The Making Of 2001: A Space Odyssey

2001: A Space Odyssey is one of the kings of science fiction movies, and widely regarded as one of Stanley Kubrick ^[?] 's best films. With the recent anniversary of the movie has come a spate of 2001 retrospectives. rombuu has reviewed one such work, titled The Making Of 2001: A Space Odyssey. The book is written in team format: Selections by Stephanie Schwam; Series Edited by Martin Scorsese; Introduction by Jay Cocks.

The Making Of 2001: A Space Odyssey
author	Selections by Stephanie Schwam; Series Edited by Martin Scorsese; Introduction by Jay Cocks
pages	326
publisher	Random House, 01/2000
rating	8/10
reviewer	rombuu
ISBN	0-375-75528-4
summary	A series of articles and interviews about the making of 2001: A Space Odyssey.

The Scenario

I remember being seven or eight when my father, who was all too aware of my love of science fiction at that age (well, Star Wars at least), sat me down in front of the television. "There is a movie coming on that you might enjoy," he said, although I don't think he had seen it. I remember being intrigued as the first strains of Strauss' Zarathustra blared out of the TV. Three hours later I was convinced I had just experienced one of the most interesting, puzzling, disturbing, confusing and at times beautiful things I ever had encountered. Twenty years later, and after more viewings that I would probably like to admit, my feelings toward this movie are largely the same -- although I'd like to think I have a little more insight about what happens to Dave Bowman at the end of the movie. (And I now have a computer than can actually primitively "talk" to me, which is more than I can say for my Timex-Sinclair 1000 back then.)

The Making of 2001: A Space Odyssey collects articles and interviews about the making of the first great science fiction movie. Starting with a reprinting of Sir Arthur C. Clarke's short story The Sentinel, which provided the seed for the movie, the book explores the writings and thoughts of those involved in the creation of both the book and the film. Clarke's diary entries show the slow and methodical creation of the story, and provides insights into the changes made over the four years between the beginning of the story-writing process and the final print of the film. For example, in some early drafts, all of the Discovery's astronauts make it into the room at the end of the film. The iconic monolith was originally conceived as a large transparent crystalline pillar with shimmering multi-faceted pictures appearing within, and later as a large ebony pyramid.

The book also includes articles on how the impressive effects on the film were achieved, such as Dave's run around the inside of the Discovery, or how the astronauts' walks in space were filmed without showing the wires, back in the days before CGI.

A selection of reviews from the original release of the film are included, showing the decidedly mixed reaction the film received in 1968. These are interesting just to see the befuddled attitudes of reviewers looking more for the bomb-tossing satire of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb than the cold, almost clinical atmosphere of 2001. One New York Times reviewer, at the end of a not-particularly-pleasent review, complains that the monolith looks like "a 1950's chocolate bar."

The book ends with a collection of interviews with Clarke and Kubrick years after the movie's release, and Simson Garfinkel's excellent, if non-techncial, "Happy Birthday, HAL" in Wired magazine from 1997 (the year of HAL's "birth") showing the gap between where computer technology is now and where Clarke's film had projected it would be.

What's Good?

The book provides a great look at the evolution of the film and book 2001 from its infancy in Clarke's short story. Interesting articles include those about the technical challenges in filming Kubrick's vision of the movie and the advances in filmmaking he created during the production. The interviews with Clarke and Kubrick show some new (to me at least) insights into their creation -- interestingly, both of them view 2001 as very spiritual -- not religious, but spiritual, along with other insights that make me want to go fire up the DVD player right now and watch this great flick again.

What's Bad?

Some of the more technical filmmaking details probably won't grab the attention of readers with little interest in the actual nuts and bolts of filmmaking. Some of the reviews, too, particularly Annette Michelson's Bodies In Space: Film As Carnal Knowledge (I'm not making this up, hell, I wish I could think this stuff up) are unbearable. Bodies in Space is 20 pages of the worst kind of torture that film criticism has to offer -- long winded, self-important, and largely irrelevant -- but is oddly enough one of the few positive reviews included in the book.

So What's In It For Me?

If you love 2001 or Stanley Kubrick's other works, this book provides a fantastic glimpse into his creative process as work, both as a storyteller and as a technician. Although you may not gain any great insights into the film itself -- not really a bad thing since the process of digesting the ambiguity is a great deal of fun -- you will have a better idea of why this film was made the way it was.

Table of Contents

1. SK /
2. Jay Cocks
   The Production: A Calendar / Carolyn Geduld
   Credits / Carolyn Geduld
   The Sentinel / Arthur C. Clarke
   Beyond the Stars / Jeremy Bernstein
   Christmas, Shepperton / Arthur C. Clarke
   Shipbuilding / Piers Bizony
   First Day of Shooting
   Monoliths and Manuscripts / Arthur C. Clarke
   How About A Little Game / Jeremy Bernstein
   Filming 2001: A Space Odyssey / Herb A. Lightman
   Front-Projection for 2001: A Space Odyssey / Herb A. Lightman
   Creating Special Effects for 2001: A Space Odyssey / Douglas Trumbell
   Testimonies
   Ancedotes
   Reviews
   Happy Birthday, HAL / Simson Garfinkel
   2001: A Space Odyssey Re-viewed / Alexander Walker
   Stanley Kubrick Raps / Charles Kohler
   Free Press Interview: Arthur C. Clarke / Gene Youngblood
   How the Book Ends / Arthur C. Clarke
   Playboy Interview: Stanley Kubrick
   Appendix: Stanley Kubrick Filmography