Why is "2001: A Space Odyssey" considered such a good movie?

[eggynack]

So would you consider something like The Human Centipede to be a successful film? Or Antichrist? Few, if any, would call them entertaining. And would you then argue that there is no such thing as a bad movie, since all films have someone who liked something about them? Having just watched the Fantastic Four reboot, I find that sort of mentality troubling. There has to be some sort of standard to objectively say a movie is good or bad. And I can think of none better than the determiner of whether you enjoyed your time with the film or not.

Why would there be an objective standard as to whether a movie is good or bad? What does that even mean? Human Centipede was probably successful for a few people, and unsuccessful for a lot of others. In any case, you can get a lot of different things out of a movie. Narrowing it down to some easy to define metric is pointless. Why would I peg all of my stance on a movie on how much I enjoyed it? That's so ridiculously limiting.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

There has to be some sort of standard to objectively say a movie is good or bad.

No, there isn't.

And I can think of none better than the determiner of whether you enjoyed your time with the film or not.

That is not an objective standard. It's a subjective one.

GW

[hustlertwo]

Why would there be an objective standard as to whether a movie is good or bad? What does that even mean? Human Centipede was probably successful for a few people, and unsuccessful for a lot of others. In any case, you can get a lot of different things out of a movie. Narrowing it down to some easy to define metric is pointless. Why would I peg all of my stance on a movie on how much I enjoyed it? That's so ridiculously limiting.

So if you were asked which movie was better, Pluto Nash or Empire Strikes Back, would you simply say "It depends on who you are?" No.

You can do other things with a film beyond just entertain. Educate, enlighten, elucidate. Even things that don't start with 'e'. But if you're boring they will fail, because your audience is not invested enough to get the message if their mind is wandering or they're wishing they were doing something else.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

So if you were asked which movie was better, Pluto Nash or Empire Strikes Back, would you simply say "It depends on who you are?" No.

You are actually claiming, in all seriousness, that all 7 billion people on this planet would agree on what film is more entertaining than any other. When this thread alone has shown people completely disagreeing on whether one film is enjoyable or not.

Your argument is demonstrably false.

Grey Wolf

[Fawkes]

So if you were asked which movie was better, Pluto Nash or Empire Strikes Back, would you simply say "It depends on who you are?" No.

No, because I would assume the person asking me was asking for my subjective opinion, because I understand how conversations work. But is someone specifically asked me to rank them 'objectively', I would ask them what the heck they meant, because there's no way to objectively rank art. The closest thing would be to assess the (entirely subjective) opinions of a large group of people through aggregated reviews, but that's not an objective comparison of value.

[eggynack]

So if you were asked which movie was better, Pluto Nash or Empire Strikes Back, would you simply say "It depends on who you are?" No.

Indeed no. Instead, I would say that the term "better" is one that's intrinsically meaningless, making the larger question also meaningless. That or the thing about how I'm assuming that either my opinion, or a general consensus, is being requested. Neither of those things, however, implies any sort of objective truth about betterness.

You can do other things with a film beyond just entertain. Educate, enlighten, elucidate. Even things that don't start with 'e'. But if you're boring they will fail, because your audience is not invested enough to get the message if their mind is wandering or they're wishing they were doing something else.

You don't have to be entertaining to not be boring. People can be engaged on other levels. Plenty of people, myself included, are engaged simply by the fact that they're learning new things.

[Bohandas]

I don't think films have a primary purpose. A film can have a primary purpose, certainly, but any two movies can have completely different primary purposes. Entertainment is quite often a secondary purpose that facilitates the primary purpose by getting you to watch that purpose happen, but even then it's not strictly necessary.

The thing is that 2001 is praised as good sci-fi and good in general, not as a good art film. It's more likely to be put up along side something like The Empire Strikes Back than something like Empire; It's more likely to be considered beside Age of Ultron than beside L'Age d'OR.

EDIT:
Even if we acknowledge it as a good art film it is still terrible by the standards of the genres and supergenres that it is more typically cited as an example of (sci-fi, entertainment, etc.)

