2001: A Space Odyssey
Stanley Kubrick stated after
the release of the film that he had created a film that has intended to bypass
the conscious rationalisation of its audience and to sink straight into the
unconscious
Various interpretations of
the films: a bold statement about
mankind’s evolutions to the stars.
A propaganda films to
increase the public support to the US moon landings, that came shortly after
the film’s release
It is like a cinematic rubix
cube (complicated)
Kubrick’s films affected the
audiences directly through unconscious symbols (semiotics and steganography- is the art and science of writing hidden
messages in such a way that no one, apart from the sender and intended
recipient)
The
art of encoding hidden messages within a seemingly unrelated context, Kubrick
was a master of these skills
Steganalysis is the art of decoding
such hidden messages
Same haunting music played every time a
evolutionary step is being taken in the film, the apes encounter monolith in
the dawn of man, when astronauts encounter second monolith in moon, the third
when
the character David encounter another
near Jupiter.
Music is the singing voice of the monolith (A monolith is a geological feature consisting of
a single massive stone or rock, such
as some mountains, or a single piece of rock placed as, or within, a
monument. Erosion usually exposes the geological formations, which are most
often made of very hard and solid metamorphic or Igneous
rock.)
The music Is played few
places too which audiences fail to notice, at the beginning of the film over a
black screen, and intermission just before the astronaut do the battle with
Hall 9000 computer, again over a black screen. Why the black screen? In the book by Arthur C. Clark book, the
monolith is described as a pyramid shaped piece of polished mineral surrounded
by spherical force field. Kubrick changed this to a black rectangular box,
because the monolith is representation of the cinema screen itself. The
dimension of the monolith turned 90 degrees almost fit the wide screen cinema
frame of which the film was shot.
S during the film opening and
intermission we are not looking at an empty black screen, but rather the
surface of monolith “ the monolith is the film screen” and its singing directly
at its audience the same way with the ape-men and astronauts.
For over 40 years’ people
watching the film not realizing they are staring at the monolith.
“The film itself is a Star
gate and we are its subject”
Space
Odyssey now has literal meaning, refers to as special relationship between a
screen, the audience and the audience surroundings.
The scene we see the camera
moves several meters outside the room (we see the view into the room as if we
are looking into a window/ 3D effect) if you see the dimension of the room and
the monolith when turned 90degrees we see they are in same aspect ratio. This
brings back the point of the monolith representing the cinema screen
