2001: A Space Oddity: Stanley Kubrick had it so wrong.

[Fred Sanders]

Last edited Sun Sep 21, 2014, 01:29 PM - Edit history (2)

In 1968 he shared his vision for 2001:



Instead, in 2014 we got this, not bad, but just saying:



And the one clear reason is this:


?w=700

....................

Stanley, I am so sorry.

[Atman]

1. I own in Blu Ray of 2001. SFX is 2001 is as good as it gets.

To this day, the 1968 sfx using nothing but models is still far more realistic and beautiful than anything in the Star Wars movies. There was a certain purity to it, as well as a certain realism achieved by the use of scale models that CGI just doesn't achieve. I guess it's kind of like the vinyl/digital music argument.

[Action_Patrol]

20. Star Wars used models.

Unless you are speaking of the prequels which were awful.

[Atman]

23. The first couple of them did.

I own the original versions, where you can see all the matte lines. They cleaned up all that crap in re-releases, until CGI became the norm.

[Action_Patrol]

25. I've got them too

Preferred the original versions.

[Eleanors38]

35. Even the rescue pod's "moving" gauges were conventional...

I read where John Whitney was turned down for doing the effects (they would have been computer-generated) for 2001. Whitney created for Saul Bass the wonderful title spirals for Vertigo (Hitchcock, '58), considered to be the first feature-length movie with CG effects. Whitney employed a rebuilt M-5 anti-aircraft auto-cannon director (full-blown analog computer) to paint the Lissajous curves. The machine was military surplus by 1955. Similar devices operated the automated .50 machine gun turrets on B-29s. No one "manned" the guns.

Google video vertigo credits, select "art of the title."

[nationalize the fed]

2. We can still make him proud

Humans aren't extinct yet. Although we've pretty much devolved into the opening scenes of 2001.









RIP Stanley Kubrick. A Legend. One who changed Cinema forever. Too bad Speilberg farked up his last project. Was looking forward to that ever since the rumours. He could have made it something like 2001. Something people would have never forgotten.

[postulater]

3. What was the project Spielberg farked up?

[nationalize the fed]

4. A.I.

[postulater]

7. Never heard of it. Had to look it up.

No wonder.

Thanks.

[nationalize the fed]

9. Exactly. ~30 years in the making and most of those who saw it can't even remember it

[FSogol]

17. A.I. is a really underrated movie. Jude Law's performance as a robotic gigolo with an outdated

work permit makes it worth watching on its own. The movie can be creepy, scary, and wonderful in the same scenes and is more unpredictable than anything Spielberg ever attempted. As technology improves, humanity is going the other way. You should check it out.

[Frank Cannon]

33. Agreed. AI was not perfect, but it wasn't bad.

It suffers from the usual over-the-top Spielbergisms (e.g., Robin Williams as the voice of the Q&A computer), but it has decent acting and a compelling story. Like Starship Troopers, I think a lot of people just don't "get it".

[Action_Patrol]

19. Blame Kubrick

Every idea in it was Kubrick's. If you didn't like it, blame him.

[edbermac]

29. I liked A.I., very underrated.

Nice analysis here

http://thepaincomics.com/A.I.pdf

[leeroysphitz]

21. I thought A.I. was a touching and thought provoking film.

We'll never know what it could have been but I wouldn't call it farked up.

[gratuitous]

26. I don't know that Spielberg messed up A.I.

I have said in other venues that Kubrick never made A.I. for a simple reason: The story is fucking incomprehensible. From the get-go, you have a perfect little robot boy, 8 years old. He never ages, never matures, never goes from third grade to fourth grade. He's 8 years old forever. Nobody would invite this little monster into their homes. Nobody. Sure, it seems all right when you're 32, pining for the boy who nearly drowned and is in a coma. But think about it: When you're 42, roboboy is still 8 When you're 55, roboboy is . . . 8 years old. You're 67 and making your way through the living room when you stub your toes on the coffee table. You're hopping your way to the medicine cabinet when little Marblehead proudly shows you his latest creation in the never-ending "Mommy and Me" series and get out of my way, you little shit!

I think Kubrick couldn't get around that first insuperable obstacle to start in on a story. Spielberg took what Kubrick had done, and tried to realize Kubrick's vision. But there wasn't a vision; there's wasn't a story; there wasn't a movie. Spielberg should have walked away.