[Thrudd]

Art it may be, but that doesn't mean everyone is going to like it. Even basically universally recognized and respected artists have their critics, and the most famous pieces aren't loved by everyone. 2001 is pretty widely hailed as a fantastic piece of art, and there's plenty of room for it to not be to everyone's taste. That's just how art goes.

[eggynack]

The thing is that 2001 is praised as good sci-fi and good in general, not as a good art film. It's more likely to be put up along side something like The Empire Strikes Back than something like Empire; It's more likely to be considered beside Age of Ultron than beside L'Age d'OR.

A movie can be multiple separate things, and being considered good sci-fi does not preclude being a good art film. And, in fact, I'd consider 2001 something of a hybrid of the two. Sci-fi treated as an art film. I certainly don't often think of 2001 and Star Wars in concert with each other, and to the extent that people put them on the same list, it's more because genre is an easy way to categorize a thing. Because, yes, 2001 is sci-fi, and if someone loves the movie, and is composing a sci-fi list, they'll probably put the movie on the list. It's just also an art film.

[Lethologica]

The thing is that 2001 is praised as good sci-fi and good in general, not as a good art film. It's more likely to be put up along side something like The Empire Strikes Back than something like Empire; It's more likely to be considered beside Age of Ultron than beside L'Age d'OR.

2001 is far more likely to be contrasted with TESB as different poles of what the SF genre can be. No one sensible is going to apply space-opera criteria to 2001, beyond "has pretty shots of space", which 2001 inarguably fulfills.

[Thrudd]

The thing is that 2001 is praised as good sci-fi and good in general, not as a good art film. It's more likely to be put up along side something like The Empire Strikes Back than something like Empire; It's more likely to be considered beside Age of Ultron than beside L'Age d'OR.

Someone who would put 2001 and Star Wars into the same category for comparison should not be taken seriously as a film critic. They are so completely different in every way it isn't funny. Yes, they both can be called "science fiction", but that category the way it is commonly used is so broad as to be pointless. It's basically saying "these movies are about outer space and spaceships or aliens or sciency stuff." That's like saying all movies that have cities and police officers are basically the same thing. So which movie is better, "The Other Guys", or "The Departed"?

[Lethologica]

So would you consider something like The Human Centipede to be a successful film? Or Antichrist? Few, if any, would call them entertaining. And would you then argue that there is no such thing as a bad movie, since all films have someone who liked something about them? Having just watched the Fantastic Four reboot, I find that sort of mentality troubling. There has to be some sort of standard to objectively say a movie is good or bad. And I can think of none better than the determiner of whether you enjoyed your time with the film or not.

There is no universal standard across the medium. The more similar two films are, the more one can say that one is directly better than another, because more expectations about the movies are shared, so reasonable standards can be established. Comparing disparate movies can only really be done by saying that they rank favorably or poorly among their comparables. Fantastic Four is bad for a superhero movie, 2001 is good for an artsy SF film, so 2001 is better than Fantastic Four.

Some films have more comparables than others. IDK if there are really comparables for The Human Centipede. On the flip side, something Pixar does really well is broaden their storytelling to engage with multiple sets of expectations--so Toy Story is not just "good for a kids' film," for example.

One may also have opinions about whether some kinds of film are better than others, but that's much more subjective.

[Emperor Demonking]

No, there isn't.


That is not an objective standard. It's a subjective one.

GW

No it isn't. Whether you enjoyed it, or not, is objective fact. If science isn't able just to look at your brain to find out if you enjoyed it yet, then that's a limit of 2016.

[Lethologica]

No it isn't. Whether you enjoyed it, or not, is objective fact. If science isn't able just to look at your brain to find out if you enjoyed it yet, then that's a limit of 2016.

Science can probably look at your brain and figure out whether you're enjoying your chocolate ice cream. For that matter, science can probably predict whether you'll enjoy chocolate ice cream by looking at your taste buds. We still call ice cream flavor preference subjective, because different people enjoy different things.

[Bohandas]

A movie can be multiple separate things, and being considered good sci-fi does not preclude being a good art film.

