2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

Film: 2001: A Space Odyssey

Director: Stanley Kubrick

Country: USA / UK

Released: April 1968

Runtime: 143 minutes

Genre: Science Fiction

Studio: Stanley Kubrick Productions

Influenced: George Lucas, Ridley Scott, James Cameron, Christopher Nolan, Kathryn Bigelow

Has there ever been a better marriage of sight and sound than the opening scene of this film, where the sun, earth and moon emerge in perfect symmetry to the tune of Richard Strauss’ Also Sprach Zarathustra? 2001: A Space Odyssey's special effects were created by Douglas Trumbull, who invented revolutionary new techniques for simulating zero gravity, for depicting space flight and for creating realistic landscapes. The result was a film that looked like nothing that had been seen on screen before. Instead of a traditional score, Kubrick chose classical music pieces that were already well-known, such as Johann Strauss II's The Blue Danube, giving the film an elevated sense of grandeur. 

Divided into four parts – The Dawn of Man, Jupiter Mission, Intermission and Jupiter & Beyond the Infinite – 2001: A Space Odyssey was conceived by Kubrick in collaboration with science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke. The two met in New York in 1964 and started discussing the possibility of making a science fiction film that would be both scientifically accurate and intellectually stimulating. Clarke had already written a short story called The Sentinel, which featured an alien artefact on the moon that had been left there by extraterrestrial beings. This story became the basis for the film's opening sequence, in which a mysterious black monolith is discovered on the moon.

We’re told that something has been found that was deliberately buried on the lunar Clavius Base 4 million years ago but we don’t know what it is. Then we see six astronauts approaching the same black monolith that the apes found. Suddenly the music becomes very harsh and atonal at this point, followed by a high pitch tone that precipitates a blackout on the screen. After an intermission, the story then jumps forward 18 months to the Jupiter mission, starting with an innovative shot of an astronaut jogging and boxing around a circular wheel. Thanks to the BBC World Tonight report, we find out more about the half a billion mile voyage of Discovery 1 to Jupiter, including forced hibernation of the astronauts.

As well as its technical brilliance, the movie is also a profound exploration of still relevant themes like human evolution, the role of technology in society and the nature of consciousness. The film begins with the dawn of humanity, as a tribe of apes discovers a mysterious black monolith that seems to give them a sudden surge of intelligence. The film then jumps ahead millions of years to a future in which space travel has become routine. The main character, Dr Dave Bowman, is sent on a mission to investigate the monolith, which has been discovered orbiting Jupiter. So much of the film is prescient about the future of technology, like the Picturephone booth that Dr Heywood Floyd uses to make a video call and the passport control process involving face and voice ID.

2001: A Space Odyssey also captures so well the very frightening prospect of how difficult it would be to live in a world where a super intelligent AI was no longer aligned with our goals and, in fact, actively working against us. Everything the astronauts do and say on the spaceship is under the surveillance of HAL 9000, a super computer that operates like a sixth member of the crew and which we're told is “foolproof and incapable of error". Yet there's something sinister about HAL’s voice ("I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that") and, in one BBC interview scene, HAL is asked if it experiences genuine emotion and we detect a sense of pride in its answers. HAL is able to lip read Dave’s secret conversation with fellow astronaut Frank and, in order to ensure it would not be disconnected, the AI takes the drastic measure of killing Frank. The scene where all we can hear is the breathing of the astronaut as he goes out to repair the satellite is incredibly intense. 

Kubrick also added a few comic moments, like the zoom out on the 10 instructions on how to use the zero gravity toilet, but the overall tone of the film is serious and enigmatic. After Dave travels through a mysterious star gate and experiences a surreal and psychedelic journey, he finds himself in an ornate neoclassical bedroom. He then sees versions of himself ageing rapidly until he appears as an old man, before finally being transformed into a star child, a glowing foetus-like entity floating in space. The film's final sequence, which takes place beyond the limits of human comprehension, has been interpreted in various ways, but it is generally seen as a meditation on the nature of consciousness and the potential for a future stage in human evolution. Kubrick actually gave his own explanation in 1980 (see below).