Background Information on "2001: A Space Odyssey" |
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| Written by: MGM, 1968. Text cleaned up from a vintage MGM Exhibitors Campaign Book by Anders M Olsson, Sweden | Date: 25.03.2026 |
TIRED BUSINESSMAN CAN LOOK FORWARD TO SIX-DAY WEEKEND IN THE YEAR 2001 |
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 The year is 2001. The six-day weekend is over and people are returning to
work. Mr. Smith rises refreshed after his satisfying three-hour sleep,
breakfasts on synthetic tea or coffee and checks with his boss on
closed-circuit television.This view of mankind in the 21st century is offered by a man brilliantly equipped to venture predictions about the future. It is visualized as an imminent reality by Arthur C. Clarke, acknowledged as the world's foremost writer on the subject of space, and co-author with producer-director Stanley Kubrick of the MGM Super Panavision and Metrocolor adventure, "2001: A Space Odyssey." Clarke predicts that 33 years from now, man will have a ticket to the Moon and will be exploring the outer reaches of the solar system. He will have abandoned land farming as being an unrealistic method of producing food and instead will cultivate the ocean, using the heat of nuclear reactors to derive nutriments from the great plankton beds that now lay unused in the seas of the world. Many farmers of the future will be engaged in "whale ranching." "Cities as we now know them will almost certainly be on the way out," Clarke declares. "As methods of communication increase there will be less need for aggregation and little for commuting, except to other countries. People will work from home with the aid of closed-circuit television. The traveling salesman, for example, won't exist as we know him today. He will show his merchandise to potential buyers on the screen." In another prediction, Clarke states that automobiles ("those immobile lumps of hardware blocking the highways") will disappear from town centers, and free transport will be introduced in thickly populated places either through a rapid shuttle bus system or moving sidewalks. "Ours will be the last century of the savage," says Clarke. "A high standard of education will become vital for survival. Mere literacy will be totally inadequate. Education will teach people that even in a world of infinite leisure boredom is inconceivable." Sleep will become greatly reduced. New scientific discoveries will produce a profound instantaneous sleep, diminishing the need for rest to no more than two or three hours a night. Clarke continued, "I have hopes that in addition to the scientific knowledge that will be needed for survival, there will be an increase in artists as pressures of time are removed. Otherwise, inevitably the suicide rate must increase among those who are unable to fall back on their own resources." As science takes over menial work, low grade jobs will disappear. Office work will be handled by computers. Much of today's normal food will not be seen on menus of the future. Meat-eating will be abandoned as uneconomic and will be replaced either by whale-steaks or yeast and algae compounds. Almost all food products that now depend on manual labor will become an old-fashioned thing of the 20th century. Such things as tea and strawberries will only exist in synthetic form unless they are grown by amateur farmers as a hobby. "All this will create great redundancy in jobs in the transition period," Clarke avers. "The unemployed will have to be paid so that they can continue to consume goods. "Perhaps," he concluded, with a smile, "computers will have to be taxed heavily." |
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'HAL 9000' IS PIVOTAL CHARACTER OF KUBRICK'S "2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY" |
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 "2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY" MOON BUSOne of the fascinating sights in "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick's epic production for MGM - a Moon Bus, hovering a few thousand feet above the surface on its rocket jets, flies over the landscapes of the airless moon, illuminated by the great light of the earth low above the horizon. Still 276 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 2-J For the most part actors approach a new characterization with two basic questions: What kind of a man is he? What made him act this way? However, Douglas Rain's study into character became considerably more complex with his exploration into the role of Hal 9000 in Stanley Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey," MGM Super Panavision and Metrocolor adventure into the future. For Rain, his initial probing into the background of the characterization began with, "Am I playing a man or a machine?" It was a justifiable question since Hal 9000 is a computerized super-brain machine which accompanies the two astronauts, Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood, on their half-billion-mile journey to the vicinity of Jupiter aboard the spacecraft "Discovery." In the year 2001, Hal 9000 is the latest development in machine intelligence - a computer which can reproduce most of the activities of the human brain with incalculably greater speed and reliability. The fact that his voice and not his image "creates" his unique role in "2001: A Space Odyssey" offered Rain the greatest challenge of his acting career. "This is a character that thinks rather than acts," he explained. But can a machine think? According to the noted mathematician, Alan Turing, the answer is in the affirmative. Turing has stated that if a man could carry on a prolonged conversation with a machine, whether by typewriter or voice inputs, without being able to distinguish between its replies and those a human being might give, then the machine is thinking by all rational definitions of the word. On the journey to Jupiter in "2001: A Space Odyssey," Hal 9000 is the supervisory brain and nerve center of the spaceship. By the humans aboard "Discovery" he is regarded as another member of the crew. |
