in which I react to the space baby

The Uptown theater was showing 2001: A Space Odyssey this past weekend at midnight, and it was collectively decided that it would be a great idea to go see it on the big screen. Having never seen this movie nor read the book, I had no idea what I would be in for. First of all - I get the whole apes-evolved-into-man thing. I felt that the first chapter or act or what have you was a little drawn out, but as an avid fan of movies such as the Godfather and Casablanca I can appreciate that our society today is used to a faster pace than films of yesteryear. What I can not understand, however, is the damn monolith music. Whoever created it must have appreciated the sounds of kittens going through a lawnmower, because I'm pretty sure exactly that happens every time it's played.

Please don't kill me!

The rest of the music was phenomenal - Strauss' "Also Sprach Zarathustra" was delightful, and has been a standard cultural nod in reference to the movie decades later. I had to stop myself from laughing out loud when the ape "evolves" and learns to use the bone tools over this music selection. It was nice to see where this reference started.

Eh, who are you kidding. I laughed my ass off.

The middle third of the movie, the space station/moon/HAL sequence was fantastic. I appreciated the tribute to "The Blue Danube" that was so fitting for the waltzing of satellites. It was interesting to see what people 43 years ago thought the world would be like 10 years ago. I'm sorry to say that we haven't progressed as far as it was assumed we would, but for all of the "advancements" we should have made, but it was also pointed out to me that there were plenty of things that neither Arthur C. Clarke nor Stanley Kubrick saw coming - like mobile phones or internet.

"I'm afraid I can't do that, Dave"

I must say though, the entrance of the damn monolith music, again, in addition to the nails-on-a-chalkboard radio interference sound (see end of video link) nearly made me walk out and never come back. I might have lost some hearing from that, and for that I will never forgive Mr. Kubrick. I lost my sanity in the next section.

The last third of the movie completely lost me. Something about a monolith in space, a nasty acid trip in space with psychedelic colors and extremely creepy 2-frame shots of Dave generally freaked out, a painfully slow series of events in which Dave gets increasingly older, the damn monolith again, and finally a space fetus/baby. WHAT ARE YOU ON, STANLEY?!

Mama?

I'll have what he's having...

I feel like I should draw some parallels and symbolic meanings out of all of this, but all I get is that the people behind the film felt that knowledge and wisdom would be the next great evolutionary step in mankind, told through Dave's accelerated life cycle and being reborn as a giant space infant looking down upon Earth. If this is why we're not going to the moon, I totally understand. Infants creep me out as it is.

Furthermore, I'm still having nightmares of those 2-frame splices of Dave into the bad acid trip. Many of those that know me well realize that I'm prone to "attacks" of OCD - usually associated with colors. The colors were horribly out of order in that acid trip. Just to let you all know.

At least I don't have to worry about sleeping past my alarm at all this week!