True, but being a good art film does not automatically make it good sci-fi, and that was my point. Most of the points cited in its favor seem to have to do with it's beauty and profundity. Beauty does not make good sci-fi, and while profundity has a place, most of the supposed profoundness lies outside of segments where profundity would be most appropriate and furthermore is often not accessible without the film having to be explained to you.

[SuperPanda]

Objective criteria for what makes good art:

I'm a literature teacher with a post-graduate degree in applied linguistics - the consensus for the body of written art is: while there might be no objective measure of what makes a thing art that does not mean its constituent parts cannot be objectively examined and evaluated. Construction, innovation, adherence to convention and subversion of it can all be examined... Its just that by calling something art or making judgements on "goodness" of it the objectivity must accept varying levels of subjectivity.

In the context of this conversation though there has been no attempt to operationalize "better movie" or "enjoyment" to a meaningful degree to it remains very subjective.

Re: 2001, Star Wars, and "Good Sci-fi"

Text doesn't convey the right emphasis. I'll use italics to represent the stress.

Star Wars is good sci-fi. The emphasis is on good, with sci-fi being a softener added to warn people that space ships are involved rather than real world issues. Superhero films, some star-treks (not much) and star wars fall in here. Films most people will say are good despite being sci-fi.

2001 is good sci-fi without the softener the focus is on that this is good at being what sci-fi is suppose to be. The martian, 2001, Gravity, Apollo 13* and films like that are here because part of what makes them good is that they are also good sci-fi. (Apollo 13 is actually Sci-non-fi in that its a dramatized non-fiction but I doubt the average viewer would make the distinction).

It is the "science" elements of the sci-fi that makes Gravity or The Martian into a "good" film while it is Campbell's monomyth which makes Star Wars good and the laser swords are the sugary icing on that cake.

So I agree that if 2001 is being compared to Empire Strikes Back it should only be to point out the differences in extreme within speculative fiction movies generally called "sci-fi" because they belong in different genres (commonly called hard and soft sci-fi).


Re Enjoyment is not subjective:

True-ish.

1. Whether or not something was enjoyed is a fact that can be recorded.
2. Enjoyment cannot be externally measured and relies on an individuals judgement of whether or not their experience was enjoyable.
3. That judgement is subjective.
4. Many factors external to the film itself can affect enjoyment (Anecdotally: I hated serenity when I saw it because of who I saw it with - I watched it again years later and though it was good). These varriables cannot be controlled for the experiment.
5. X people saw a film and Y people enjoyed it gives us a correlation rather than a causation - we don't know if the film or other variables caused the enjoyment and even within the film we're not sure which parts caused enjoyment.
6. Not everyone knows why they enjoy something in a work of art making self reporting on the above unreliable.

This is why the critical examinations of art mediums typically look at tools, Technics, Tropes and the like and compare the skill in which they are executed. Quality of special effects, framing of shots, use of transitions, sound design, characterization, Thematics - while not 100% objective it is possible to approach objectivity in talking about them - though doing so requires study of those things at a close level in general and specific instances.

[Lethologica]

True, but being a good art film does not automatically make it good sci-fi, and that was my point.

You can rewrite the labels however you like. Call 2001 artsy SF, or call it an artsy film that happens to be set in the future, in space, with man using (and fighting) futuristic technology to make contact with aliens. It doesn't change the quality of the movie, or the expectations one would set for it, or the degree to which it's comparable to other films.

Most of the points cited in its favor seem to have to do with it's beauty and profundity. Beauty does not make good sci-fi,

It sure doesn't hurt.

and while profundity has a place, most of the supposed profoundness lies outside of segments where profundity would be most appropriate and furthermore is often not accessible without the film having to be explained to you.

Sorry, which segments are inappropriately profound, and which are inappropriately not-profound? That's a new one.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

No it isn't. Whether you enjoyed it, or not, is objective fact.

Emperor Demonking's post NOT brought to you from "words have meaning" school of thought.

Objective: not influenced by personal feelings or opinions in considering and representing facts.

Since you and I seem to have different understanding of what "objective" means, your pretense that you were correcting my post becomes meaningless. You might as well have said "no it is not, because in my mind objective is a synonym of subjective, and therefore you are wrong".