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30 GLOBAL NATIONS BELONGING TO "NUCLEAR CLUB" IN YEAR 2001 ARE NON-AGGRESSIVE FOR FEAR OF TOTAL ANNIHILATION |
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 SCIENTISTS FROM MOON EXAMINE BAFFLING OBJECT IN "2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY"A group of scientists from Clavius, Man's first colony established on the Moon, examine the TMA-1 excavation in the giant crater Tycho and its strange rectangular object in the center, which has been hidden beneath the lunar surface for millions of years. It is one of the absorbing scenes in "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick production, presented by MGM. An epic drama of adventure and exploration that sweeps you half-a-billion miles from Earth to the very limits of our solar system and beyond, it reveals the strangeness, beauty and wonder that we will discover on the Moon, the planets and stars - in the year 2001. The picture was directed and produced by Stanley Kubrick from a screenplay by Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, with Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood heading an international cast. Filmed in Super Panavision and Metrocolor. Still 116 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 4-B What was life like on Earth 33 years ago and what will it be like 33 years hence in the year 2001? An exciting and imaginative answer to the second question is found in Stanley Kubrick's MGM Super Panavision and Metrocolor adventure into the future, "2001: A Space Odyssey," starring Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood as two young astronauts involved in a deep inter-solar probe. But first, Question Number One. A mature person has only to recall our battle-scarred earth writhing helplessly between two world wars. Mankind, still led by a few nations whose technologies and armaments exceeded their less fortunate neighbors, did not yet possess the capacity for supersonic flight. Uses Own Brain-Power Man in general, taking half a century to double his scientific knowledge and almost totally oblivious to the advancing age of computerization and automation, worked for nearly 50 hours a week. He still used his own brain-power for everyday calculations and his own two hands for construction and manufacturing, as he had done for thousands of years. Like his ancestors, very much a carnivore, he continued to depend on the breeding and slaughter of livestock for food. In many scientific fields we were emerging as if from an age of darkness; hospitals and surgeons were still regarded with subconscious fear. |
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 STEWARDESS DEFIES LAWS OF GRAVITYIn "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick's epic production for MGM, unfolding a drama of adventure and exploration into the future, a stewardess, carrying a weightless food tray, enters the cockpit area of the spacecraft Aries to serve a meal to the crew on duty. She walks on Velcro-lined shoes which enable her to cling to the Velcro-lined floor in any position even when she appears to be moving in an upside-down position. Still 260/1 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 2-G The worlds of rocketry and astronautics belonged virtually to the realm of imagination. For only a few people had taken notice of Robert Goddard who, a decade earlier, had launched the first liquid-propelled rocket. With the horror of World War I still very apparent, man vowed to himself that this senseless slaughter could never be allowed to happen again. But an insignificant German with an insane but brilliant gift of leadership had other ideas. This was the scene 30 years ago on Earth, an infinite speck orbiting 93 million miles from its sun in a universe of eternity. This was the scene many alive today knew and experienced. Now, what about Question Number Two? As seen by producer-director Stanley Kubrick and famed space authority and science writer, Arthur C. Clarke, with whom he co-authored the screenplay of "2001: A Space Odyssey," in the year 2001, Earth will be basking uneasily in a vast nuclear stalemate. Nearly 30 nations belong to the "Nuclear Club," none daring to show aggression for fear of total annihilation. War is gradually but surely being throttled to death. Mankind, increasing his knowledge with incredible rapidity, has rid himself of his earthly shackles and is on the threshold of his solar system and the stars. With lunar bases firmly established, he prepares for the beginning of a new life. His spacecraft are now powered by nuclear energy, and commercial airlines, or spacelines, are operating between Earth and the Moon. By 2001, the costly research into manned space travel beyond our moon has brought pyramiding benefits, one of the greatest being the successful application of hibernation techniques to the human body. The incurably diseased need no longer fear a death both premature and painful; they can now be hibernated until a cure can be found. At last, Man with his life expectancy vastly increased, has cured cancer, tuberculosis and many other seemingly indestructible diseases. Ultra-sophisticated computerization and automation has put the long working week into the history books, and the greatly increased time for leisure brings the dawning of a new era of culture. The successful synthesising of meat brings the slaughter of animals for human consumption to an end. These are merely a few concepts of the world 33 years from the present, as envisaged by Kubrick and Clarke. With "2001: A Space Odyssey" they have filmed an epic adventure of man on the threshold of the universe with his feet planted firmly on the first stepping stone, Luna, our Earth's moon. |
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ELECTRONIC LIBRARY A MARVEL OF FUTURE |
