The beginning of the film is a black screen for 5 minutes, accompanied by a little weird and noisy music. I waited patiently, looking forward to finding something special in the music. Later, there was a black screen with background music for 5 minutes in the middle of the film. I thought it was the director who had other deep meanings, and I realized after watching the film reviews that this was a feature of the movie at that time: the first five minutes was to wait for the audience to enter, and the five minutes in the film was for everyone's convenience. Poorly, I thought that I was not good enough, and
I couldn't understand the director's deep meaning... I don't understand this movie very well. It may also have something to do with the interruption of other things intermittently. The beginning of the film is the origin of mankind. Shows some details of the life of ape-man. Apes and animals live together and share some food. There may be some conflicts, but they are not intense. There are also quarrels between the apes and the crowd, but the victory is determined by the level of the voice, which is relatively not fierce. Later, the apes learned to use tools, and they discovered that using animal bones can smash other things and subdue their opponents. They used tools in hunting and improved their lives. At the same time, they also used tools in fighting. Therefore, the conflicts between humans and other creatures and human communities have become more intense, and the consequences of conflicts have become more terrible. When humans never use tools to know how to use tools, a black stone (monolith?) appeared. This stone seems to have appeared in the dark, and the film seems to imply that its appearance is related to the use of tools by humans.
Immediately afterwards, the picture turned, and it was in 2001. Humans can travel in space. Humans also found this stone on the moon. While humans were surprised at the mystery and magic of this stone, they naturally sent scientists to study. But in the process of research, scientists died mysteriously. Later, humans also discovered this stone on Jupiter. Humans were full of curiosity about this stone, so they secretly sent an expedition to Jupiter to explore the secrets of this stone. This expedition includes astronauts, sleeping scientists, and a computer with artificial intelligence that is believed to never make mistakes. In the process of interstellar travel, computers with human thinking capabilities began to doubt the purpose of the trip and showed some abnormal behaviors. So the astronauts discussed to shut down the computer. The computer was very upset, so he took action to stop this behavior. The action of the computer killed all the astronauts and scientists, leaving only one astronaut desperately surviving. He turned off the computer in anger and headed towards Jupiter alone. When approaching Jupiter, he discovered that there was also a monolith in space. At this time a magical phenomenon occurred. Under the guidance of Monolith, he passed through the star gate and shuttled in the endless space of the universe. At this time, the picture is gorgeous. Under the guidance of the monolith, the astronaut has experienced the changes of the macroscopic stars and the microscopic world. In the end, he returned to a quiet and comfortable room wonderfully. In this room, he jumped through the process from young to old. When life was about to end, the monolith appeared again. The end of life turned into a baby in an embryo, and life entered the next cycle.
The meaning of the whole movie feels very abstract, and it is difficult to understand at first glance. Think carefully. At the beginning, the battle between the apes and tools, as well as between astronauts and computers, seemed to show the relationship between humans and tools. I think what the director wants to show here seems to be the conflict between instrumental rationality and human nature. In the life of apes, there are contradictions and conflicts between human relations and other animals, between human relations and human relations. This kind of conflict was not so intense before the appearance of the tool, but after the appearance of the tool, the manifestation of the conflict became extremely intense and "cruel". With the help of tools, humans can conquer nature and win among human companions. It is not difficult to imagine that this has enough driving force for people to pursue the improvement of tools and worship the use of tools. Perhaps this is also a source of human worship of science. In the interstellar journey in 2001, the computer was used as a tool, but it had a part of human consciousness. Here, the "evil" side of human consciousness is magnified. Computers kill humans for their own purposes. What these two clips show is very clear: the director shows the negative impact of tools (science) on humans through these two clips. Tools (science) magnify the "evil" side of human nature. Therefore, the director here criticized the instrumental rationality, the rigid pure rational scientism (I don't know what term to use to express this).
Mankind's exploration of the universe is part of the exploration of the world. Human beings can’t wait to understand the world and understand themselves. This is part of the pursuit of truth. In this pursuit, the director mocked that human beings were trapped in rigidity and lost in a purely rational world in scientific exploration without fully realizing the existence of human nature. To put it to the extreme: human beings cannot even understand their own spirit, how can they understand the secrets of the infinite universe. At the end of the film, the astronaut experienced the cycle of life, and he seemed to understand this. After tools have expanded the "evil" of human beings, humans need to discover the existence of "good". In instrumental rationality, it is difficult to experience "goodness". Therefore, it is necessary for human beings to explore spiritually and find "goodness" in spiritual perception.
In the real world, instrumental rationality and human nature coexist. Few people fall into these two extremes. The pursuit of science does not obliterate human beings' perception of human nature. In fact, the two complement each other and promote each other. Instrumental rationality promotes the material development of mankind, so that mankind has a better foundation to explore human nature. At the same time, the exploration of human nature has in turn promoted the development of science. The real world is often so dialectical and balanced. But precisely because the real world is dialectical, it is difficult for us to understand it clearly. Kubrick did just that. He delicately felt the philosophical proposition of the conflict between instrumental rationality and human nature. He felt the negative impact of scientific exploration on mankind, and expressed it to the extreme in an artistic way. This idea is also the essence of this film.
Jump out of this video. I always think of myself as a person who pursues the truth. Later, I thought that what I pursued was the beauty of human nature. These seem to be clearer now. Part of what I call the pursuit of truth is actually the pursuit of science and the pursuit of instrumental rationality. Truth to me also includes the part of human nature, but I am not strongly aware of it. Later, I felt the existence of human beauty, so I turned to the pursuit of human beauty. Instrumental rationality and human nature, science and human nature, these seem to have some contradictions. But this contradiction is based on a common foundation. The pursuit of instrumental rationality allows me to better obtain the resources of life in this world. And the pursuit of human nature makes me feel the beauty of life, so that on the basis of instrumental rationality, I will not become mediocre, so that I can have the opportunity to achieve spiritual sublimation and realize the meaning of being a human being. Now I understand better that what guides my heart is the pursuit of the contradiction between instrumental rationality and human nature. The two are contradictory but inseparable.
PS: I don't understand religion. But from this perspective, I believe that the existence of religion has a profound significance. When people are not awakened and spontaneously pursue humanity, religion plays a very important guiding role.
View more about 2001: A Space Odyssey reviews
