Midterm Essay

Living Space

2001: A Space Odyssey is a 142 minute science fiction space film produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick in 1968. The film has a dominant presence with its smart use of lengthy shots, spectacular special effects, use of imagery, and the precise attention paid to sound and movement. The dialogue in the film is very limited and the communication of emotions become possible in methods of repetitions of sound, such as the sound of the astronauts breathing. Kubrick's choice of music adds to the zero gravity effect by sending the satellite stations floating through the camera shot almost like a dancer may float across a stage. Throughout the whole film the zero gravity special effect is done really well, at every opportune moment it seems there is a way it continues to keep the viewer in space with the cast. A great amount of attention was given to small material details, such as the special caps worn by the space stewardesses to keep their hair from floating about their faces. Apart from the material aesthetic and the way the film was presented by Kubrick there is the interpretation that comes from the story by the viewer, each viewer is not certain to have the same experience or interpretation. Kubrick consciously made no explanations or attached any underlying meanings to the story but that it is to be interpreted by the viewer, therefore creating the possibility of no right or wrong answers.

The story begins in a prehistoric Africa where an extraterrestrial force has planted a single black monolith which happens to be very close to a group of ape-like beings who become curious of its presence. Their courage grows as they approach the monolith and their fears start to subside as they touch it and become more comfortable, eventually leading to the evolutionary invention of the tool. The ape-like beings discover the tool is good for a lot of tasks, one of which is winning a battle with another group of ape-like beings that results in a murder. The power balance between individuals can now be measured in possession and use of tools. As billions of years have passed man is now at his peak of technological advancements and is now exploring with more confidence than ever before, his confidence is placed in the hands of artificially intelligent robots that control operated space stations. However there are clues that all of the new technological advancements are not entirely perfect, in one of the scenes a pen floats away from the sleeping passenger on a space shuttle due to zero gravity. The pen represents one of the many tools created in the evolution of technology that has now gone out of the control of it's creator. The space stewardess comes by to put the pen back in it's place, literally and theoretically, she is doing her part in the continuation of man's believed control that he has over his creations. The fact that humans in space must relearn how to walk and move, to use a zero gravity toilet, and must adapt to special space food also shows that there is something to be weary of in space.

Showing man's strength and need to explore, invade, and dominate the film takes the viewers to the scene of another monolith being excavated on the moon. Man, being the confident beings they are in this future setting, have no fear of the monolith and walk right up to it with a camera, a horrible radio signal sound is triggered and things get fuzzy. The perspective of the camera at one point puts the viewer in the space suit of an astronaut, humanizing this mistake of technological indifference of the much more advanced monolith. The radio signals towards Jupiter, which leads to the Jupiter Mission where the character HAL 9000 becomes prominent. HAL 9000 is the central nervous system of the spaceship on the Jupiter Mission, HAL has started showing growing characteristics of human-like intelligence. In HAL's perspective it is far more advanced than the humans that survive within its intelligence. HAL is starting to see the humans as something disposable, it has a plan to take full control over the operations. HAL relates a message that the mission will fail, sending the two astronauts out of the shuttle to repair a unit only to discover that it is working correctly, once inside the astronauts, Dave and Frank, have a conversation about shutting down parts of HALS controls if the unit does not fail as predicted and how HAL may react. They try to be sneaky but HAL can read lips and sees their conversation through the pod windows. Frank then goes outside of the shuttle to work on the unit again, HAL sends a pods sweeping arm to smack Frank sending him spinning out into space grabbing for his air tube.

At this point in the movie the rhythm of the Franks breathing are vital to the emotion of helplessness and the suffocation effect of being out of ones element, like a fish out of water, man cannot survive without technology in space. Computers, however, can function without breathing, showing the power the computer has over man in this environment. Dave goes to retrieve Frank in one of the pods, named the Discovery, but once Dave tries to return HAL has already taken over control and won't let Dave back into the main shuttle. Dave now knows the extent of what has happened, HAL has the upper hand here but Dave decides to position the Discovery pod door next to one of the main shuttle's entry points. Without his space helmet Dave is out of his element with the lack of oxygen but also the temperature is drastically lower, he pops the Discovery door and shoots into the entry area, this part uses the contrast of silence after a loud noise to also emulate the loneliness that Dave will be destined to. Once back inside Dave must now turn HAL's controls off, he ends up doing this task using a simple screwdriver tool in HAL's main system, cutting Dave's relationship with technology and forever securing his fate of an unknown death. Technological advancements almost replaced the human that created and cultured it, ultimately raising the question; without tools, what is man?