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 "SPACE ODYSSEY" MISSION COMMANDERMission Commander Bowman, enacted by Keir Dullea, inside the Brain Room of the Hal 9000 computer - one of the marvels of "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick production for MGM, a drama of adventure and exploration taking you to the Moon, the planets and the stars in the year 2001. Still 281 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 2-K An orbital newspad, screening the news from major journals published throughout the world, became a standard reading device at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's British Studios during the filming of Stanley Kubrick's MGM Super Panavision and Metrocolor adventure into the future, "2001: A Space Odyssey." In this remarkable instance of "news in orbit", a coded number is depressed on a channel selector, which allows each page to appear on a high-definition screen and remain there until a button is pressed to select other sections of the paper. A probability of everyone's future, its workings are one of the many secret items in the complex structure of Kubrick's fascinating drama which cinematically advances time by 33 years. But a man who can claim at least part paternity of such orbital communication is Arthur C. Clarke, co-author with Kubrick of "2001: A Space Odyssey," who predicted communications satellites in a technical paper published in 1945, almost twenty years before Early Bird. "What people want is information, not wood pulp," declares Clarke. "By the beginning of the next century, newspapers won't exist except as trains of electronic impulses. Communications satellites will enable us to move almost instantaneously to any part of the world with transmission of the written and spoken word. This also applies to telephones. A network of advanced satellites will bring all points on earth into close contact. It will be as easy to call Australia from Greenland, or South America from China, as it is to put through a local call today. "Satellites will also alleviate one of the basic problems of our culture, that of information storage and retrieval. It is now possible to store any written material or any illustration in electronic form, as is done every day on video tape. One can thus envisage a Central Library or Memory Bank which would be a permanent part of the world communications network. Readers and scholars could call for any document, from the Declaration of Independence to the current best-seller, and see it flashed on their screens. "The Electronic Library is bound to come. Then, any man on Earth who knows how to dial the right numbers will have immediate access to all printed knowledge, flashed from Central Memory Bank up to the nearest satellite and down again, to be displayed on the screen of his receiver. And he will be able to store it in his own electronic library for easy reference, just as we now record music or conversation." |
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"2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY": TRANSLATING THE CHALLENGES POSED BY EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL LIFE INTO A MOTION PICTURE |
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 A space-suited Gary Lockwood, as he appears in his role as Astronaut Poole
in "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick production for MGM, an epic
drama of adventure and exploration taking you to the Moon, the planets and
the stars - in the year 2001.Still 44 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 1-A "2001: A Space Odyssey" tells of an adventure that has not yet happened but which many people - scientists, philosophers, writers and engineers - think will happen, and which may happen very soon. The adventure is the first contact that the human race - we on the planet Earth - will have with life somewhere in the Universe. This limitless void, with its uncountable numbers of suns and planets, is like a gigantic theatre filled with stages on which the drama of life can be acted out and on which very probably it is being acted out and has been acted out for eons. What are the beings that inhabit these worlds? Will we be able to recognize them or will they appear so alien that if we were to see them we would hardly know them as intelligent life at all? Will they be biological life forms, machines or even disembodied creatures of pure energy? Will they he hostile toward us; or will they think that we are so primitive that they will pass us by and look elsewhere for other beings more nearly equal to them? If we get a signal from outer space, what should we do about it? Should we answer it and invite visitors or should we ignore it and continue to live in the Universe as if we are alone? Or have we already been visited? Has some extra-terrestrial civilization left a souvenir for us to find when we get to the moon or the planet Mars? If we find life in the Universe - perhaps beings more intelligent than ourselves - what will we come to think of ourselves, our problems, our quarrels and our struggles, all of which take place on an obscure rocky planet not far from one of billions of average stars? For nearly five years, ever since he finished making "Dr. Strangelove," Stanley Kubrick has been fascinated by the theme of extra-terrestrial life and how the challenges it poses could be translated into a film that was exciting to see, scrupulously accurate from the scientific point of view, and as beautiful as modern cinematic art could make it. Science fiction and science fiction films are now commonplace but most of them deal with impossible worlds set in a far-off future, filled with death rays and weird monsters. In MGM's presentation of "2001: A Space Odyssey" Kubrick has tried to imagine how things are really going to be a few decades from now. If computers talk in the film it is because the leading experts in the computer field in the United States and England, where the film was made, assured Kubrick that by the year 2001 computers will talk. If in 2001 the surface of the Moon looks like what you would expect it to look like, from the latest rocket pictures, this is no accident, since Kubrick has been