The movie IS a Monolith for its viewers; you were just supposed to sit closer to the screen to receive its enlightening effects.

The first step on the path to wisdom is realising that one is a fool.

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"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky

There are certainly people who insist that everyone agree with their viewpoint on the movie, but from my point of view, there usually seem to be more that push the "if you like it, you're wrong" position than the "if you dislike it, you're wrong" position.

I think it is clear there is a bit of perception issue, and not just from one side.

Oh, that's certainly true. I always have considered it a great science fiction film, and liked it for that reason. I never had any spiritual revelations, whatever intentions they might have had.

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I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

Disclaimer: Avatar is not an official NASA image and does not imply any specific interplanetary or interstellar capability.

The Leif Ericson Cruiser

It has never bothered me if people do not like 2001. Same goes for any film though I may wonder why a re make is raved at yet the original is forgotten and that may be a far better film.

One film I thought was a scream when I was younger comes under the name of "Dark Star". I had the opportunity a few years ago to see it again I had to wonder why I thought it hilarious the first time around. Whilst I still enjoyed it, the memory I think tried to let me know it was a side splitter when in fact it was a rib tickler.

Impressions change and tastes vary. Dull world otherwise.

I believe you. Even though I used your initial post to this thread as an inspiration for my first reply, I did not mean to criticise you directly. Your post was quite measured and reasonable, except for one thing: you complained about the elitist attitude of some 2001 fans, but never noticed that in this thread no such opinions were expressed. On the contrary, several of the replies to this thread (not yours) were rather crudely scornful of 2001 ("It's lame!" -- can you think of a lamer criticism?)

I just found it, well... shortsighted... to complain about the snobbery of 2001 fans in a thread where such snobbery was nowhere to be seen, while there were actually several examples of gratuitous 2001 egging, which is at least just as obnoxious.

Or, as Van Rijn explained more concisely, above:

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"A witty saying proves nothing" Voltaire.
"All your bias are belong to us" Ara Pacis.

But I wasn't complaining about snobbery in this thread. I can't remember if there was any in evidence before my original statement, and whether I noticed there wasn't any (or not) is entirely unrelated to my making the statement in the first place. I was talking about the snobbery associated with the film in general.

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I offer a complete and utter retraction. The imputation was totally without basis in fact, was in no way fair comment and was motivated purely by malice. I deeply regret any distress that my comments may have caused you or your family, and I hereby undertake not to repeat any such slander at any time in the future.

I think that qualifier "in general" is in your mind alone. Most people who like 2001 just like it. They (we) don't use it as an argument of superiority.

Furthermore, many intellectual film snobs do not like 2001. They think it's too science fictiony, and complain that we didn't have regular space flights to the Moon in the real year 2001.

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"A witty saying proves nothing" Voltaire.
"All your bias are belong to us" Ara Pacis.

That's your opinion. It is not mine, and does not match my experience. Also, it's not all fans of the film, merely a small subset of snobs who try to use it as an argument of superiority.
Yes, I've seen that too.

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I offer a complete and utter retraction. The imputation was totally without basis in fact, was in no way fair comment and was motivated purely by malice. I deeply regret any distress that my comments may have caused you or your family, and I hereby undertake not to repeat any such slander at any time in the future.

Then the qualifier "in general" is hardly justified, is it?

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"A witty saying proves nothing" Voltaire.
"All your bias are belong to us" Ara Pacis.

Kubrick was American, but the film was made at Shepperton in England.

I agree with Jason that the middle segment of the film is deliberately banal. To me, it is a reprise of the prehumans gathering around the monolith, examining something they cannot possibly understand. The great joke was having everyone gather in front of it to have their picture taken.

And, yes, it helps to see (as I've said elsewhere) it in Cinerama. Watching it on a television screen really doesn't help.

I always felt the film had to be judged as completely separate from the novelization, since Kubrick and Clarke had, um, differing views of the human species. Consider 'Paths of Glory', 'The Shining' or 'A Clockwork Orange'. When the Star Child appears in the final scene and looks out at the audience, for all I know it is thinking, "You're next."

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If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about the answers.

Are you actually intentionally misrepresenting/misunderstanding almost everything I say? It's becoming increasingly tiresome, and I am increasingly disinclined to continue this utterly pointless discussion.

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I offer a complete and utter retraction. The imputation was totally without basis in fact, was in no way fair comment and was motivated purely by malice. I deeply regret any distress that my comments may have caused you or your family, and I hereby undertake not to repeat any such slander at any time in the future.

If I am misrepresenting some of what you've said, it's not intentionally (and most certainly not "almost everything" you say -- a bit of hyperbole there). What have I misrepresented?

