'2001: A Space Odyssey': 5 Things You Probably Didn't Know About The Film

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by Oliver Lyttelton
April 2, 2012 11:38 AM
16 Comments

3. Seventeen Minutes Of Footage Cut At The Last Minute Was Recently Rediscovered
Given how much footage was shot (as much as two hundred times the length of the final cut), it's unsurprising that enormous amounts were left on the cutting room floor, but it's unlikely ever to surface: Kubrick always burnt his negatives after a film was finished. But the director did cut nineteen minutes after release, seventeen minutes of which were rediscovered in 2010 in a vault in a Kansas salt mine. It's yet to see the public light of day, but surely something is planned soon.

4. Jack Kirby Wrote A Marvel Comic Based On The Move, That Spun Off Into A Superhero Series
Even aside from Peter Hyams' lesser 1984 sequel "2010: The Year We Make Contact," the tale's gone on to have life elsewhere. Clarke wrote two more novels, "2061: Odyssey Three" in 1987 and 1997's "3001: The Final Odyssey" (Tom Hanks reportedly picked up the rights to the latter with the idea that he might direct it). Perhaps most curiously, a decade after the film was released, Marvel produced a ten-issue series by comics legend Jack Kirby that expanded on the film. The series saw the first appearance of Kirby's robot superhero character "Machine Man," who would later go on to become a stalwart part of the Marvel universe.

5. HAL 9000 Actor Douglas Rain Reprised His Role...In Woody Allen's 'Sleeper'
The film's been much parodied over the years, by everyone from Mel Brooks to "The Simpsons," but few went to the same lengths as Woody Allen. When he made his science-fiction comedy "Sleeper," the writer-director-star wrote an evil computer into the climax of the film, and got none another than Canadian stage veteran Douglas Rain, who lent his voice to HAL 9000 in "2001," to voice it in an uncredited cameo. Watch Woody Allen talk about his first impressions and growing to love Kubrick's movie below.

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More: 2001: A Space Odyssey, Stanley Kubrick

16 Comments

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Cos | May 6, 2012 3:33 AMReply

Can't be too critical of Kael. As Sidney Pollack said in the documentary "Kubrick A Life in Pictures", all of Kubrick's films opened to mixed reviews; then 10 years later they're all classics. Woody Allen says in the same doco that it took him 3 viewings to realise 2001 was a masterpiece.
Larry Russo | April 6, 2012 3:46 PMReply

Even the controls and displays in 2001 (on Discovery) were visionary. As flat screen monitors didn't yet exist, they used rear projection film to simulate futuristic computer displays (rather than using rounded tv tubes, insert fx shots or static graphic displays). For her to use the word "unimaginative" in describing this movie, Pauline Kael only proved herself shamefully useless.
walt milos | April 6, 2012 2:25 PMReply

H.A.L was chosen as the name for the Computer because each letter was one letter away from I.B.M!
Cos | May 6, 2012 3:29 AM

Arthur C Clarke always denied this; he claimed HAL was short for Heuristically programmed ALgorithmic computer
Huffy | April 3, 2012 5:02 AMReply

Does anyone know how Kubrick managed to secure basically complete creative freedom so early in his career? I know it wasn't unusual in the 70's but Kubrick had final cut all the way back in the early 60's, when Hollywood was still very much studio-driven. To deliver a film that late and that over-budget, especially a film as unconventional and experimental as 2001, would have been a death sentence to most careers. So how did Kubrick become so trusted?
Kimar | April 2, 2013 2:39 PM

Watch Room 237 for one theory... :)
Mark | April 3, 2012 9:48 PM

Huffy,

Kubrick had taken over the failing, huge studio film Spartacus and saved it. He then made the relatively modestly budgeted (and brilliant) film Dr. Strangelove, which was both a critical and financial success. Then, rather shrewdly, Kubrick parlayed this celebrated status into a green light on 2001. I believe he was very specific in his demands for independence. We're all lucky Kubrick wss so shrewd ...and capable.
Miles | April 2, 2012 8:00 PMReply

Seventeen Minutes Of Footage - hope we get to see this someday.
Terry | April 2, 2012 4:44 PMReply

The only major critic at the time who came out swinging for the film was Penelope Gilliatt, Pauline Kael's cotenant for many years at The New Yorker. Gilliatt, as always, was prescient whereas Kael wanted nothing to do with the film, couldn't understand it, and went behind Gilliatt's back to complain to others regarding Gilliatt's review. Thank the gods that Gilliatt was there, since Kael had an appetite only for junk and could not understand films of any complexity. Kael was the junk queen at the New Yorker, whereas Gilliatt got to the core of films' deepest meanings, something Kael couldn't have done if her life depended on it.
a | April 2, 2012 4:38 PMReply

Well, Pauline Kael disliked a lot of generally acclaimed films. Polarizing is a better word for the critical reaction, and a good modern analogy would be, well... The Tree of Life.
Terry | April 12, 2012 5:48 PM

NO, I do not believe that Bonnie and Clyde was a great film, and if you read the first review of the film in The New Yorker, Penelope Gilliatt got to the core of the film's successes and failures far better that Pauline Kael did in her hyperbolic, long, long, overly long, response. There are flaws in the film, and Kael preferred to write about the film's future influence rather than those flaws. As for its influence, what movie today has an earlier source of influence in Bonnie and Clyde? The Tree of Life was more like a Tarkovsky meditation than an action film. Kael was simply biased against films that required thinking. She was a pure sensualist who had no interest in thoughtful film making, experimental film making, next to no interest in documentaries, and on and on. As time goes on, Kael's over-the-top hyperbole makes for almost comic rereading of her work. Gilliatt's criticism just stands higher and higher in comparison.
Thomasi | April 4, 2012 3:49 PM

Sorry, that was meant to be a reply to Terry, above.
Thomasi | April 4, 2012 3:48 PM

"Bonnie and Clyde" is junk?
Gian | April 2, 2012 12:36 PMReply

Thanks for this. I had the film in my Netflix queue and had been planning to rewatch at some point so I now have a great excuse. I actually live 3 blocks from the Uptown here in DC and I supposed I could even head to the coffee shop across the street from there and at least recreate the geographic experience! LOL.
Nik Grape | April 2, 2012 12:06 PMReply

Forget just the genre, this is one of the greatest cinematic achievements of all time, period.
Dave | April 5, 2012 3:53 PM

Agreed. I've seen 2001 many times and I'm always amazed at how well it stands up. The special effects, the sets, the story are all absolutely visionary. Small case in point. I watched it a few weeks ago and during Dr. Floyd's voyage to the moon a stewardess (ok, flight attendant but it was released in '68) is watching a wrestling match on a wide screen monitor. That's right, HDTV in 1968!