studying these pictures for the last three years to make sure that the Moon looks like the Moon. The real world of science is now so fantastic that old-fashioned science fiction movies - with space ships on strings - look tame and out of date, especially to the modern generation of moviegoers who have grown up with Sputnik, Cape Kennedy and manned space flight. "2001: A Space Odyssey" is probably the most technically complex movie ever made. Each scene involving space flight or activity on the Moon took weeks of preparation. First Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, who co-authored the film and who is regarded as the most distinguished contemporary writer on science themes, studied technical reports, NASA photographs, or consulted with professionals in the field to find out what was really known about futuristic communications or about what the Earth will look like when seen from the Moon, or how space suits will be designed thirty years from now. While these preparations were going on, Kubrick's office in the MGM studios outside of London looked something like an engineer's design room. Kubrick has a chess player's instinct for organization. (In his salad days he was a professional player.) He is very fond of charts and bulletin boards, and while the technical studies were taking place the bulletin boards were crowded with photographs, drawings of space ships and various pieces of material which might be used for space suits. In neighboring buildings there were crews at work building the Lunar Hilton, hotel for visitors to the Moon, or a pre-historic landscape for the scenes involving the dawn of man. The space ships of the future, in which men will live for months and maybe years, will have artificial gravity which will keep things from flying around and which also seems necessary for the health of the astronauts. One way of supplying gravity is with a centrifuge - a room that spins so that things are stuck to the edges, just as gravity sticks to the ground. Kubrick wanted his space ships to have "centrifugal gravity," so he had the Vickers-Armstrong Engineering Group build, at the cost of $750,000, an actual centrifuge, thirty-eight feet in diameter, which spins on its axis at a maximum speed of three miles an hour. The centrifuge is big enough so that the astronauts in the film, played by Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood, have plenty of room to move around inside of it. In order to direct them while they were inside, Kubrick installed a closed circuit television system which enabled him to monitor the activities in the space ship from the floor of the studio. During the shooting of the space ship sequences, the MGM studio, with the whirling centrifuge, cameras, television sets, flashing lights and microphones, looked a little like the launch pad at Cape Kennedy. "2001: A Space Odyssey" is a craftsman's mixture of science and fantasy - fantasy that is all the more intriguing since it might very well become reality sooner than we think. After seeing some of the rushes of the picture in London, Kubrick's old friend and partner, James Harris, with whom he was associated on such pictures as "The Killing," "Paths of Glory" and "Lolita," remarked: "It will be the only picture ever made after which people who have seen it will say that they have never seen anything like it - and they'll be right." |
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THEY CAME FROM ALL OVER GLOBE TO MAKE "SPACE ODYSSEY" |
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 A MOON BUS SKIMS ACROSS LAKES OF LAVA IN ONE OF THE GREAT SCENES OF "2001: A
SPACE ODYSSEY"A moon bus skims past crater walls, over serpentine valleys, across lakes of lava that have been frozen for billions of years. It is carrying a group of scientists from Clavius, Man's first colony established on the Moon, to the giant crater Tycho. The moon bus, hovering a few thousand feet above the surface on its rocket jets, flies over the desolate but spectacular landscapes of the airless moon, illuminated by the great light of the earth low above the horizon. It is one of the fascinating sights of "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick's production, presented by MGM. An adventure in space and time which reveals, as no other movie has done, the promise and excitement of the great age of exploration that is opening up for mankind among the planets and the still more distant stars, the epic film was directed and produced by Stanley Kubrick from a screen play by Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, noted science writer and authority on space, with Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood heading an international cast. The production was filmed in Super Panavision and Metrocolor. Still 168 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 5-B During production of "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanly Kubrick's MGM production in Super Panavision and Metrocolor, the principal restaurant at MGM's British Studios, just outside London, sounded like the delegates' lounge at the United Nations. For this Kubrick was mainly responsible. For his epic space adventure he literally "took over" Metro's five main shooting stages and even overflowed into the Shepperton Studios, which are some twenty-five miles away. To design the future, Kubrick engaged artists and set specialists from every part of the world, averaging out at one for each year that his story leapfrogs into the future. Accents, dress and airline luggage labels proclaimed that they hailed from Tokyo, Scotland, South Africa, Israel, Australia, Rome, London, New York, Minneapolis, Boston, Huntsville, Denver and Chicago. Recruited six months before the first foot of film was exposed, the art department, probably the largest and certainly one of the most talented ever assembled for a single motion picture, worked two weeks ahead of shooting crews during the time required to complete the principal photography. MGM's massive floor space was packed with space vehicles and impedimenta of the future, all of heroic proportions. One functioning prop alone stood 36 feet tall and weighed 38 tons. |
