I can't be the only one who thought this movie was stupid.

MotherMemories wades through a creepily obsessive pool of drowning thoughts.

"gonna throw, my raincoat in the river...gonna toss, my umbrella in the sea"...Sammy Turner.

it is merely a matter of taste we are discussing

Indeed. I hope, for your sake, that you strive to broaden your tastes. What you may be missing about this film is that it is utterly unique in the annals of film. There has never been anything like it before or since. It strikes me you approach it as you would any one of a host of other films which aren't unique in the way this film is. But you'll never get anywhere judging a totally unique film by the standards of films which aren't especially unique.

Let me put it in another way. You are probably "deciphering" this film as if it were in one language where in truth it's in an entirely different one. Let's say you watched a movie in a foreign language you didn't understand at all, and it was a movie without subtitles. Apart from how it looked, and what few physical clues you might pick up from the performances, how much would you get out of it?

2001 is just such a film. Its advantage is the language it's in is one of almost pure visual information, something that anyone can grasp whatever language they speak, so long as they apply their mind to that language. If you stop trying to understand the movie solely from its dialogue and actively plug your mind into its rich visual information, IMO you'd get a whole lot more out of it.

ad hominems aren't necessary

I said your opinion was "uninformed and meaningless." This isn't a description of you as a person. If it were, that would make the comment an ad hominem. But it's not; it only describes an opinion you've presented.

Opinions aren't written in stone. They aren't "who you are."


Religion is like a rocking chair -- a lot of work to get nowhere.

P.S. Here's Kubrick's own explanation:

GELMIS: The final scenes of the film seemed more metaphorical than realistic. Will you discuss them -- or would that be part of the "road map" you're trying to avoid?

KUBRICK: No, I don't mind discussing it, on the lowest level, that is, straightforward explanation of the plot. You begin with an artifact left on earth four million years ago by extraterrestrial explorers who observed the behavior of the man-apes of the time and decided to influence their evolutionary progression. Then you have a second artifact buried deep on the lunar surface and programmed to signal word of man's first baby steps into the universe -- a kind of cosmic burglar alarm. And finally there's a third artifact placed in orbit around Jupiter and waiting for the time when man has reached the outer rim of his own solar system.

When the surviving astronaut, Bowman, ultimately reaches Jupiter, this artifact sweeps him into a force field or star gate that hurls him on a journey through inner and outer space and finally transports him to another part of the galaxy, where he's placed in a human zoo approximating a hospital terrestrial environment drawn out of his own dreams and imagination. In a timeless state, his life passes from middle age to senescence to death. He is reborn, an enhanced being, a star child, an angel, a superman, if you like, and returns to earth prepared for the next leap forward of man's evolutionary destiny.

That is what happens on the film's simplest level. Since an encounter with an advanced interstellar intelligence would be incomprehensible within our present earthbound frames of reference, reactions to it will have elements of philosophy and metaphysics that have nothing to do with the bare plot outline itself.

GELMIS: What are those areas of meaning?

KUBRICK: They are the areas I prefer not to discuss because they are highly subjective and will differ from viewer to viewer. In this sense, the film becomes anything the viewer sees in it. If the film stirs the emotions and penetrates the subconscious of the viewer, if it stimulates, however inchoately, his mythological and religious yearnings and impulses, then it has succeeded. (Gelmis, The Film Director as Superstar, 1970, p. 304.)

SFMZ, you're a darn good assistant too! The next time I watch this on my SmartPhone, I'll have you over for some WhiteLightnin' and we'll give some to the alligators. They'll light up like StarGators, gnawing on my fresh 'mators.

"gonna throw, my raincoat in the river...gonna toss, my umbrella in the sea"...Sammy Turner.

I understand not getting/liking it...but stupid? What do you look for in a film?

Life isn't satisfying - no monolith magic for us, I'm afraid. Only in films, only in dreams..


Maybe take some drugs (weed, booze...lsd if you're bold enough) and watch it again. It will blow your mind.



Buy The Ticket, Take The Ride

I think specifically the fact that the concept seemed to be so open to interpretation that there wasn't much continuity in the responses. I love open ended movies, but I do like there to be enough laid out in the film to come to an intelligent conclusion; movies that leave you with questions but don't expect you to interpret the entire film. Again, I am in the obvious minority of people who didn't get much out of this so maybe I just didn't catch some of what the movie was trying to convey.

I think you're right and "stupid" was the wrong term to define this.

The HAL storyline is the most accessible. Something to think on if you will. At the basic plot level the movie tells the same story four times. The HAL sequence is the third of the four.