Also, two more considerations:
First, you can enjoy some things some times and not enjoy them other times, so even when reduced to a single person, enjoyment is not an objective measure.

Second, you moved the goal posts a long way to go from the claimed "enjoyment is an universal objective standard of measure of film classification" which I was answering to "enjoyment is a personal objective measure of film classification", which seems to be your position.

Grey Wolf

[The Fury]

Maybe they are breeding tongueless cattle to increase the price?

That does it! This thread is now completely tasteless!

Right, 2001 and Kubrick-- I've seen 2001 once, I didn't care for it. Visually, it's interesting but I thought the scenes were way too long and drawn out for what they needed to do. Or what I think they needed to do? It's a difficult movie for me to comment on. I liked some of Kubrick's movies though, Dr. Strangelove was my favorite.

See for yourself.

Well, it did have that little zinger at the end:

Dad: "Romeo and Juliet, huh? Know how those two ended up?"

Girl: "In love."

Dad: "Dead."

In the movie of the Shining, Kubrick goes out of his way to give the family a different car than the one in the book, and then has them drive past a wrecked car that is the model of the one in the book. I mean, this guy was a hardcore jerk who makes a point to uproot the spotlight from the source material and make it into something that shines with his ego.

Not really crucial to your point, but I don't remember that at all. I even tried to look up an image of a wrecked car from the movie. My Google-fu is weak maybe? Do you have a screencap of this?

[theNater]

This is why the critical examinations of art mediums typically look at tools, Technics, Tropes and the like and compare the skill in which they are executed. Quality of special effects, framing of shots, use of transitions, sound design, characterization, Thematics - while not 100% objective it is possible to approach objectivity in talking about them - though doing so requires study of those things at a close level in general and specific instances.

I want to expand on this by saying that those tools and techniques form a language, which has a grammar, so you can call one film "better" than another in the sense of adhering more accurately to the rules of that grammar. That doesn't necessarily make it more evocative, of course.

For example I can say "Roy Greenhilt struck Xykon in the head, causing Xykon's skull to fall off" or I can say "Roy and Xykon fought, and he knocked his block off". The first sentence adheres more closely to the rules of English grammar, and is objectively "better" in that sense. Does that make it more enjoyable? Not really.

What does that mean for 2001 and Transformers? It's been long enough since I've seen either that I can't support this super strongly, but I think an argument can be made that 2001 is basically poetry. It does not follow traditional grammatical structure, choosing instead to follow a different, carefully plotted other structure, which can be disconcerting to those not used to it. Transformers, on the other hand, is more similar to someone saying "that guy done farted!", in an attempt to get a laugh. While more accessible, it's still worse at following grammatical rules, because it's just ignoring them rather than adhering to an atypical rule set.

[DeadpanSal]

I don't really know when, but it's brought up in a Kubrick documentary. Room 231.

[Bohandas]

For example I can say "Roy Greenhilt struck Xykon in the head, causing Xykon's skull to fall off" or I can say "Roy and Xykon fought, and he knocked his block off". The first sentence adheres more closely to the rules of English grammar, and is objectively "better" in that sense. Does that make it more enjoyable? Not really.

The subjects of the pronouns in the second example sentence are unclear (unless you've already read the first one).

2001 is good sci-fi without the softener the focus is on that this is good at being what sci-fi is suppose to be. The martian, 2001, Gravity, Apollo 13* and films like that are here because part of what makes them good is that they are also good sci-fi. (Apollo 13 is actually Sci-non-fi in that its a dramatized non-fiction but I doubt the average viewer would make the distinction).

It is the "science" elements of the sci-fi that makes Gravity or The Martian into a "good" film while it is Campbell's monomyth which makes Star Wars good and the laser swords are the sugary icing on that cake.

2001 has neither of those things. 2001 only has this:

Spoiler

Show

combined with this:

Spoiler

Show

(which, now that I think of it, actually sounds a hell of a lot more enjoyable than the movie that was actually made)

[Metahuman1]

IT is a real law, it's the Romeo and Juliet law. The basics of it are far more disturbing. As long as you're above 13, if you're within 2 years of your partner anything is basically okay. Perhaps frowned upon, 100% super ****ing creepy, but totally legal.