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STARS SPEND SIX WEEKS IN SPACE SHIP PERIMETER |
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 PRODUCER KUBRICK AND WRITER CLARKEStanley Kubrick, director and producer of "2001: A Space Odyssey," presented by MGM, on a set of the picture with Arthur C. Clarke, noted science writer and space authority. Kubrick and Clarke wrote the screen play of the epic drama of adventure and exploration into the future. The notice above Mr. Kubrick's head reads: "CAUTION WEIGHTLESS CONDITION." Filmed in Super Panavision and Metrocolor. 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 2-P In one of the most remarkable assignments ever demanded of motion picture stars, Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood, cast as astronauts in Stanley Kubrick's epic-scale MGM Super Panavision and Metrocolor adventure into the future, "2001: A Space Odyssey," spent six weeks of working days inside the cramped perimeter of a giant space-ship called "Discovery." The Centrifuge of the circular steel structure, weighing 38 tons and standing 36 feet high, created an area of gravity for Dullea and Lockwood to move in freely during their deep space probe in the breathtaking adventure. Created and constructed by a top team of engineers from Vickers Armstrong, the Centrifuge required six months to build and perfect as a practical working structure complete with a control panel which operated the intricate machinery required to control the critical rotation of the massive device. The space-ship dominated one of the eleven sound stages at MGM's British Studios. These stages were filled with the complex of futuristic sets entailed in Kubrick's vision of the future in "2001: A Space Odyssey." During their protracted interplanetary travel as astronauts in the film, Dullea and Lockwood were able to engage in a relatively normal domestic routine. Extensive electronic equipment screened the books, magazines and newspapers of their choice and other relaxation stemmed from taped music and a library of films. A well-stocked larder of special space-age foods provided their dietary requirements and a compact gymnasium enabled the actors to maintain their physical health. During the six weeks of filming in the Centrifuge, Dullea and Lockwood worked "in solitary" and under claustrophobic conditions imposed by the set. The entire structure was sealed for the "takes," with the camera photographing from a predetermined position inside the Centrifuge and with Stanley Kubrick directing the scenes from the outside with the aid of radio equipment and a television monitoring set-up. This is only one of the many marvels of "2001: A Space Odyssey," dramatic story of the exploration of the Earth, the planets of our solar system and a journey light years away to another part of the galaxy, exploring the infinite possibilities that space-travel opens to mankind. Stanley Kubrick Got His "Instant" Movie Rushes! "Instant rushes" became available to producer-director Stanley Kubrick and his cast during filming of his MGM adventure into the future, "2001: A Space Odyssey," while using closed-circuit television in conjunction with cameras inside a rotating 38-ton centrifuge. Gary Lockwood and Keir Dullea, as two astronauts involved in a deep space probe, worked alone inside the 40-foot-tall set, with Kubrick directing the scenes outside with the assistance of TV screens and a sound hook-up. As the action was transmitted to Kubrick on the screen, it also was video taped, with the result that seconds later the actors were able to watch themselves in a run-through of their scenes before trying another "take." |
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"SURVIVAL" IN A VACUUM OF SPACE
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 Arthur C. Clarke, noted science writer and authority on space, who, together
with director Stanley Kubrick wrote the screen play of "2001: A Space
Odyssey," Kubrick's epic production for MGM, a drama of adventure and
exploration in the year 2001.2001: A Space Odyssey Still AC-1 Mat 1-C Today, everyone knows that beyond the Earth's atmosphere there is nothingness, an almost complete vacuum from which astronauts must be protected either by the air-tight walls of their spacecraft or by the multi-layered fabric of a spacesuit. It is popularly believed that a man would die instantly upon exposure to this vacuum and that his body would probably explode if his suit or the pressurization of the spaceship cabin failed. There is now mounting evidence that this is not true, and one of the most dramatic sequences in Stanley Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey" shows something never before depicted on the screen - the reactions of an astronaut when his body is exposed to the vacuum of outer space. This sequence, which is certain to arouse controversy, is firmly based on some of the latest scientific researches in the field of space medicine. U.S. Air Force doctors, working with dogs and chimpanzees, have now shown that these animals can survive exposure to almost complete vacuum for surprisingly long periods, up to two minutes. If they are re-pressured before the end of this time, they survive without any permanent damage. Though experiments have not yet been carried out with human volunteers, it seems likely that these results can be applied to men. The situation will certainly arise in space, sooner or later, when an astronaut in a disabled spacecraft has to transfer to another vehicle without a spacesuit. The medical evidence suggests that an unprotected man could retain consciousness for perhaps ten seconds in the vacuum of space, long enough to transfer between two spacecraft in close contact and to slam the door of the air lock behind him. Exposure to vacuum may not be a pleasant experience, for there would probably be a sensation of intense cold owing to evaporation of the body fluids, particularly around the eyes and the mouth. However, if this was the only way of saving his life, any astronaut would be prepared to accept the danger and discomfort involved during a brief exposure to vacuum, just as men trapped in a sunken submarine are prepared to risk leaving their vessel and making an ascent back to the surface. In an underwater escape the strains of the body may be considerably more severe; any skin-diver coming up from a depth of thirty feet undergoes a greater pressure change than a man stepping out of a spacesuit into a vacuum. The exciting space-exposure sequence in "2001: A Space Odyssey," although it may seem improbable at first sight, is therefore firmly based on the latest scientific knowledge. |