Images start to appear and travel into the unknown at an unknown speed of time and space, colors and textures become more important then locations or dates, it seems that every element or feeling can be translated into light and movement. Now free to create any reality Dave finds himself in a strange room eventually discovering himself over and over but at different stages of aging. He is watching himself grow older and weaker, he walks in on himself at his last supper scene where his older self accidentally knocks over a glass, the glass breaks but what's inside is still there, foreshadowing symbolism of the relationship between the body and soul. The scene pans over to oldest Dave on his death bed, hovering in front of him is a monolith. Oldest Dave stares at the monolith in his last moments and then his soul is free from its body, what appears next is an embryo like star child. Dave's soul can now be reborn into a new vessel, perpetuating life and progress. Being reborn symbolizes the metaphysical relationship between creatures and their environments, the journey of life rather than creating or destroying life.

With the theme of life traveling rather than being destroyed and created, ideas and creativity also travel in the situation of their impact over time in the form of a new film; Gravity. Gravity, starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney, is not a remake of 2001: A Space Odyssey, but the two can be compared on their similar plots and styles. Gravity, 90 minutes, is remarkably shorter than 2001: A Space Odyssey's 142 minutes, showing the quicker pace newer films seem to have over older films. Reviews commented on the film's ability of holding the audiences' attention even with lengthy shots and lack of characters, this shows just how different the audiences of 1968 might have been when compared to 2013's. Length of the films set aside, Gravity brings a new plot with new characters, this time a female lead, Ryan Stone, who is played by Sandra Bullock, is on her first mission in space, she is paired with a veteran space traveler on his last mission coincidentally, Matt Kowalski, played by George Clooney. Things start to turn for the worse when a storm of debris from a Russian missile heads their way while they are outside of the shuttle, they cannot make it inside in time and get hit by the debris storm, sending Stone attached to an armature of the shuttle spinning into space forced to detach she is then spiraling alone into space. Her breathing mirrors her emotions throughout the film, mirroring her helplessness as well as loneliness and her physical state with lack of oxygen, the same attention paid to the use of breathing audio in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Kowalski's character has a self propelled pack enabling his efforts to save Stone, leading to their perilous journey to find a safe station before the debris storm returns. In their attempts Stone becomes entangled in parachute straps with Kowalski only holding on by the rope attaching them together, he detaches himself in hopes that Stone will have better odds of survival alone, forever securing her fate of loneliness. Stone is forced to embark on this mission with very little knowledge or guidance, she narrowly escapes strings of bad luck that seem to never let up for her. The idea of Stone's character forever being alone is supported when its revealed she lost her only daughter at a young age from a school yard accident. The spectacular special effects in the film are breath taking and the visuals are only enhanced by the 3D element. By making Gravity in a 3D version it gives the audience the feeling of zero gravity, putting the viewer in the suit of Ryan Stone as she drifts through space and her different emotions when paired with the audio. 3D also adds to the experience when any prop is experiencing zero gravity, for example there is a reoccurring image of a pen floating, just as in 2001: A Space Odyssey, the pen symbolizes the unknown power of what humans have created and trust with their lives in environments not suitable for human life, such as space travel technology. The pen is not the only connection to other imagery in films, the image of the embryo/fetal position used in the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey is used in Gravity also, when Stone sheds her suit, suspended in zero gravity inside a ship, she resembles an unborn baby floating inside a womb, bringing the idea of her soul traveling beyond her body into a new dimension, she represents the star child. Safe inside the Russian Soyuz Capsule she puts on a suit that has the number 42 on it, 42 can be referencing “The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy” where the number 42 is the “answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything”. The number 42 on the suit is foreshadowing her possible success in survival when she is hit by yet another road block once the Soyuz Capsule is aligned toward the Chinese ship she discovers there is not enough fuel and begins to shut the oxygen flow off to die painlessly. In what seems like the last moments of Stone's life, Kowalski suddenly appears in a hallucination only to tell Stone of another method to get the ship where it needs to be. The same use of silence is in the scene when Dave shoots from the Discovery into the main shuttle entry is used during the scene in Gravity when Kowalski shoots into the Soyuz Capsule. The silence of loneliness is contrasted with Kowalski's presence, then again supported when it's apparent his appearance was only a hallucination of Stone's. With the grace of luck she some how makes it to Earth nearly drowning after landing in a lake, she finds her way to shore and takes her first steps very weak and wobbly. Her first steps signify her rebirth on Earth, the continuation of her soul, her metaphysical energy.

The similarities of the two films is apparent in their themes of helplessness, loneliness, and the threat of technology. The aesthetics of both show great advancements in cinema and the technical parts that join in the end to create something that uses sight and sound in a way that creates a unique experience for the viewer. The obsession with discovery and progress parallels closely with obsession of the eminent disaster of said progress and knowledge. By leaving the explanations of imagery in 2001: A Space Odyssey open to the viewer it gives permission for Gravity to do the same, which it takes and spins into it's own completely new creation but still relates strongly to the same concepts and ideas about metaphysics and humankind's metaphysical relationship with it's environment.