2001: An Obsessive's Odyssey

First forty or fifty times seeing 2001: A Space Odysseyyou were truest of true believers immodestlyworshiping at shrine of Stanley Kubrick honestly

inhaling everything connected with the film from short storyThe Sentinel by Arthur C. Clark to reflected gloryof memoirs by anyone attached to its making-of story

absorbing everything linked to this work of art from terrificdocumentaries to deep think pieces on symbolicsignificance of killer computer & black slab monolithic

intimation of God or gods or evolution or alien mastersor who-knows-what you knew it to be achievement by masterfilmmaker long before AFI listed it among all-time masterpieces.

But these past twenty-odd screenings lately exposed portentousZarathustra horns & drum & Dawn of Man meat-eating with pretentiousbubble-wrapped bug-eyed floating frozen-face Star Child ridiculous

& tech-centric middle scenes & trippy light show in need of cuttingso deeper drama starker impact would lead to Wow ! endingwith “Its origin and purpose still a total mystery” instead of Huh ? ending.

Now you watch & study 2001: A Space Odyssey as muchfor Kubrick’s indulgences & puny human errors as for inspired touchof towering artistic genius. Still, he, and it, remain nonesuch.