That's not even what that law was aimed at. It's more intended for "Well, the two 17 year olds are dating, one parent doesn't approve of there 17 year old seeing the other 17 year old, so when the other 17 year old turns 18, despite the fact that there's only a few months gap in the age in actual practice, they call the cops to have them arrested and charged and if possible convicted as a child molester in order to get rid of them and teach THERE child not to date people whom they, the parents, do not approve of.".

That's literally the kind of case that brought that law into being in the first place. *sigh.*.

[DeadpanSal]

The subjects of the pronouns in the second example sentence are unclear (unless you've already read the first one).



2001 has neither of those things. 2001 only has this:

Spoiler

Show

combined with this:

Spoiler

Show

(which, now that I think of it, actually sounds a hell of a lot more enjoyable than the movie that was actually made)

I WOULD WATCH THE HECK OUT OF THAT MOVIE.

I'm starting a Kickstarter campaign.

[Thrudd]

The subjects of the pronouns in the second example sentence are unclear (unless you've already read the first one).



2001 has neither of those things. 2001 only has this:

Spoiler

Show

combined with this:

Spoiler

Show

(which, now that I think of it, actually sounds a hell of a lot more enjoyable than the movie that was actually made)

The elements which are generally thought to make 2001 a good science fiction is the realistic depiction of space travel (thanks mostly to Clark's involvement). The ship was based on actual NASA designs, the length of the journey was appropriate to get to Jupiter and the astronauts' activities were realistic, radio communications took the correct number of minutes from the ship back to earth, there is no sound in space, the technology was believable for the time period in which the film was made (has dated in a similar way to most other stories written in the 50's and 60's), it depicted plausible interaction with believable AI and included an Asimov-like programming conflict problem. It has nothing to do with the pace or style of filming, but the scientific accuracy and plausibility of the content. Even the god-like aliens with magic-level technology are also plausibly depicted, in a way. They are so remote and incomprehensible that Dave's experience of them and ascension to a post-physical state is depicted as a psychedelic light show.

Yes, it is slow, languid, glacial. Yes, you could see it as pretentious and boring. Yes, the ending is unexplained and almost incomprehensible if you didn't read the book. But it is good science fiction in the sense that it has good science behind much of what is shown. It depicts realistic space travel and astronauts with artistry and a classical score. If you aren't in the mood for sitting down to an orchestral concert accompanied by science fiction visuals with some dialogue interludes, then the film probably won't be enjoyable.

[Aedilred]

I think it's important to make the distinction between "films I don't really like" and "bad films".

Of the seven Kubrick films I've seen, I think I only really liked two of them, in the sense that I'd go back and rewatch them of my own volition (and indeed I have): Doctor Strangelove and Spartacus. But even though I may not have particularly enjoyed the others, I can still recognise that they at the least contain scenes and sequences which are masterpieces of cinematography. The boot camp sequence in Full Metal Jacket is near-flawless, and were it not for the second part of the film where they head out to Vietnam the film would rise considerably in my estimations. A Clockwork Orange is brilliantly shot and edited and it's only really the subject matter and some of the scenes that I find inherently pretty disturbing and which put me off the film. The match cut linking the first and second story segments of 2001 is so elegantly perfect that to the casual viewer it doesn't even attract attention.

2001 certainly has its flaws: that it's pretty deliberately inscrutable gets it a bit of a frowny face from me. But there is also something to be said for not spoon-feeding the viewer. The Interstellar comparison was made earlier and I think it's apt. Nolan may be the closest thing we have to Kubrick at the moment (a director with auteuristic tendencies who gets to play with big budgets) and in relative terms he made a complete pig's breakfast of it.

Some of it is doubtless down to a gulf in expectations. The bit with HAL is the most conventional, arguably only conventional, part of the film, and viewed through that lens it's easy to see how the conclusion could be drawn that "it's the only part of the film with value." Certainly it's the most watchable part of it to a 21st-century (and probably contemporary) viewer. However if one takes a step back and looks at the film as an abstract story of the evolution and development of humanity then that's actually the part of the film which is most expendable.

