2001: A Space Odyssey

[Gaff87]

I'd love a 13" EVA pod, will never get one though Not at that price.
It'd be cheaper to get a replica suit i think and i really want one of those!!

[phase pistol]

Quire right Steevy. "2001" is part of the "pre-Apollo" science fiction genre, which took "for granted" that we would land on the moon, establish colonies, on to Mars, and conquer the Solar System by no later than the early 21st Century.

In fact, if you could go back to 1964, when "2001' was being planned, and you could tell Stanley Kubrick and his team, how things ultimately turned out, I bet they would be quite surprised!

So "2001" is not wild speculation. It was a rational extrapolation from trends as they were understood at the time. History just took a different course.

This is more apparent in the book, but in the world of "2001", Mankind has very firmly established a presence in space. There's Space Station Five (implying four others), which is regularly serviced by Pan Am spaceplanes from Earth. The Aries !B craft, also operated by Pan Am, make regular runs to the big US Moonbase at Clavius. There is also at least one Soviet Moonbase.

The book implies manned exploration of Venus and Mars is underway. The Discovery is actually just supposed to be the latest interplanetary probe ship, but it has been reassigned to carry a team of astronauts to Jupiter (Saturn in the book) to investigate the Monolith's radio signal.

[Mr Webber]

Your passion for the original is great Karl and i agree with everything you say but i still think you should give it a look Neil, just to tick it off the list.
Im a big fan of Peter Hyams work and although he dropped the ball on this, the poor bastard was on a hiding to nothing taking this on after the
vast achievments of the original.
Take the Phanthom Menace for an example, if any other director served that up to us, they would never work again. When the pod race started
with an American style sports announcer style skit, my heart sank.
Not that i have anything against American sports presentation, I watch more of it than local stuff but it does not belong in my SW universe.
Yet, a must see for sci-fi fans. If you havent seen them already Neil, checkout John Carpenters "They Live" and "The Thing" and Peter Hyams "Capricorn One" and while im at it have a look for Saturn3, horrible flic but i think the sets and art direction were pretty cool.
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Formerly offworld66

[Gaff87]

[SKIN JOB 66]

Regarding the books devoted to 2001 and Kubrick's films I totaly agree with Karl's list, those are MUST HAVE !!!
BTW, Taschen re-released their impressive KUBRICK ARCHIVES in reduced format (and price) last September...

I should add CINEFEX issue 85, great infos on the sfx to be found in those pages (as always).

We french people are lucky because we also have Michel Ciment's impressive KUBRICK, don't know if it was translated in english... Ciment met Kubrick a few times and his analysis of each film is impressive, very sharp. Not an easy book but worth reading it from beginning to end !

I also like LES INROCKUPTIBLES mag Kubrick special issue... Great cover and good review of Kubrick's oeuvre released a few days after he passed away...

Fred

PS :If you really love 2001, read Stephen Hawkins' book "A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes", you'll love it too !


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THE FUTURE IS A THING OF THE PAST

[phase pistol]

An interesting sideshow to all this is LEMON magazine issue no. 3, which they renamed CLOCKWORK LEMON for the special issue...



It has a couple of articles "on" 2001, but mostly "about" the film not how it was made. Plus a bit on Jack Kirby's 2001 comic.

Yes that's right, Jack Kirby did the "official" comic book adaptation of "2001"...



Which is pretty mind-blowing in and of itself... there's a large format comic of the adaptation, but Kirby went on for a number of issues, telling ORIGINAL stories in the "2001" universe... mostly involving groups of apes, or astronauts on weird space missions.

[Gaff87]

Theres a few 2001 comics on the bay at the moment. Starting bid is 99p.

[phase pistol]

A few more super rare shots... Kubrick rehearsing the actors in the TMA-1 pit (note cloud of smoke and cigarettes everywhere... )



And... action.



Super rare shot showing how they filmed the weightlessness... actors hung from cables, with the camera on the floor shooting upwards... the actors thus hid their own cable, and appeared to be weightless!

[The Loyalizer]

Isn't this the same technique they used in Alien when the creature gets ejected out the back of the shuttle?
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"We began to recognize in them a strange obsession..."

http://fcomin.cgsociety.org/gallery/

[phase pistol]

Well 2001 did it first...

But in the case of ALIEN, the creature was harpooned by the spear gun, so it was actually "hanging" from a rope to the shuttle. It took the "invisible" technique from 2001 and made it literal.

[Gaff87]

Great pictures Karl! Looks like Kubrick is wearing the space boots aswell.

[phase pistol]

As far as analysis of 2001, I found this book very interesting (although it should probably not be your first choice, instead see the other books I listed above):

Kubrick's 2001: A Triple Allegory by Leonard F. Wheat



Wheat claims that 2001 is actually three narratives superimposed: the story of the events in the film, obviously, but also a retelling of the ancient Greek story of Odysseus, and a third layer, the story of Nietzche's Zarathustra.

Whether these parallels are deliberate or unconscious, only Kubrick could have said!

There is in fact a "making of" 2001 book, but it mostly collects stories and essays from other books (which I already have in my collection). But if you want a streamlined single volume that's mostly text, you could seek out

The Making of 2001: A Space Odyssey by Stephanie Schwam



Here is reprinted for the umpteenth time, Arthur C Clarke's short story "The Sentinel" (which was the germ of the idea of 2001, the finding of an ancient artifact on the Moon). There are also chapters that have been previously pubished in "Lost Worlds of 2001" and "Filming the Future", among other places.

[Mr Webber]

Gaff87 wrote:

[joberg]

Right you are Tim

[Gaff87]

Good call Tim!

[SKIN JOB 66]

Yep, good eye Tim !



Fred
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THE FUTURE IS A THING OF THE PAST

[Gaff87]

I was flicking through TV channels last night and saw something familiar...

http://www.veoh.com/browse/videos/category/music/watch/v15927506FwEEWYtB

[joberg]

Good find Gaff...nice c.g. by the way, notice how they transformed some of the details of the Aries-1B

[Gaff87]

I was just a bit shocked to see it in a new'ish music video. Will need to take another look i think

[phase pistol]

Whoa! Super Seventies.

Well you know last December was the 40th anniversary of the release of 2001! So it might have penetrated into the consciousness, a little.

- k