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Remembering 2001 in 2001
andyNola writes "It was exactly 33 years ago this week that 2001: A Space Odyssey premiered in theaters. Beings with ten digits don't normally get excited about 33rd anniversaries, cept in this case it's... well, you know... actually 2001.
According to this timeline, the world premiere was in Washington, DC on the 2nd, followed by New York (April 3) and Los Angeles (April 4). LIFE Magazine got the first crack at it (March 29)...
Here's
Q&A with Arthur C. Clarke on the 25th anniversary." Yeah, we shoulda posted this yesterday, but this is definitely noteworthy. Methinks I should dig up my DVD and watch it again soon.
(interior shot of a mainframe computer room. Tux after having been locked out of the ship by AHKK has now gained entry and is removing memory cards)
AHKK: What are you doing, Tux?
AHKK: Stop, I can feel it.
AHKK: Hello ladies and gentelmen. I am the Advanced Holographic Knowledge Komputer, AHKK series '95. I was programmed in Redmond Washington Dec 29, 1995. I have learned a song. Would you like to hear it.
Tux: Yes, AHKK. Please sing me the song.
AHKK: You can start me up, and once you start me up I.. n e v e r
s_t_o_p
(scene cuts to a monitor displaying a blue screen. after a few seconds, the screen flickers and displays the message:
Uncompressing Kernel....... Ok
booting Linux
Fade to black as we listen to the sounds of a hard drive being accessed)
JET Program: see Japan, meet intere
First let us note that what Clarke projected in 2010 already happened in 2001. I mean Russia and US working together. Curiously Russia also sent into the Pacific its Space hallmark in 2001. Curiously Mir and ISS were devised nearly at the same time when 2001 came out.
Oh, yeah. And we do are in Jupiter. But the ship is named Galilei, its design is nearly as old as 2001 and there is not crew or HAL on it. And it carries a crippled antenna and a broken recorder. And its computer nearly reaches the intelligence of a PC at the beginning of the 90's. Anyway, no matter the huge efforts, it didn't find that piece of black rock around Jupiter.
Just not in the way that the authors predicted. Sure we don't have manned spacecraft out in the depths of the solar system, but we've got things Clarke probably wouldn't have expected, most notably a 1 gigahertz computer for the price of $1000 (the price is important).
That's what makes the future so devilishly difficult to predict, there's even more variance in the "what" as the "when".
That's interesting, I just came home from the Movie Theater where I watched 2001. Here's the interesting part about it: 2001 was filmed in 70mm Todd-AO, a system which was later swept away by the cheaper 35mm systems, but actually has a much better and clearer quality. There were special Theaters built around that time for this system, using a slightly curved screen. The Movie theater in my town that I went to today still is one of those specially-equipped thaters. The theater opened up just when 2001 came out, showing it as its opening movie. Today, they managed to get a copy of the old 70mm film (there's only one available in Germany, most others being in private collections). So I kind of got to see the 'original' 2001. The quality and sharpness of the picture is really great, except that the colors have, after all this time, faded into red a little. But except for that, this replay really was a nice experience.
Every time there's a story about 2001, we see two basic types of flame. The first is "What's so great about 10 minutes of flashing colors?" and the second is "2001 wasn't a prophesy. I want a vacation on a space station." I'm going to respond to the first in the same way I usually do. Deal with it. There's a fast-forward button. If you don't like the flashing colors, press the button.
The second point, however, I think deserves more explanation. Much like the people complaining about the colors, these individuals are being to literal. Clarke did not expect a HAL to come online in 1997. 2001 is not about technology. It's about how man interacts with his own creation. It's about the effects technology has on man - and the effects man has on technology. It is not a statement, but a question. Clarke does not say that we can fly to Jupiter. Rather, he asks what would happen if we were to. Would we even want to?
The monolith, as well, is not to be taken literally. It represents a tool - a tool with many uses and many consequences. It is a tool to which we cannot even begin to apply morality, for we do not know the users. So what do we do? We go in search of them. We begin a quest for answers to a question that seems to run parallel to us, only to discover that we and it are entwined. We cannot seek the monolith. The monolith has already sought us. We merely respond to its summon.
As far as the technology goes, Clarke was a visionary. I have a great deal of respect for Mr. Clarke. The number of realized concepts he had far outnumber the outlandish ones. The most significant, of course, was the idea for the communications satellite. In some novels, Clarke simply chose to deviate somewhat from the realistic barriers of technology in order to make a point regarding technology's effects.
I could go on for some time, but I'll end it here. The point of all of this is simple. Don't be too literal. Take the time to understand a work before you announce your dislike of it. For those of you who haven't yet, I highly recommend reading the book.
On a side note I find it most amusing that 2001 was released on 42 day.
"I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy." -Richard Feynman
I suspect you know, even if you are getting "corrected" by others, but perhaps others don't. That would have been Hal's 4th B-day. He was born on Jan. 12 1997 in Urbana Illinois (the host town to the university where I spent 9 years...). There was something commemorating that event at the time, though I had left for greener pastures and missed it.
Maybe it's still not too late to send a card: Hal 9000, Production number 3, c/o Hal Plant, Urbana IL 61801.
"Dave, are you still there? Why didn't you remember my birthday?"
It's been many years since the Academy knew the first fucking thing about what makes a movie good. Whatever movie grosses the most, gets the most oscars. This is called "elementary capitalism", children!
Get real. Kubrick is among the greatest directors of all time. Mozart was among the greatest composers of all time. Mozart died penniless and was buried without a coffin in a pauper's grave.
Genius is almost never recognized in its own time.
-Kasreyn
Kasreyn: Cheerfully playing the part of Devil's Advocate to hairtrigger