Rent 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

A Shocking Waste Of Time - 2001: A Space Odyssey review by AP

This came out when I was at junior school so I'm old enough to have heard about it (a lot) but never got the chance to see it. What a dissapointment! I waited 40 years to devote a couple of hours to seeing 'a masterpiece' and was REALLY let down.

It is, with out doubt, the biggest load of whacky, self indulgent garbage I have seen since Black Swan. Kubrik on a good day is a master (A Clockwork Orange) but this has to rate as a stinker. No plot....at all, really annoying music score, looooooong sequences of nothing other than shots of a spaceship floating around in space, actors in monkey suits grunting at each other and an ending that just left me saying...'what on earth was THAT all about?'

I invested over 2 hours of my life into this film and I will never see those again and consequently I'm really annoyed that I bought the hype. I don't know where Kubrik was when he put this thing together but it certainly was not planet Earth.

Innovative for it's day. - 2001: A Space Odyssey review by AA

I watched it over two days and yes it caught my attention but only because I'd read the book. However I expect in it's day, with a huge cinema screen it would have been fantastic. However the story line from 'conception to infinity' still makes it one of the best sci-fi movies ever made. So even though it was a tad boring etc, I could still appreciate it.

Unmissable Classic - 2001: A Space Odyssey review by GI

A deliberately provocative film that still divides audiences to this day although often cited as one of the greatest films of all time. It is certainly a bold and ambitious film and probably the first serious science fiction film that attempted to delve into the origins of man and the meaning of intelligence. It deals with theories around evolution, development of technology and artificial intelligence and man's place in the Universe. It has one of there most famous cuts in film history as it jumps four million years from a prologue sequence that follows some early ape like humans as they are transformed by a strange alien object to a time of space travel. The middle section of the film is a fairly straight forward narrative starting on the moon and the discovery of an alien artefact that is sending a signal towards Jupiter to the mission to find out what's out there. A mission that goes awry. The epilogue of the film is a psychedelic exploration of the meaning of existence. There's little doubt that the film raises more questions than it answers and for those who just like straight forward stories this will baffle and annoy but it is a film that should certainly be seen at least once because it's definitely a landmark in cinema history from a genius director. For film fans this is a film that draws you back for repeated viewings just to allow you to check new theories and to puzzle it out.

Arthouse Sci-fi. - 2001: A Space Odyssey review by Steve

Complex science fiction epic which became a key film for the sixties counterculture and eventually acclaimed by critics as a masterpiece. There are two linked stories: a mythic, arcane mystery triggered by the discovery of a black obelisk buried on the Earth's moon; and an ill-fated voyage to Jupiter undermined by the spaceship's computer, Hal.

And it's this allusion to artificial intelligence that most makes the sixties futurism feel relevant now. Otherwise Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke's vision of the near future doesn't seem all that intuitive. It was made in a year of social revolution and there is a sense of optimistic change. In the present cycle of history dominated by global heating, our destiny seems more dystopian.

So it feels like a film of its time, now past. The long psychedelic finish was innovative in the period, especially if enjoyed with hallucinogens. It is an audacious endeavour of imagination and craft, an immersive synthesis of theory, set design, effects and its famous score. But for long periods, Kubrick is just showing off the work of his designers while the story drifts through space.

The acting is deliberately understated. The most vivid and memorable performance is the impassive computer, Hal (voiced by Douglas Rain). It's a head movie and its themes of mind expansion and evolutionary leaps made it pertinent to the hippie generation. Now it feels likely to be more of interest to the sci-fi hardcore and effects nerds.