There's often a problem with artists that as their reputation and influence grows they start to outgrow the safety constraints placed on them by the infrastructure of the medium in which they work. Contrary to what seems to be popular conception, relatively little in the way of great art is produced by one guy working free from all external influence and pressures. Publishers and studios become reluctant to cut them down to size and impose themselves on the creator's process. Most infamously, these days, A Song of Ice and Fire has ballooned to the point of deadline-busting, bookshelf-breaking immensity almost certainly in part because the series' popularity means the editors are unwilling really to put the hammer down on GRRM and don't prune the manuscripts sufficiently, leaving the books to sprawl where earlier instalments were pretty tight. Harry Potter suffered from something similar in its middle years, although the bloat was reined in a bit in the last couple of books (not films).

Similarly, my two favourite Kubrick films are the two earliest of his I've seen (I've not seen Lolita to completion), working within the constraints of the late studio system with Spartacus and with a big and powerful ego in Strangelove, which likely helped sharpen up his direction and editing and cut away some of the more indulgent stuff. A few years later, he has something more approaching free rein over his projects; he doesn't have someone on his shoulder to sift out the visionary from the esoteric, so it gets jumbled up together.

I've actually heard Kubrick touted as the greatest director of the 20th century (at least when it comes to Anglo-American cinema) and while I'm not sure myself I can certainly see where such arguments are coming from, for who else is there in competition? Coppola is obvious, but Part III was mediocre and I'm not sure whether Apocalypse Now is a work of genius or a trainwreck that somehow gives the illusion of being genius. Sergio Leone rarely if ever put a foot wrong, by my estimation, but his body of work is small. Spielberg may be the greatest blockbuster director of all time, but his films rarely if ever achieve the status of "art", in my opinion, and he has a couple of turkeys to his name. Some of the criticisms that one can level at Kubrick can be levelled at Orson Welles, too, and in any case Welles is always going to be a bit of a might-have-been, maybe-was as a director, certainly in the absence of a director's cut of Ambersons. John Huston made some great films, but he was also partially responsible for one of the worst films I've ever seen, which is hard to forgive. David Lean, maybe? What about Elia Kazan? Hitchcock? I think Kubrick merits comparison with any of them.

[Bohandas]

it depicted plausible interaction with believable AI and included an Asimov-like programming conflict problem

Was the programming conflict actually elucidated in the movie? I haven't seen it in a while, but I remember it only being explained in the book.

[theNater]

The subjects of the pronouns in the second example sentence are unclear (unless you've already read the first one).

Indeed; proper association of pronouns with antecedents is the primary grammatical failing of the second sentence. However, some people will enjoy the sentence regardless, whether because they intuit the correct meaning, intuit an incorrect meaning which they find satisfactory, or because they find humor in the poor grammar. I suspect that many fewer people will enjoy the first sentence, despite its "better" construction, because it lacks panache. That is, in fact, the point: there is an objective measure of "betterness" which is not the same as "enjoyablity".

[Fawkes]

Some of the criticisms that one can level at Kubrick can be levelled at Orson Welles, too, and in any case Welles is always going to be a bit of a might-have-been, maybe-was as a director, certainly in the absence of a director's cut of Ambersons.

Few things in this world depress me as much as the knowledge that I'll never be able to watch the full version of The Magnificent Ambersons.

For those of you who haven't heard of it, Ambersons was Welles's follow-up to Citizen Kane. After creating a rough edit, Welles went to Brazil to work on another movie. While he was in Brazil, the studio re-edited the film, shot an entirely new ending, removed about 40 minutes from his cut and destroyed the discarded footage.

[Lethologica]

Was the programming conflict actually elucidated in the movie? I haven't seen it in a while, but I remember it only being explained in the book.

The exact nature of the error is not explicitly laid bare. That there is an error, basically leading HAL to see the human astronauts as detrimental to the mission, is made sufficiently clear.