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IDEA OF EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL LIFE, DERIDED HALF A CENTURY AGO, HAS BECOME ACCEPTED AS GENERAL SCIENTIFIC BELIEF |
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 WHAT
SPACE STATION'S LOUNGE MAY LOOK LIKE IN YEAR 2001Less than an hour ago, you were rocketed up from New York's Kennedy spaceport, to embark on a journey that will take you out into the far reaches of the Universe. Your first stop is the slowly turning wheel of Space Station V, in orbit high above the Equator. This is the space station's main passenger lounge. The floor curves upward because the lounge is on the outer rim of the giant, 100-feet dimeter wheel. Because of the station's slow rotation, centrifugal force presses the passengers down against the floor with a force that gives them a sensation of normal weight. It is one of the fascinating settings of "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick production, presented by MGM. Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood head an international cast in the Super Panavision and Metrocolor picture, an epic drama of adventure and exploration that takes you to the Moon, the planets and the stars - in the year 2001. Still 28 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 3-A A half century ago, it was worth a man's academic standing to openly admit a belief in extra-terrestrial life. Twenty years ago, any man who said he believed in it was put down as someone who read the comic strips. Today, few if any scientists question the idea that life is widespread throughout the universe and that, in fact, much of it may be far older and more sophisticated than our own. In writing the story of "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick's spectacular production for MGM in Super Panavision and Metrocolor, the producer-director took this premise as the basis for his adventure into the future, encompassing a sweep in history from the dawn of man to some thirtythree years ahead when man has reached the moon and beyond. The noted space authority and science writer, Arthur C. Clarke, collaborated with Kubrick on the screenplay of "2001: A Space Odyssey," which depicts in fascinating terms the proposition that there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe and that Earth is nothing more than a very ordinary planet circling a very ordinary star, the Sun, in a very ordinary galaxy, the Milky Way. |
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 Is there, in fact, logic behind their assumption?There are probably many millions, perhaps as many as 50,000,000 planets harboring civilizations within our own galaxy, and our galaxy is very much like countless billions of others. There are some 150,000,000 stars in our galaxy of which at least fifteen per cent are identical to our own sun. Mathematically, given millions upon millions of similar if not identical environments, those within which life could develop, reason must conclude that life will exist in many of these environments. The only chance man has of confining the phenomenon of life to our own planet within the context of discernible logic is to demonstrate that our planet is unique in one special way. No scientist has yet come up with such information. Earth is made of the same chemical substances found in billions of other heavenly bodies. Our position in relation to our star gives us temperatures that are duplicated billions of times throughout the universe. Our age is the same as millions of other planets, younger than millions more, and older than other millions. With time, chemistry and heat identical or similar, with the same radiation and the same law of physics and chemistry, how could a habitable planet fail to become, as has the Earth, an inhabited planet? A new science has been born and named that deals with the apparent fact of intelligent life on other planets. It has been termed "extrasolar intelligence" and is today the arena of intensive research and study. There are seven research projects under way in the United States alone to develop devices designed to detect primitive life or, at least, pre-life evidence within our own solar system. Although it appears to be highly unlikely that intelligence will be found on the other planets of our solar system, there may be lower forms of life on Mars, at least. We will know the answer in the years immediately ahead. The existence of primitive life or Mars, although of great scientific interest, is not the issue. The issue is the quest for intelligent life in the universe other than on this microscopic bit of dust we call home. Science believes that without question it exists. So do Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, as they explore the infinite possibilities of this greatest of all wonders in Kubrick's fascinating film, "2001: A Space Odyssey." |
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MAGICAL YEAR |
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 In
an emergency, Mission Commander Bowman, portrayed by Keir Dullea, has risked
the perils of "explosive decompression" and crossed space without the
protection of his space-helmet. Now a blast of air blows him from the
hovering space pod in which he had left the deep-space exploration ship
