows is a consideration of how far short of reality the authors' projections were, i.e. how little computers today have actually reached HAL's level. But I believe that HAL is a story element more akin to the plot necessity of the aliens than it is to the technological feasibility of a picture-phones. I would postulate, and I think most would agree upon contemplation, that if Kubrick and Clark were informed (as they very possibly were) that the kind of artificial intelligence and self-awareness of a HAL 9000 would be utterly impossible before 2001, they would nevertheless have retained HAL as a "character." HAL is as necessary for the plot as the monolith, even if it/he is just as improbable.

HAL represents what I call the "Golem Test." In Jewish mysticism, if one has mastered the secret of divine letter combinations to the extent that one can create a golem, then one has entered the realm of wielding God's own creative powers in the hands of mortals. After all, if we are the product of God manipulating matter into awareness, then when we create an entity with awareness--not through our biology, but through our intelligence and self-awareness-- then we have become as Gods. By our awareness, we have created awareness.

But the golem stories are filled with instances of the golem getting out of control and the rabbi, who created the golem, having to figure out how to erase an alphabetic inscription to deactivate his creation. In 2001, Dave must turn off HAL; and Mary Shelley has Dr. Frankenstein place and join his monster in terminal exile.

This brings up what I see as the next stage of the Golem Test. Once you have wrested the divine power and manipulated it and set loose your golem, the golem will take on a life of its own. It is true that its designated purpose was to serve you (as you were to serve God), but just as we have individuated from God and manifest our own free will (the Eden rebellion myth) so too the golem from us. So the next part of the Golem Test is: Can we survive the golem, and can we maintain our mastery over it?

Our ability to control some of the basic powers of the universe to serve our own ends, may unleash consequences beyond our design and possibly beyond our control. The golem story, 2001, and Frankenstein, all deal with this question in regard to the homunculus: the human-created humanoid. Using awareness made by awareness is a convenient and compelling tool to raise the question of whether we can survive our own creations when they take on a life of their own. But the Golem Test is not the province of artificial intelligence questions alone. The Golem Test is ultimately the question of whether once we have graduated to the role and powers of God, whether we are god enough to handle it. Now that we are as gods, do we have the appropriate level of mastery and sense of responsibility?

The Golem Test is the ultimate mythic question of our time. Can we preserve the biosphere after having disseminated our creation: civilization? Can we achieve balance in the face of the imbalance we have created? Can we survive the nuclear age, brought on by our mastery of the elemental powers of the universe? Can we survive our mastery; can we survive our creations?

After all, when we look for examples of intelligence elsewhere in the universe, we ask: Is there a location out there that can support a biosphere; will the biosphere produce animal life with awareness; will the beings of awareness achieve technology; and will they have achieved sufficient mastery and wisdom to have survived their technology? This is a fundamental stage in the life of an intelligent species. And it is not a philosophical question. My young children have asked me: will we grow old enough to have children of our own. And I say, "Probably." But this is not the same as saying, "Yes."

When the astronaut David (he is not only wrestling with a golem but with a Goliath) takes control back from HAL, it is at precisely that moment when he is informed that his mission entails confronting the secret of the monolith which, unbeknownst to Dave or to Mission Control, is the very intelligence which caused us to be intelligent. We are, after all, God's golems. Once we pass the Golem Test ourselves, if we do, what is in store for us? Who knows? We should live so long.

Contact David

If you would like to discuss these thoughts with David, please email him at DavidJCoop@aol.com

Widescreen cinema by Tom Brown

Tom Brown's exhaustive work on Widescreen cinema has been an important feature of The Underview on 2001 since the early days. Whatever it is, if it's related to Widescreen, you will find it here (but it predates digital technology).

All work: Copyright © 1993, 1996-2001, 2008

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