2001: A Space Odyssey revisited

[MaxCathedral]

I was thinking of my favorite sci films....Planet of the Apes, Fantastic Voyage, The Andromeda Strain, Silent Running and of course that all time knock out Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey.

 

I remember seeing it for the first time, and what a mind blower.

The symbolism is rampant and as Kubrick himself said open to many interperations.

 

Among some of the symbolic interpertations.

 

 

1. Homer's Odyssey parallel. The Computer HAL is the one eyed cyclops.

 

2. The Monolith is touched first by the naked hand of the ape, then the gloved hand of Heywood and finally by the mind of Bowman at the end of the film.

 

3. Hal only has one red eye (sees things in only one way), while Bowman on his journey into the Infinite has closeups of his eye changing into myraid colors (man is able to see things on many different levels).

 

 

4. Bowman knocks over a red wine glass and breaks it. Stares at it for sometime. Meaning: Even if humans were put in the perfect enviroment, we would cause damage.

 

Obscure Symbolism: The phone charge is 1.71 and Bowman's final abode has paintings from the 17th/18th Century. Even the furniture hints at this time period. Meaning: Man took a terrible wrong turn at the birth of the Indurstrial Revolution.

 

Leopard reclines on dead Zebra. Meaning: The beast in man has prevented him from racial unity. In the sixities the point was a hot one.

 

The Monolith: What is it?

 

God, or an alien marker? Certainly Clarke's interpation is Alien Marker. But Kubrick starts and ends the film with music of Thus Spake Zarathursta which is the title of Frederic Nietzsche's famous book, in which its lead character utters the famous line, "God is dead."

In short saying that man must get beyod God to become a Star Child. Not my personal view, but to each his own.

 

 

Thats the great thing about 2001, a myriad on interpertations again and again as you watch.

 

Comments or other symbolism welcome...