The film is so delicate that it can hardly be faulty, the space is so slow, graceful and silent. This is yet another sci-fi film that is thoroughly sci-fi, and it does its best to realistically present weightlessness, centrifugal force, and sound transmission. In 1968, it is said that human beings had not had a picture taken from outer space, and it was only in 1969 that it landed on the moon for the first time. However, we saw it in the film. At the same time, we have also seen the details of card consumption, video calls, etc. that have become a reality. The future of 2001 has become the past for us.
Despite this, the models, images and montages in the film are still very good, and they look not inferior today. What is impressive is that in the ring-shaped spacecraft, gravity is the centrifugal force, and people can jog along a straight line for a week and return to the starting point. The ring structure appears in large numbers in the film, like a metaphor, everything goes round and round.
The most "artistic" part of the film is still at the end, and different people have different opinions and understandings on it. At the same time, this also involves the key clue of the film-the analysis of the black slate. I personally prefer Arthur Clark’s explanation. The black slate symbolizes the higher wisdom outside the earth, and the ending Dave turns into a "star child". After all, he is the creator of the original short story and later the complete tetralogy. Director Stanley Kubrick obviously didn't want to be limited to this, so he played more freely. They probably have differences, so that the novel "2001: A Space Odyssey" is not signed by Kubrick.
Arthur Clark is the master of science fiction I admire. He has a famous conclusion: Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic (Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.). In a 1945 short paper, he proposed the illusion of three satellites covering the world's satellite communications system. Scientists only "invented" them in 1967. It is said that until today, the World Communications Satellite Organization has to pay a symbolic $1 per year for patents. Fei, and he had just figured it out while looking at the sky in a villa on the beach in Bengal.
Stanley Kubrick’s film is more divergent and unrestrained, and its focus does not seem to be on the plot. The symbolic meaning of the film may be greater than the actual meaning. But it is this combination of forbidden science, logic and beautiful and slightly psychedelic style that gave birth to this classic. The director strives to be real in space and presents psychedelic surpassing human wisdom. This corresponds exactly to the classic thesis of Arthur Clarke mentioned earlier.
HAL-9000 is a supercomputer. In the film, it is already a kind of life or wisdom. Since then, we can see similar names in many film and television works-such as changing the number to pay tribute to it. Whether artificial intelligence can become another kind of intelligent existence is a serious question worthy of discussion. I personally think it is possible. We may underestimate this possibility, because we ourselves do not yet know how wisdom is produced. If a computer can "think" at a level close to that of humans, perhaps we should redefine "intelligent life", even if it still obeys human design and instructions.
There are also many explanations for how HAL-9000 "crashed". I tend to understand from the perspective of wisdom. As far as we have observed, the biggest difference between human thinking and computer "thinking" is that human thinking is fault-tolerant, which is why computers give people a rigid feeling. If a computer is so advanced that it can even "understand" people's emotions and thoughts, you can hardly say that it does not have the ability to think on an equal footing with us. Perhaps it has made a choice between two incompatible instructions, or perhaps this is wisdom.
The higher wisdom represented by the black slate can be interpreted as aliens or even gods (after all, it has "inspired" human evolution several times), but it is undoubtedly a higher level of wisdom. At the end of the film, Jupiter, Earth, Moon, Sun, etc. were lined up with black slates across it. We couldn't help but sigh at our smallness and how fascinating the universe is.
The birth of "Star Child" is another evolution, but it seems to be returning again. He can symbolize rebirth, innocence, and a higher level of ignorance... Regarding the vast universe and seeming infinite truth, no matter how we try to understand it, it is an expression of incomprehension.
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