REQUIRED VIEWING: Watch the film 2001: A Space Odyssey (directed by Stanley Kubrick), available on Amazon.com. I recommend watching it in its entirety without interruptions, preferably in a dark room. Remember, this film was originally intended for exhibition in a movie theater.
THE PROMPT: In his 1968 interview with Playboy magazine (people really used to read it for the articles), Kubrick avoided explaining the symbolism behind 2001: A Space Odyssey. He turned Marshall McLuhan’s media philosophy on its head, stating:
To convolute McLuhan, in 2001 the message is the medium. I intended the film to be an intensely subjective experience that reaches the viewer at an inner level of consciousness, just as music does; to “explain” a Beethoven symphony would be to emasculate it by creating an artificial barrier between conception and appreciation. You’re free to speculate as you wish about the philosophical and allegorical meaning of the film—and such speculation is indication that it has succeeded in gripping the audience at a very deep level—but I don’t want to spell out a verbal road map for 2001 that every viewer will feel obligated to pursue or fear he’s missed the point. (Kubrick, Playboy, 1968)
In light of Kubrick’s comment, what do YOU think is the message behind 2001: A Space Odyssey?
(You can’t be wrong, right?) Make a strong argument and give specific examples from the film that evoked your sense of its message.
Remember, if the “message is the medium,” it is important to analyze elements like point of view, composition, color, camera angle, camera movement, music, and dialogue. It is also important to be mindful of the fact that this movie was intended for mainstream distribution* at the time that it was released. The cinematic experience was initially shared by a general public on a movie screen. This was a time when not as many movies were distributed nationally and globally, and they remained in the theater for a longer time. As a result, the general public had a very shared experience of current films. Also keep in mind that the culture was fairly obsessed with space travel and extraterrestrial life in the 1960s.
2001: A Space Odyssey was groundbreaking and highly influential. It seeped into nearly every aspect of the popular culture that surrounded it, and it became a modern archetype.
Your paper should be at least 500 words (2 double-spaced pages). It’s okay to write more if you want to (I recommend it), but you don’t have to. You don’t have to cite. Just concentrate on developing ideas and giving your opinion.
*
mainstream distribution: when media, products, and services are made readily available to and appealing to the general public, as opposed to being of interest only to a very specific subset of the public.