Discovery into the ship's open air lock. This is one of the exciting moments
in "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick's epic production for MGM, a
drama of adventure and exploration into the future.Still 55 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 2-C When the distinguished American Astronautical Society held its Fourth Goddard Memorial Symposium in Washington, D. C., in March of 1966, the subject was "Space Age in the Fiscal Year 2001." That seems to be a magical year. Stanley Kubrick has created the world as it will be in 2001 in his spectacular space adventure for MGM, "2001: A Space Odyssey," filmed in Super Panavision and Metrocolor. |
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PRESS A BUTTON AND CHANGE THE SCENERY |
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 During a nine-month trip aboard the deep-space exploration ship Discovery,
astronaut Poole, portrayed by Gary Lockwood, keeps in shape by doing
roadwork inside the spinning drum of the ship's centrifuge in "2001: A Space
Odyssey." Stanley Kubrick's epic production for MGM, unfolding a drama of
adventure and exploration that takes you to the Moon, the planets - and
beyond! The slow rotation of the centrifuge creates a normal weight,
enabling the astronaut to walk and run.Still 36 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 2-B Houses evaluated at sky-high prices because of their outlook onto panoramic views will be obsolete in the future, according to art director Tony Masters, who created designs for "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick's production for MGM in Super Panavision and Metrocolor. Masters visualizes, instead, simulated views selected by a push-button and operated by the householder, which automatically will bring the South Seas to the window as naturally as the sight of geraniums. Seats with built-in controls for telephone, tape recording and music; entire underfloor heating; automatic cleaning through suction; and panels for indirect, over-all lighting control will be regarded as normal appurtenances. Masters casts a visionary eye on many aspects of the future domestic scene. Kitchen equipment, lighting, windows, seats and other furnishings underwent revolutionary changes in the Art Department at MGM's British Studios outside of London, where "2001: A Space Odyssey" was filmed. Too, every inch of the studios was crammed with space ships, control facilities, satellites, space laboratories and other futuristic paraphernalia that comprise the year 2001 in the eyes of producer-director Stanley Kubrick. |
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MARVELS SHOWN IN "SPACE ODYSSEY" PROVIDE FASCINATING SPECULATIONS |
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 PILOTS SPACE POD ON RESCUE MISSIONPiloting the space pod, at right, Mission Commander Bowman (Keir Dullea) approaches his fellow astronaut, Poole (Gary Lockood), in an attempt to rescue the latter, who is drifting away in space. This is one of the spellbinding moments in "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick's epic production for MGM unfolding a drama of adventure and exploration into the future. Filmed in Super Panavision and Metrocolor. Still 60 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 2-D No motion picture director likes to go into a project without his facts straight. What kind of weapons were used in such-and-such an era, what were the costumes worn? What percentage of the population wore beards, and what was the vocabulary of the day? What kind of jokes made people laugh, what was considered bad taste? These facts and literally thousands more are required information for today's film-makers, making movies for ever more discerning audiences. The problems are far more profound when the movie-maker casts his eyes ahead instead of backward. Predictions of what knowledge will be available are hard to come by and can be difficult to justify. If the director happens to be looking up as well as ahead, his problems are enormous, for our knowledge of the universe, even of our solar system, is very small. Hundreds of Questions When Stanley Kubrick, one of the screen's foremost producers and directors, sat down with Arthur C. Clarke, the world's most prominent writer on the subject of space, to begin work on the screenplay of "2001: A Space Odyssey," MGM's epic adventure into the future in Super Panavision and Metrocolor, he found some perplexing problems indeed. Unfortunately, you can't call the Research Department and get answers to many questions about even celestial bodies as handy as Luna, Earth's moon. Here are just a few of the hundreds of questions, answers for which will certainly be known in the year 2001, but which for the time being leave the inquirer with an understandably quizzical look: On November 3, 1958, the Soviet astronomer N. A. Kozyrev was studying the crater Alphonsus of our moon. In the middle of the crater is a mountain peak 4,300 feet high. It was glowing with a peculiarly bright light. Spectral analysis showed that carbon-containing gases were being emitted. Was this volcanic action? What about all the theories about Luna being a dead world? It is an established fact that polar caps appear on the planet Mars and follow a southward and northward trend toward the Equator in the appropriate seasons. They retreat in the summer, advance in the winter. Is this snow? If it is snow, is it made up of water or of gases? Do the other color changes on Mars indicate plant growth also following seasonal cycles? If these patches of brown and green are plants, what other form of life has appeared on Mars? |
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 Mars orbits the same sun we do here on Earth and comes at times within
34,000,000 miles of us. Jupiter, too, orbits around our Sun and comes to
within half-a-billion miles of us. Between the orbits of these two planets
are thousands of small bodies circling endlessly in space. Many of these
have been given names: Ceres is 475 miles in diameter, Juno only 128.
