I love science fiction. This genre provides some of the most entertaining movies of all time, delivering eclectic stories that stretch the imagination. I’ve heard of 2001: A Space Odyssey and I knew it was regarded as one of the best science-fiction films of all time. I knew so little about the movie that I literally thought it came out in the late 1990s’ or early 2000s’. Imagine my surprise when I learned it came out in 1968 and imagine my even deeper surprise when I discovered how well-made the movie’s effects and story turned out to be.
Now, despite my praise of the film I didn’t finish the movie. I couldn’t. I’m that person who walk out of the movie theater if something is either too scary or too disturbing. 2001: A Space Odyssey disturbed me deeply.
Throughout the first third of the film we are introduced to this strange alien life form during some long and drawn-out scenes that come accompanied with a haunting piece of music that made me very nervous. The second third of the movie feels like ALIEN except with a super intelligent robot named HAL that gradually kills off all but one of the ship’s passengers. HAL is one of the worst movie villains of all time. And, undoubtedly, he is officially the scariest robot that I’ve seen in a movie. Geez!
The last bit of the movie is where I had to make my abrupt departure. Kubrick’s vision of space travel takes a psychedelic turn that had me staring at the screen in crease-eyebrowed horror. I was okay with everything…until I wasn’t. It got to a point where I was so deeply disturbed and wary of what visual trauma I was going to see next that I elected to stop the film. I would later find out what happened at the end of the movie thanks to the plot’s layout on Wikipedia along with other individuals’ movie reviews so essentially I finished the movie, just not visually.
Prior to this, Interstellar was my favorite science-fiction movie of all time. It still is but undoubtedly 2001: A Space Odyssey takes the cake for sheer sci-fi brilliance. The great thing about this genre is you can go as wacky as you’d like to. Kubrick did that and more. I’ve never seen a film that wasn’t a horror movie that disturbed me so greatly. Thankfully, I watched it with my sister in the early morning instead of at nighttime because I clearly would’ve lost sleep.
What do you think about 2001: A Space Odyssey (if you’ve seen it)? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
I thank you for reading and I hope you have a wonderful day.