Odin’s Insights into 2001: A Space Odyssey
What does the Kubrickian masterpiece tell us about the future we inhabit?
Kubrick’s earlier success of Dr. Strangelove catapulted the director into the public eye, but 2001: A Space Odyssey was by no means a perfect storm for critics or audiences in 1968. The slow pacing would become a hallmark Kubrickian artifact, but it tried the patience of the casual viewer to the breaking point.
I remember first watching the film as a child and being struck by certain powerful moments: the apes in the beginning, certain sequences between HAL and Dave, the Velcro-slippered flight attendant in the orbital shuttle. There are gulfs between those fiery snapshots. Was I bored? I honestly don’t remember, but I suspect that my experience was something more akin to a trance.
When the film premiered, the great artistic savants of the era like David Bowie and John Lennon immediately understood its potency. For one thing, the transcendent visuals were like nothing that had come before.