[zappaman]

28. I work in the film industry and can tell you a story...

I love Kubrick. One of the greatest directors ever.
Anyway, the word was that AI, if it was filmed as written, would have a budget close to 200 million. Back in those days(early 90s) Warner Brothers said "no way"...certainly not for a Kubrick movie.
They told him they would only green light it if he made a movie with a certain "star" that really wanted to work with him. Kubrick ended up working with that "star" so he could do AI.

And that's how we got EYES WIDE SHUT.

[Frank Cannon]

34. Harlan Ellison handled this subject very well...

In his story "Jeffty is Five". Maybe Stan and Steve should have read it.

[Orrex]

5. Cygnet Committee is a terrific song.

Wait. Wrong Space Oddity.

[hack89]

6. Military spending is 4.7% of GDP

It should be reduced but it is not the reason 2001 did not come true.

[Fred Sanders]

8. A trillion dollars a year, a trillion on one fighter jet, yes, it is a massive part of the reason,

and for so many other nice things America never had.

Comparing anything to the national GDP creates an illusion of cheapness, it is bad form.

[n2doc]

10. Imagine what 4-8 trillion would have done for the space program, science, health….

Even taking less than 1/2 of the last 2 decades military spending would yield 4 trillion. And we still would have vastly outspent every other country on earth. Money flushed down the rathole of the MIC.

[edbermac]

11. Kubrick had it so right

Not much difference between the apes fighting over territory and the current state of the world today

On edit: And he DID NOT film the moon landing!

[Archae]

16. That satellite the bone changed into was a weapon too.

An orbital nuke.

[Iggo]

12. Odyssey.

Oddity was Bowie.

[Fred Sanders]

13. Thanks, I think.

[BrotherIvan]

14. The one thing that Kubrick regretted was that the Earth looked wrong

He decided to make space bright, which was an aesthetic choice, but many at the time told him space is a black void. The view of Earth in 2001 shows a bright, pastel blue planet. When they eventually did make it into space, they realized that it is bright, but that Earth was even more vivid and colorful than anyone could imagine.

His thought processes and system to develop a film are truly impossible in today's studio system. Also, the magnitude of the film was only realized after being in the theaters for nearly a year, with people getting high or dropping acid and sitting in the front row. As usual, most critics were less than complementary. In the way we have films come and go in two weeks, 2001 would have been completely forgotten.

Kubrick was arguably one of the greatest directors that ever lived. Though a lot of people feel his movies were rather cold and stark, each of his films are his own and have gone on to influence just about everyone. He was a right bastard to work for, but the next time around, everyone said yes because it meant they could do their very best work.

And yes, we have abandoned the space race in favor of war and weapons, which only speeds our decay as a country and as a species. When we decided that exploration was not worth as much as making money and blowing shit up, we turned into Rome. Sad, really, we had a lot of potential.

[Silent3]

15. It'll be a long, long time until we have a space station like that, even with a 10X NASA budget...

...because sustained microgravity environments are such a rare and valuable thing. Only with plenty of other space activity going on, and much lower-cost lift capability, will we indulge in rotating space stations that create artificial gravity for the comfort of travelers, travelers who aren't in space with the intention of spending plenty of time in microgravity environments anyway.

[Recursion]

31. Manned space exploration is something of a boondoggle

One of the reasons we quit doing as much of it is because we couldn't come up with a good justification for it.

[ThoughtCriminal]

22. The Future...

Approximate size comparison of "Space Station V" from 2001: A Space Odyssey to the International Space Station (2006).

http://thoughtcrimewave.blogspot.com/2008/02/future.html

[Boom Sound 416]

24. Yes. That's exaclty the reason

[brooklynite]

27. Certainly mistaken to work with TWA and Pan Am...

[Recursion]

30. Two problems

1. Military spending is still stimulative

2. Most of our space program was developed through the military anyways

[DetlefK]

32. No, the reason is that there's no money to be made in space.

If we found minable rare metals on the moon, what do you think how long it would take for Big Money to set up mining-stations there?

There is no reason for humans to be in space, other than to conduct scientific experiments. Shooting things into space is expensive and we don't need infrastructure up there.