Fifty years ago today Stanley Kubrick’s 2001 A Space Odyssey took audiences into the future
More than a year before men landed on the moon director Stanley Kubrick took humanity into the depths of space
NSW
Don't miss out on the headlines from NSW. Followed categories will be added to My News.
More than a year before man first landed on the moon, Stanley Kubrick’s imagination had the human race exploring the depths of space in 2001: A Space Odyssey. The director’s timeless masterpiece premiered 50 years ago today, at The Uptown Theater in Washington, D.C.
Kubrick had crafter the original screenplay together with visionary science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke. It was, in part, a convincing glimpse into humanity’s future congruent with the forewarnings of Issac Asimov’s I Robot series a decade before.
Following the critical success of his film Dr Strangelove in 1964, Kubrick began to speculate his next feature. Reaching out to Roger Caras the vice president of his production company, Hawk Films, Kubrick expressed his wish to create a film exploring extraterrestrial life.
Caras contacted Arthur C. Clarke, cabling: “Stanley Kubrick — “Dr Strangelove,” “Paths of Glory,” et cetera, interested in doing film on ETs. Interested in you. Are you interested? Thought you were recluse.” Clarke replied: “Frightfully interested in working with enfant terrible. Contact my agent. What makes Kubrick think I’m a recluse.”
And so began a collaboration which would end with one of the most critically acclaimed films of all time, and a novel of the same name by Clarke, released shortly after the film premiere. 2001: A Space Odyssey was budgeted at $6 million — a hefty investment in 1965 when it was first financed. However it had blown out to $10.5 million by the time it was released three years later.
Kubrick engaged multiple experts to create 2001, in order to hone the most believable of science fiction tales. He discussed the imagery of extraterrestrials with astrophysicist Carl Sagan, consulted NASA’s future projects employee Harry Lange and hired its former chief of space information systems, Frederick Ordway.
Ordway was an aerospace engineer who helped design the Saturn V rocket, and was instrumental in the creation of the film’s authentic space ship sets. Kubrick and Clarke initially referred to the film as “How the Solar System Was Won”, later using the working title of “Project: Space”. But the time it was in production, Kubrick had settled on “2001: A Space Odyssey”. A homage to Homer’s Odyssey, the film explores humanity’s journey to explore space and understand the origins of man.
Beginning with the dawn of man, viewers are shown great apes awakening upon the discovery of a monolith looming from the ground. In a seemingly abstract shift, the apes are inspired and learn to use bones as tools to defend themselves.
Kubrick fast forwards millennia, to 2001 when United States spacecraft Discover One is headed for Jupiter, after another monolith has been discovered, supposedly created by an intelligent alien race.
On duty astronauts Dr David Bowman (Kei Dullea) and Dr Frank Poole (Gary Lockwood), along with three others in suspended animation, lead the mission with the assistance of HAL the ship’s artificially intelligent computer.
Kubrick explored multiple themes in the film, including the philosophical dilemma of charging computers with cognition — much like Asimov’s forewarnings in his robot series. The meaning of the film, and in particular, its dreamlike finale, which ends with the birth of a ‘starchild’, continue to be contested. Kubrick and Clarke left that to the viewer. In an interview with Playboy in 1968, Kubrick said: “You’re free to speculate as you wish about the philosophical and allegorical meaning of the film — and such speculation is one indication that it has succeeded in gripping the audience at a deep level — but I don’t want to spell out a verbal road map for 2001 that every viewer will obligated to pursue or else fear he’s missed the point.”
Visually, the film was also a watershed moment. Its futuristic sequences, psychedelic hues and elaborate special effects continue to be lauded by the film industry, much of which was attributable to special effects artist Douglas Trumbull.
In her review of the film on April 4, 1968, in the Daily News, Kathleen Carroll summed its effect. “It becomes a trip. The psychedelic effect of being hurtled via Cinema through what look like two neon-lit streets compressed into a tube, through exploding blobs, over luminescent canyons, is stunning.”
The 50th anniversary of Kubrick’s magnum opus will be marked by a screening at the Cannes Film Festival on May 12, with Kubrick’s daughter, Katharina, in attendance.
ADF’s newest missile fired for the first time amid China threat
The United States is “actively designing” its army to confront China, with President Trump’s top army official declaring a new long-range missile test in the Northern Territory sends a clear message of deterrence.
Disgraced MP Gareth Ward walks off jail time worries
Convicted NSW MP Gareth Ward has spent what could be one of his last days of freedom walking to Kings Cross police station where he is required to check in daily as part of his bail conditions.