Evaluation over 2001 A Space Odyssey

Annah Humphries
Evaluation over:
2001 A Space Odyssey

Watching 2001 A Space Odyssey was little difficult for me being that it was full of science fiction and had very little dialogue. The movie really makes the viewer sit there and think when they view the film. The first time viewing this movie the intention of the movie was very unclear to me. I had trouble picking up the plot and distinguishing the motives between characters. I found the characters in the movie were very complex and had definite motives once I learned them. It took several views and a deeper examination of the film to discover these true motives and to relate to the characters. After being able to do this, I could evaluate the movie. Overall I found the lack of dialogue to be the biggest problem, which led to problems understanding the plot and the motives for the characters.
At the beginning of the movie, I think this was the hardest part to understand and grasp my attention. The apes came across a giant rectangular monolith. As soon as the apes saw this they began to wonder what it was but the giant rock was big in size and very hypnotizing. It began to make the apes become crazy like with their actions, which was very clear in the scene. But this large rock also brought revelation to them, and they soon learned how to provide food for themselves. The rock enlightened the apes and brought a sense of survival mode to them. While coming in contact with a pig, Moon-Watcher, the smartest and keenest of the apes picked up a rock and threw it at the pig. This rock killed the pig and allowed the apes to feast on it. This visual was a creative way of showing the evolution of the apes and their development due to the monolith. Since there was very little dialogue, this visual helped bring the concept full circle.
One of the biggest characters I had trouble understanding was Hal. He was a very intelligent computer operated robot, but his motives in the plot were uncertain to me. Hal at first seemed like a smart, witty robot that was there to navigate the voyage to Jupiter. As the movie went on I found his motive changing and his character to be somewhat untruthful. Hal was programmed to help Dr. David Bowman and Frank Pool get to Jupiter successfully to find out about the monolith. His plans quickly changed maliciously when he realized his existence was at stake. This caused for a change in the mood of the movie and other characters such as David Bowman changed their actions to accompany Hal’s.
Dr. David Bowman was one of the characters that stroke me as the most relatable. Throughout the movie I was looking for a character to relate to on an emotional level. Bowman quickly became the character that I felt was emotionally tied to the voyage. When Bowman found out that Pool had been sucked in by Hal and killed during this attempt, this really turned the tables for him in the movie. At this point, Bowman had revelation and better understanding of the voyage. Bowman accompanied his new eye-openers with actions. Quickly Hal became the victim and Bowman would disconnect him, so Hal would cease to exist. There was dialogue in the movie that showed revelation when Hal discovered what was happening to him, he says “I’m afraid, I’m afraid. Dave, Dave. My mind is going. I can feel it.” As Hal spoke his last words there was little bit of comic relief, Hal began to explain when and where he was created, who his instructor was, whom told him how to sing. Then Hal went on to sing a song to Bowman while he was beginning to lose all recollection of himself. In this moment the movie’s focus changed.
Bowman’s revelation of the purpose for the voyage was a new direction for the movie. Bowman discovered the purpose after Hal was excommunicated. There was a recording from Floyd that Bowman found and discovered his mission, which was to go to Jupiter and beyond the infinite. Bowman learns that he will be turned mortal toward the end of the movie. Bowman becomes more aware and his motives become clearer toward the end of the movie because of this discovery.