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| Title: 2001: A Space Odyssey | ||||||||||||
| Director: Stanley Kubrick | ||||||||||||
| Rating: Film - 10/10 Novel - 10/10 | ||||||||||||
| Summary: A mysterious object is discovered on the moon and it sends a radio signal to Jupiter and so a mission to Jupiter is prepared but along the way things go horribly wrong. | ||||||||||||
| Plot: Way back in 1968 a post-Dr Strangelove Stanley Kubrick wanted to create the "proverbial good Science Fiction movie" he teamed up with Sci Fi author Arthur C. Clarke and together they wrote the screenplay for "2001: A Space Odyssey" while this may not be the greatest Sci Fi film of all time it certainly is the grandest. The movie focuses on a mysterious black Monolith that somehow interferes with human development - skip ahead to 1999 and a second Monolith is discovered on the moon and its radio signal is sent to Jupiter. In 2001 astronauts Dave Bowman (Keir Dullea) and Frank Poole (Gary Lockwood) are sent to Jupiter to discover whatever secrets may lie at the second Monolith which hovers between Jupiter and its major moons - Io and Europa. The ships onboard computer however has other ideas and attempts to kill the astronauts - it succeeds in killing Poole but Bowman survives to disconnect Hal (voice of Douglas Rain) and then he goes on to face the Monolith alone. After a trippy (psychedelic sounds better no?) Dave ends up in a recreation of a Hotel Room, where he begins to grow older, until he is 70-80-ish and lying on his death bed he reaches out to a/the Monolith and then while his "old" body is discarded all that he really is (spirit, conciousness, katra for Star Trek fans) transferred to a new Immortal body of....A HUGE ASS BABY, except he can change his form between any of his old, young states. | ||||||||||||
| Good Points: Great special effects, unusual narrative, classical music, can be creepy at times. | ||||||||||||
| Bad Points: Far too long and drawn out at times. | ||||||||||||
| Title: 2010 | ||||||||||||
| Director: Peter Hyams | ||||||||||||
| Rating: Film - 10/10 Novel - 10/10 | ||||||||||||
| Summary: A follow-up to the disastrous 2001 mission is prepared by the Americans and the Russians and again they must deal with the mysteries of the Monolith. | ||||||||||||
| Plot: In 1984 a sequel to "2001: A Space Odyssey" was made this time the cast was made up of (relatively) famous faces including Roy Scheider (Jaws) as Dr Heywood Floyd who was the one who ordered the original 2001 mission to Jupiter. Also in the cast is John Lithgow (3rd Rock from the Sun) as Walter Curnow the expert on Discovery and Helen Mirren (Prime Suspect) as Tanya Kirbuk (Get it?) who is commander of the Russian ship Alexie Leonov named after a Russian scientist. In "2010" the crew return to Jupiter to discover whatever the can about the Discovery accident as well as the larger Monolith, when a probe is sent to investigate the Monolith destroys it and sends whatever Dave Bowman (Keir Dullea returning from "2001") has become to Earth, simply put he is used as a probe, but he also visits his dying mother as well as an ex-girlfriend. Meanwhile on board Discovery Hal is reactivated by Dr. Chandra and so everything seems Ok, until news from Earth that tensions between the USA and Russia are getting worse so all US citizens are ordered to the Discovery. Later Bowman appears to Heywood Floyd and tells him if they don't leave in two days they will not leave at all, so Floyd and the Russians work together (they strap Discovery booster-style to the Leonov so they can escape on time) When they get far enough away a million Monoliths are replicated and they begin sucking up all the gases of Jupiter - the point of all this being that enough energy is released to turn Jupiter into a new Sun, the point of that was to help the life-forms evolving on the moon Europa. To leave the movie with a fairly happy ending Bowman saves Hal and the Monoliths allow the use of all of Jupiter's moons except Europa. | ||||||||||||
| Good Points: Good special effects, good acting all round, changes from the book actually make it better. | ||||||||||||
| Bad Points: Very little mystery is left from 2001. | ||||||||||||
| Title: 2061 (Book only) | ||||||||||||
| Rating: 5/10 | ||||||||||||
| Summary: Heywood Floyd is "guest of honour" aboard a space-ship heading for Halley's Comet but soon the ship diverted to the forbidden moon Europa on a rescue mission. | ||||||||||||
| Plot: Ah yes! there always has to be a bad-one among any series of books, don't get me wrong I still like "2061" better than a lot of Sci Fi garbage out recently (Star Trek and Star Wars as well as Doctor Who novelisations really annoy me although I am a fan of said shows) "2061" starts with Heywood Floyd engaged in a very confusing discussion about age. But that isn't entirely the focus here, Heywood Floyd is on his way to the famous Halley's Comet, and on the journey are several notable celebs for the time (scientists, authors, actresses) However when they get to Halley's Comet they are almost immediately sent to the forbidden moon Europa since the sister ship of the one Floyd is on has crashed there. To add a little dramatic tension to the story we have minor plotlines about a massive mountain of diamond that has appeared on Europa (Diamond is basically carbon and a lot of that was going about when Jupiter exploded today the popular theory is that Jupiter's core is one big diamond) the other plot is Heywood's grandson is the first officer of the ship. Ingeniously using the Comet's water as a fuel (makes sense in the book trust me :) They get to Europa and then after rescuing the crew that's pretty much a rap, except Heywood has an encounter with Dave Bowman and Hal who are "living together" (they share a body not a house dummy) anyway Dave reveals that when Jupiter went kaboom so did they native life-forms and this according to Dave was a choice that the Monolith had to make between the Jovians and the more promising Europans. Dave also reveals that because the Monolith's creators have dissappeared the Monoliths are becoming stupid and soon they may eventually breakdown. | ||||||||||||
| Title: 3001 (Book only) | ||||||||||||
| Rating: 7/10 | ||||||||||||
| Summary: Frank Poole is rescued out near Neptune and when he is returned to Earth and revived he decides to investigate the Monoliths. | ||||||||||||
| Plot: So close but so far-fetched! Actually that's not true, Arthur C. Clarke's vision of the future is pretty much your standard "Star Trek" style future (Humans are the best so don't argue) war, poverty, disease, famine are all non-existant, and even better they have a cure for death as Frank Poole discovers when he awakes in this future, Frank was hurled into space after Bowman realised he couldn't save himself and Poole at the same time. So Poole went spiralling around Jupiter and 1,000 years later the space-tug Goliath picks him up and returns him to Earth. Of course in this day and age a 1,000 year old astronaut doesn't have to worry about learning the ways, wheres and whys since they have a device called a Braincap that is like a PC on the brain (whole sphere of Human knowledge all availible when you want it) but despite everything (Skyscrapers that reach from Earth to Orbit, colonies on Mars, Mercury and the Jovian moons) Poole finds that without a purpose in life he wants to end said life, until he gets an invite to Jupiter's moon Ganymede and then of course after hearing the life story of Jupiter and a recap of 2001 to 2061 he commandeers a pod and heads to Europa where he is met by (who else but?) Dave Bowman and Hal, of course the two are melded so deep by now he calls him "Halman" it turns out that the Monoliths are really not happy with the progress of the Europans (and of course we poor Humans) so it is decided that pre-emptive action is needed against the Monoliths (did I mention they destroy a whole solar system earlier in the novel?) so borrowing an idea from "Independence Day" a series of computer viruses are unleashed into the main Monolith (the giant one at Jupiter) but before the Monolith disintegrates it transmits a radio signal to its "Higher-up" 450 light years away and of course we have a setup for another (unlikely, I say unlikely because Arthur C. Clarke expressed no wish in continuing the odyssey of Hal, Dave and the Monoliths. | ||||||||||||
| And Now On To 3D Art | ||||||||||||