2001

[related: HAL, Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C. Clarke, Hāl]

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Seminal science fiction film that emerged from a strained collaboration between famed film auteur Stanely Kubrick and pantheist author and professional diver Arthur C. Clarke. The glacially-paced film outlines the malfunctioning of HAL, a soft spoken artificial intelligence who eventually murders the entire crew on the Discovery One spacecraft, save for captain David Bowman (played by Keir Dullea)1. Modeled after systems of AI in development at Bell Laboratories and IBM, HAL displays an affinity for chess, foreshadowing IBM's development of Deep Blue in the late 1990's2. Famously, Kubrick refused to divulge the true cause of HAL's behavior in interviews, and even shielded his actors from the machine's intent, causing great frustration amongst cast and crew. Tensions boiled over when Kubrick insisted the final confrontation scene between Bowman and HAL be reshot over 100 times, while giving no additional notes or directions. The astronaut-suit clad Bowman, suffering from exhaustion and dehydration, eventually became confused and disoriented, performing the climactic scene in a fugal haze - and the director had his take.

Kubrick remained obsessed with artificial intelligence throughout his life, and perished in the midst of developing his magnum opus, A.I. Artificial Intelligence. Though Kubrick began work on the film in the early 1970's, it remained unfinished at the time of his death in 1999.

Although now widely lauded, 2001 was deeply divisive upon its release. Russian filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky criticized the film's "emotional sterility" and felt it was too reliant on au courant special effects, later releasing his emotive sci-fi masterpiece Solaris in direct response. 2001's aesthetic of cool alienation proved influential in subsequent decades, influencing interior designers, visual artists, and high profile musical acts like Brian Eno and Tangerine Dream, and various no wave and underground rap groups4.