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"A witty saying proves nothing" Voltaire.
"All your bias are belong to us" Ara Pacis.

Can you people stop arguing about who said what when and maybe get back to the subject?

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"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky

Good idea.

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Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by ignorance or stupidity.
Isaac Asimov

That's what I was wondering.

Personally I prefer the novel.

I like the novel, but I probably prefer the movie as the more "official" depiction. Jupiter and an orbiting monolith is more interesting than Saturn and a monolith on "Japetus" in my book.

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"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky

My son (the essential 18-year-old) tells me the review was totally tongue in cheek, and asked how old people like me could possibly see it as straight.

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If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about the answers.

I'm just the opposite: Completely prefer the Saturn/"Japetus" setting.

Just a thought. I really enjoyed the book and still dip into it once in a while. Maybe that the film brings up the memories of the book that you enjoyed and that makes the film more pleasurable.

Just been perusing my collection and thought "Dune" for a change. The TV series that is. Now I know the effects are low key but I enjoy it as the book and the series complement each other to an extent. At least for me anyway.

I also realise the on line reviews can be very subjective.

In the first draft of Conspiracy Wars, there was a dialog something like this:
But I cut it because it added nothing to the story

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I want to go back to the moon.
I don't care which rocket you use, whichever one you pick, I'll like it, I swear.
"If you think the LHC will create black holes, you might as well believe Hobbits are at the bottom of your garden."- Dr. Mike Inglis
Rovers forever! - ToSeek

Same. I suppose I should be flogged for admitting I've read neither The Sentinel or 2010.

I caught enough from the beginning of 2063 to catch up with some elements of 2010, including the Tsien landing, but I have no specific knowledge at all about 2001 in text.

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The last time I felt a warm fuzzy feeling, I was informed by my doctor that it was just gas.

I read the Sentinal and 2001 (the book felt more like "hard science fiction" than the movie). The Sentinal was a decent story, but I liked 2001 a lot. I was going to say I hadn't read 2010, then I realized I had, but it just didn't make much impression on me. I deliberately avoided the books in the series after that.

__________________
I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

Disclaimer: Avatar is not an official NASA image and does not imply any specific interplanetary or interstellar capability.

The Leif Ericson Cruiser

2063 was pretty good. 3001...read it once, the concept wasn't bad, it was just very blandly executed.

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The last time I felt a warm fuzzy feeling, I was informed by my doctor that it was just gas.

I read "The Sentinel." It was okay. And either it's not true that people either love or hate 2001 or I'm a rare exception. I neither loved nor hated it. I liked it, but I didn't love it.

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

That reminds me of dialogue in a story I abandoned long ago:

"Who are you?"

"I am St Christopher."

"Don't you mean Saint Christopher?"

"No."


2061, in fact. (They all have a 1 in the year.)

Ack yeah, 2061: Odyssey Three. Mad that lesdyxia, sorry...

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The last time I felt a warm fuzzy feeling, I was informed by my doctor that it was just gas.

The Sentinel and the first two books are worth reading, even (or especially) if you did not like the films. Reading Clarke is a different experience from watching Kubrick or Hyams.

I don't normally bother with novelisations, but 2001 was probably one of the first in science fiction (before novelisation became a mass industry), and it's both well written and different from the filmed version in interesting ways. 2010 wasn't even a novelisation; the film was based on it.

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"A witty saying proves nothing" Voltaire.
"All your bias are belong to us" Ara Pacis.

I probably prefer the novel 2010 to the movie. Hyams simply couldn't match the perfectionism of Kubrick, and all sorts of little inconsistancies between the two movies get to me.
Gravity in particular suffers - after the first scene of the two astronauts walking on the wall of the pod bay in Discovery people act like there is regular gravity there in a later scene. All the velcro on the floor of the pod bay and the tool locker next to it has turned into just flat surfaces. Floyd has a conversation with the Russian captain on the bridge of the Leonov as if he's in normal gravity, then he puts a pen in mid-air.
All the displays on Discovery are suddenly rounded TV screens instead of the flat-screen displays shown in 2001 (acheived through rear-projection screens). And the little "HAL 9000" sign is now lit up on all his terminals.

I like the movie, but these little things bug me when I watch it.

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"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky

Hey, in this post-Braveheart world, a movie can have bad history, bad science, bad anything - I'm still not going to watch it if Mel Gibson's in it.

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Science is like sex. Sometimes something useful comes out, but that is not the reason we are doing it.
-- Richard Feynman

Mel Gibson isn't in Apocolypto.
And a world in which one can't watch Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome would be a very poor world indeed.

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"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky