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STANLEY KUBRICK SECTION
I know that Kubrick did not make enough films that are bizarre to qualify for a seperate section, despite all the strange endings of his films. But he was the greatest director of all time, and one of my personal favorites, so why not give him his own section. Heck, it's my page anyway.
For the movie-wise ignoramuses, aside from the films listed here Kubrick
also did the classic Spartacus, the Oscar-nominated classics Dr:
Strangelove: Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb and
Barry
Lyndon, the acclaimed and often quoted Vietnam war drama Full Metal
Jacket, the classic horror film adapted from Stephen King The Shining,
the
controversial original version of Lolita, the influential (e.g.
on Tarantino) The Killing, the BAFTA winning WWI drama Paths
of Glory, the film noir Killer's Kiss, and the recently released
erotic thriller Eyes Wide Shut.
AUTHOR: PARCA MORTEM
Starring: Keir Dullea (the original The Thin Red Line;
the doctor in Blind Date), Gary Lockwood (Night of the Scarecrow,
The
Magic Sword, It Happened at the World's Fair), among others.
Written by: Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, whom parallely wrote
the novel of the same name.
Genre: Sci-fi
Duration: 2 hours 19 mins.
Availability: Every videstore/rental on Earth.
I may not have to say anything about this picture, since it is one of those films that most of the world has seen. Heck, it is one of the films that has been most parodied and referenced (definitely the champion in visual and audial references). It is constantly cited as one of the best movies of all time. And it is the film that most film students attempt to write about in an intro class, trying to impress their teacher with their own interpretation, only to get mocked by the teacher, based on his own interpretation. However, it is also a film that I constantly hear "hey man, I dug all the film and thought it was great, but I just didn't understand the ending, and it was just too weird!" Actually, it is not that hard to understand, despite the claims of Clarke that the film had been designed so no one would understand it. On one level, you have the first part of an extended sci-fi story that would become the series of novels by Clarke: 2001, 2010, 2063, and 3001. But on the other level, you have a story of the evolution of mankind. The key sequence is the intro sequence, with the simians playing around with bones, until they use them as tools. Thus, the first tool is born, under the presence (and perhaps influence) of the black monolith. Then the simian throws the tool into the air, and it gets replaced by a shot of a spaceship. Spaceships! Man had evolved to the extent that his tools were so complex that now he could start exploring the stars, and they had an intelligence of their own. Remember that this was made in the 60s, were there was an added fascination with the conquest of space which does not seem to linger around as much nowadays. Man reaching the moon was seen as the ultimate odyssey, and space, well, was the final frontier. But man encounters the monolith again, which wants to shove mankind into the next step of evolution. Man doesn't know this, but his tools do, and the tools rebel against him, trying to stop him from getting there. Man ultimately overcomes the tools (in the shape of a murderous computer in charge of a marvelous spaceship) and gets in touch with the monolith. Man ages quickly and gets reborn as a starchild, a new, godlike being. An added touch to this was Kubrick's original plans of having the starchild launch all of Earth's nuclear weapons (Dr. Strangelove deja vu, I presume?), but instead he left the ending open for a vision of glory (a turn that led people like Steven Spielberg to think that Kubrick was all about exploring hope in mankind, when we the die hard fans know that if anything he explored the dark side of humanity).
For those of you out there that have no idea what I'm talking about and want to know about the film, it goes like this. It starts with a bunch of simians wandering around Earth, until they discover how to use bones as weapons and tools, after encountering a mysterious black monolith. Skip to the year 1999. A group of USA astronauts encounters the same black monolith on the Moon. They cannot determine what it is made of, what it is, and where it came from, but they do get a signal that the monolith is transmitting towards Jupiter. So the first expedition for Jupiter is assembled. A group of 5 US astronauts is placed aboard a ship, the Discovery, with HAL, the most advanced computer of the world. Actually, only two astronauts are awake during the journey, Frank Poole (Lockwood) and David Bowman (Dullea), while the other three are in hybernation, to be awakened upon arriving at Jupiter. Of course, the astronauts do not know the reason they're going to Jupiter. Only HAL knows about the monolith, and he's not telling. HAL, by the way, talks and has a red eye, and he's the only thing that Frank and David communicate with. But one day, as they are very near to the orbit of Jupiter, Frank and David discover a gigantic black monolith that is several kilometers long and wide, just floating there in space. They also discover that something is wrong with HAL, and, in what they believe is a secret meeting, they decide to dissactivate him, a process that involves taking a spacepod to another section of the ship and rearranging some tapes. Of course, HAL knows about this all along and becomes murderous. Only one member of the crew survives his wrath (you will have to guess which) and learns about the truth, and is able to take a pod into the monolith, where he, uhm... encounters the stars...
Of course, this is not all there is to the flim. It goes rather slowly, at two hours and a half (depending on what version you are watching), but giving you every detail of the wonders of space exploration. The marvel here is that it was made one year before the first lunar landing, yet got every detail right on lunar travel (although the version here is spacetravel that was expected to be happenning by the late 90s). Furthermore, there are great special effects (with NO fucking CGI) which were at least one decade ahead of their time, if not more (sidenote: this film won the Oscar for best special effects, the only Oscar that Kubrick personally received). The cinematography, the sound (or lack thereof at moments), and the music (particularly the music) all help to set the mood, which is that of dropping your jaw in awe. The performances, on the other hand, are not anything special, as just about everyone is robotic (an odd thing for a film by Kubrick), but they fit in. Kubrick described this project as a "non-verbal experience". In other words, this is meant to be a sensual experience. Sensual not in the sense where a gorgeous dame spends the whole film flirting with the camera, but in the sense of pure enjoyment for the ear and eye instead of for the conscious mind. He has directly stated that he wanted to make a subjective film, as well, which is free to be interpreted in any way (riiight...) . By the way, the film is pretty straightforward, except for the intro sequence and the last 25 minutes, which are completely bizarre.
I highly recommend this film. And, if you get a headache and wind up with several questions about it, watch Peter Hyam's sequel, 2010, which is also pretty good, though very different. Also, for maximum effect watch the widescreen version; it DEFINITELY makes a difference. One final note: critics hated this film when it came out; now they adore it. As well, it got nominations for the Oscars for Best Director and Best Screenplay, but not Best Picture, and won none of those, receiving instead the Oscars the stil memorable The Producers for screenplay and the already forgotten Oliver! for the other two awards.
Bizareness: 8 shots out of 10
Rating: 10/10.
A Clockwork Orange
(1971)
Starring: Malcolm McDowell (If..., Caligula, Cat
People, Star Trek: Generations, Tank Girl)
Written by: Kubrick, adapting the original American edition
of the novel by Anthony Burguess.
The ultimate director's movie - or at least the most enjoyable one among the films that could wear that label. Kubrick after 2001 (and his aborted Napoleon project) apparently set out to do another movie that employed to the maximum the visual and audial aspects granted by cinema that make the medium unique. This time, however, with a more straightforward, coherent story, but without any less depth of subjects covered. This is done from the very first shot, with the hypnotic stare into the camera of the extremely well cast Malcolm McDowell and the accompanying electronic chamber music, to the very last shot of his returning to his Caligulan ways.
McDowell plays Alex, a very smart young man with a quite devious mind, who shuns his life at school and with his family, in favor of spending the evenings in violent practices with the gang which he leads. Alex is over all an aggressive person: in violent physical acts, in thoughts, in sexual behavior, in self-adoration. But he has a love for culture, as represented by his particular, elaborate looks, the overdone sculptures of the future substitutes for cafés where he hangs out, his eventual keen interest in reading, his refined manner of speech, his smooth movements, and particularly his obsession with music. His obsession with music seems intertwined with his aggression, as Kubrick shows us a visual parade of his actions set to the speed and inspired motion of particular pieces of music. The musical selection is quite particular, ranging from Alex's favorite, Beethoven, to the futuristic synth sounds made by Vocoder inventor Walter (now Wendy) Carlos, and even an improvised rendition of "Singing in the Rain" (during a rape scene). This is quite a punch back at the typical notions that low culture or unrefined teen culture is what drives young people to be violent, and that more thought process (albeit chaotic and distorted) seems to go into violence than simple copycat fashions. [not that this worked: a lot of violent episodes by teen gangs in the U.K. were blamed on this movie, making Kubrick request after a year and a half that the movie not be shown again there for a long time. It was not re-released in any form in the UK until the year 2000.]
Enter part 2 of the story: However, all of this falls apart for our young non-hero. His friends get fed up with him and betray him after one of their deadliest assaults. Thus, he gets arrested. However, in prison, he puts on a show of seemingly good behavior, and even sucks up to the religious mindset of the warden and other important officials. This is not without his changing his mindframe, though. He diligently reads the Bible, but only for the parts in the Old Testament that describe acts of massive violence and sex acts. No one notices, so he is easily selected for an experiment in inducing "reformation", by a sick, grandscale version of operant conditioning. The form of brainwashing creates extreme anxiety and subsequent physical pain in Alex whenever he has thoughts of committing violent acts, but it unwittingly conditions him to the same response when listening to his beloved Beethoven. Alex's mindset has not changed one bit, though. He's still as aggressive and as devious. But now he cannot get into a mere fight to save his own life, without the sickening feeling coming to him. His environment hasn't changed, but now the people he acted negatively towards to decide to strike back, including his friends (who are now cops, ironically). This prevents him from reforming, and becomes a larger torture in the physical, mental, and philosophical realms. He should have learned something from the obvious morale that was being displayed for him: don't do to others what you do not want others to do to you. But he doesn't, as the whole world seems to be as aggressive as he is, deep down. Eventually, one man takes him in and tries to help him get payback from the government for his torturous conditioning. The problem is, that man is the crippled husband of the woman he had raped. The old man figures this out, and tries to drive him to commit suicide.
It ends with a "happy" ending, at least for Alex. The government, to avoid a publicity mess, decides to nurse Alex back to health and "reprogram" him. That is, they remove the conditioning. However, his natural emerging thoughts are about violence and aggressive sex. He becomes deliriously happy with these thoughts. This is because nowhere along the way did they ever remove the aggressiveness from him. He never developed a conscience, nor did he have a chance to do so. He loved the higher culture, but was slave to his primal impulses, with nothing filling the gap. The official form of "reform" was mechanistic, dehumanized - thus not working on humans.
Despite the serious issues addressed, the movie keeps a mere semiserious tone, which matches the narration by McDowell, as we are seeing these events through the eyes and ears of a satirically-inclined character with little concern for others. However, much to the credit of Kubrick, the movie does not become a dehumanized black comedy, but rather we get to feel the pain of the victims, and the nauseating feelings of anger and torment. Thus, we can observe the events from a general perspective, without being forced to feel sympathy for any particular character (we get to see both the "good" and the "evil" sides of most characters), yet allowing us to feel that we somehow can relate to the terrible Alex.
This movie is fun for the many little details. For example, the very odd, very sexual sculptures of the decadent high class and the art crowd. Another is seeing David Prowse, a.k.a. Darth Vader minus the voice of James Earl Jones, as a bodybuilder/bodyguard. Then there's Kubrick playing around with the visuals: you get to see Alex have a two way, but edited at a comical high speed, set to a slightly fast rendition of the William Tell Overture (or the "Lone Ranger" theme song, for those who have problems recognizing names of classical music pieces, over which I claim not the slightest superiority). You also get to see a scene where some objects start to move slightly from shot to shot - a series of continuity errors done on purpose to make you share a sense of disorientation with the characters. There's a lot of self-referencing trivia bits that Kubrick fans will love, particularly the inclusion of the "2001" soundtrack at a record store. Alex's creative, literate language provides a peculiar delight through his many phrases that some may not admit to liking, but enjoy anyway. And there's many odd camera angles that have influenced a zillion independent films about alienation, violence, disafected youth, and the psychological perturbed.
You probably won't get it all in one viewing, like most Kubrick films, and you probably won't appreciate it as much the first time around as with repeated viewings - like most Kubrick films. There definitely is no proper description or discussion of the movie in this review, that's for sure.
Bizarreness level: 8 shots out of 10.
Rating: 9 or 10 out of 10.
Fear and Desire
(1953)
Starring: Paul Mazursky (2 Days in the Valley, Blackboard
Jungle, Moscow on the Hudson), Kenneth Harp (who?), Virginia
Leith (the classic The Brain that Wouldn't Die, A Kiss Before
Dying, Curtains), Frank Silvera (Viva Zapata!, Mutiny
on the Bounty, Killer's Kiss, The Miracle of Our Lady of
Fatima),
and Steve Coit (who?).
Written by: Kubrick and Howard Sackler (Jaws 2, The
Great White Hope).
Genre: War/Drama
Duration: 1 hour 8 mins.
Availability: Kubrick attempted to buy every single copy possible
of the film and destroy them. Fortunately, a few producers have found
two or three reels left, and some of those were adapted into videotape,
practically as bootleg copies. This is a very hard item to place,
and is usually shown only in film festivals or tributes to Kubrick.
That is, if somebody gets hold one of the few copies available...
Kubrick may have been the greatest director of all times. He may have made more classics than anyone else. He may have been a perfectionist. But man, was his first attempt ever bad! Kubrick had good reason to try to make this film dissappear from the map: it looks like an Ed Wood film. It has strange narration, cheap shots, VERY bad dialogue, ominous music reminiscent of your 50s sci-fi/horror flick, and what looks like relatives of the cast of Reefer Madness going insane for no reason.
The plot is like this: after a plane crash, four soldiers find themselves trapped behind enemy lines in an unknown war in an unknown country in an unknown time (although it looks like they were in Canada in the early 50s) with no weapons save a knife. They decide to attempt to escape back home following a river, using a raft at nightime. However, until that happens, they wander around the countryside a bit, and encounter a native woman first, whom they decide to capture and tie to a tree, for they see her as a security hazzard. So one guy stays behind watching her, while the others go on exploring for supplies. While they do this, the guy they left behind starts going insane as he becomes sexually obsessed with their captive, and starts speaking about all his psychological traumas regarding love, while his eyes start bulging. Meanwhile, the others find a cabin and kill all the occupants, soldiers and civilians alike, and take their food and weapons. Then they find that a general is located nearby, and suddenly one of the soldiers becomes obsessed with killing him and becoming a hero, even at the cost of his own life.
Well, guess how this turns out: the obsessed characters try to carry out their obsessions while they say laughably terrible lines, while the other two just try to get the heck out of there. Sure, you can see an undeveloped Kubrick in there. It is a psychological/horror study of war. The characters became dehumanized and insane. There are people playing more than one role. There are constant shots of the faces and particular facial expressions of different people. And there are a few interesting shots around there. But really, this is a mess.
Of course, I am not discouraging you from watching it. If you get a
hold of it, you are joining a select group of myself and a few thousand
people world wide who have had access to it.
Bizareness: 8 shots out of 10.
Rating: 2/10
