"Not a Space Movie" 2001: A Space Odyssey Review

By Cliff Yung on November 24, 2014

as found on imdb.com

This film is not about space. It may be tempting to call 2001: A Space Odyssey a space film but I would argue otherwise. It uses space and space exploration; and uses it extremely well, but, this film is not about space.

Space is used here as a mere plot device to drive Stanley Kubrick’s point home. The film is trying to illustrate and question humanities understanding of what exactly knowledge is. Just a warning, 2001: A Space Odyssey is an odd film and gets metaphysical or works against rational thought. So, expect it to get pretty weird especially by the end.

Stanley Kubrick was able to fantastically create pseudo-realistic world that takes direct conscious to the film’s central idea of the question of knowledge. The opening “The Dawn of Man” introduces the viewer directly the pseudo-realistic atmosphere that Kubrick takes advantage of for the rest of the film. First the apes or the pre-humans are extremely close to the tapirs. This relationship inherently is not likely to happen in this extent in contemporary understanding but, it is still there is a possibility that this might be true. The extent of possibility is taken advantaged of and contrasted against the impossibility in the idea of the “Black Monolith” presented in the latter part of the opening.

The tapirs
as found on madmind.de

That is central to this film, possibility. The events in the film are possible and can happen. This framework of thinking is not enough to understand the complexity of the film. Possibility and impossibility does well to explain the conscious and visual development of the pseudo realistic reality Kubrick attempts to convey which then helps ratifies later of inconclusive elements within the film. To explain and illustrate ‘humanities understanding of what exactly knowledge is,’ another two words would have to be employed, the rational and the irrational. Though the two pairs of words are similar, but, they attempt to describe two different phenomena. Simply, possibility and impossibility are too vague and too binary to understand the Kubrick’s point.

A very brief introduction to the words rational and the word irrational is that these ideas were conceived under the strain of western knowledge during the Enlightenment. Rational and irrational worked to create a dichotomy between what is knowledge and what is not actually knowledge. I would highly suggest tracing moments of thought that are considered rational and those that are considered irrational look at it again. This time, however, try to understand the irrational as though they were rational. It may be hard to do this, so, try creating your own rules to rationalize the irrational thought in the film.

HAL 9000 the most irrational rational being
as found on engadget.com

Space is used in this film to embody the lack of comprehension. It is the last frontier by all accounts (Star Trek and many other Space related media). It is mysterious and often beyond normal understanding to both the visual, spiritual, and the physical during this time. Kubrick uses these affects to rearrange thought rather than purposefully using Space to illustrate its importance to the actual development of the plot. Though the altercation between HAL 9000 and Dave Bowman used space to move the plot along, the object of space is not essential to understanding the film. HAL 9000′s actions are much more important as well as the actions and reactions of the other two scientists.

The Black Monolith and the “room” is well has a lot of interpretations. Under my framework, of the rational and irrational as understood by the western construct of knowledge, the highbrow or considered the epitome of western culture is embodied within the “room.” The naked statues, the realism of the paintings in the background, and the meal all are symbols of this culture. The construct of this room is then contrasted against the Black Monolith which throughout the movie has always been a construct of a different form of knowledge (this includes Hal). The contrast thus suggests the underlining difference between the rational, that of western knowledge, and the irrational, knowledge outside of the sphere of western knowledge.

The Black Monolith in the “room”
as found on fusionanomaly.net

2001: A Space Odyssey attempts and succeeds at delivering the heavy disillusionment of knowledge. This is only one way of seeing the film. Definitely, the movie is open to interpretation. Writing this movie as a space film may be the wrong way of looking at this film. However, this film is still considered one of the defining space films out there and for good reason. The cinematography for the space sequences are exceptional and definitely warrant itself to be considered one of the best Sci-fi, space, films out there. I will agree that this is one of the defining “space films” unlike how Interstellar tried to be. Nonetheless, the lack of consideration of the first and last acts of the film is largely ignored looking at this film through this lens. For me at least, 2001: A Space Odyssey is not a space film.

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