Hidalgo is a mere 25 miles across the center, Vesta 245 miles, and misshapen
Eros approximately 15 by 5 miles. How many of these asteroids are there
between Mars and Jupiter and where do they come from?Are they remnants of a tenth planet that exploded or died in a collision with another world long, long ago? Does this fate await other planets? Every year, some ten meteorite impacts are recorded on Earth. No one knows how many actually collide with us, plunging unseen into the oceans that cover nearly 75% of Earth's surface. It is, in fact, highly unlikely that any meteorite crashing through our rich atmosphere could survive the enormous heats generated by the friction, or ever will land where it can be discovered. Some estimates suggest that 500 meteorites or more do actually crash through and reach the surface of our planet every twelve months. Nearly 650 have been recorded down through history. Where do they come from? Are they bits of another world that perished in some incomprehensible catastrophe long before the first dinosaurs walked across the planet Earth? Are they travelers from other galaxies, or are they part of our own tiny little galaxy with its infinitesimally small accumulation of 150,000,000 stars, many much larger than our Sun. Our galaxy is a mere point in the sky when compared with the entire universe. But man is never so much man as when he is faced with unanswered questions. In the year 2001, he will know more than he knows now. And, as is always the case, every question answered will develop into hundreds more unanswered. The answered questions of the first year of the 21st century, as depicted in "2001: A Space Odyssey," are every bit as fascinating as the unanswered questions of today. |
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Information Transmitted By "Electronic Newspad" |
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The entire output of the world's newspapers and magazines will become
automatically available to readers at the push of a button in Stanley
Kubrick's world of the future as visualized in the MGM epic, "2001: A Space
Odyssey." An electronic newspad, with news transmitted virtually in any language, is the film's vision of breakfast-time reading 33 years from now. Envisaged, too, is the possibility of flipping up a copy of a classic or best-seller with the same facility, instantly bringing selected reading within everyone's reach. |
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Movie Magic Puts Time And History in Reverse |
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The movie craftsmen on Stanley Kubrick's adventure into the future, "2001: A
Space Odyssey," were able to move back millions of years in time just by
shifting from one sound stage to another at MGM's British Studios. After building a 38-ton, 36-feet high centrifuge inside a spacecraft capable of sustaining a half-billion-mile journey to Jupiter on one set, the technicians moved to an adjoining stage to create the sets for a Dawn of Man sequence eons before mankind progressed into civilization. |
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SPACE STATION ONE OF FILM'S MARVELS |
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 KEIR DULLEA, GARY LOCKWOOD IN MGM's SPACE EPIC, "2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY"One of the fascinating settings for "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick's epic production for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, unfolding a drama of adventure and exploration into the future, is the pod bay area of the deep-space exploration ship Discovery. The space pods enable the astronauts to leave the Discovery for reconnaissance trips. Watched by Mission Commander Bowman (Keir Dullea), astronaut Poole (Gary Lockwood) is about to enter one of the space pods. Still 649 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 2-M Today's airport waiting rooms will seem old-fashioned indeed in comparison to the accommodations which will be offered to the space travelers 33 years from now. A look into the fantastic future is afforded in the Space Station created for Stanley Kubrick's MGM Super Panavision and Metrocolor adventure, "2001: A Space Odyssey," as a stopping off place for interplanetary travelers. Designed and constructed by the film's art director, Tony Masters, with the aid of a team of 35 artists and draftsmen, this unique structure of the future orbits the Earth, spinning as it travels to create its own gravity. Extending over a curving 150 feet, the glistening white-topped sweep of flooring slopes to a height of 40 feet, indicating the circular shape of the entire Space Station. Black typography on stark-white walls stresses the clean, functional simplicity of design, with vividly colored accessories creating a "Mondrian" effect. Moon travelers will have the use of facilities undreamed of today, marking the scientific progress between the years 1966 and 2001. A picture telephone will bring sound and vision contact with people on Earth within easy reach. Other futuristic sets created by Masters for "2001: A Space Odyssey" include the interiors of three distinctly different space craft, the surface of the Moon, and a conference on the Moon in which international scientists hold a dramatic meeting. Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood head an international cast in the epic story of adventure and exploration of the Earth, the planets of our solar system and a journey light years away to another part of the galaxy, which explores the infinite possibilities that space travel opens to mankind. |
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UNIQUE BODYGUARDS |
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 A "SPACE ODYSSEY" EXPLORATION SHIP LEAVES EARTH'S ORBITThe deep-space exploration ship, Discovery, which carries a group of astronauts on a spellbinding mission in "200l: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick production, presented by MGM. Atom-powered and 700-feet long, Discovery has left Earth's orbit for a journey of more than half-a-billion miles to the giant outer planet, Jupiter, in "2001: A Space Odyssey," an epic drama of adventure and exploration that reveals the strangeness, beauty and wonder that we will discover on the Moon, the planets and the stars - in the year 2001. Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood head an international cast in the Super Panavision and Metrocolor picture. Still 169 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 3 C "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick's adventure into the future for MGM probably marks the first motion picture in which the actors were assigned bodyguards. Apart from the usual stand-ins, hair-dressers, make-up artists and concomitant workers, Keir Dullea, Gary Lockwood and the film's other performers were assigned a personal attendant. He was required because in sequences involving the astronauts' space kits, the suits and helmets were so complicated that each item was kept in a specially built container, with the attendant shadowing the actor every second he was wearing a costume, both on and off camera. His responsibility was to keep his charge from cannoning against hooks, nails or any other 20th century hazard. |
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90 TONS OF SAND HAD TO BE DYED! |
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 Two-hundred miles above Earth, the Orion spaceliner approaches Space Station
V 1,000 feet in diameter and rotating slowly like a giant wheel. This is one
of the fascinating sights in "2001: A Space Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick
production for MGM, an epic drama of adventure and exploration taking you to
the Moon, the planets and the stars - in the year 2001. Keir Dullea and Gary
Lockwood, as astronauts, head an international cast in the Super Panavision
and Metrocolor production.Still 219 2001: A Space Odyssey Mat 2-F So meticulous is producer-director Stanley Kubrick in creating his film productions that even a matter of sand entailed an elaborate operation. In this instance, it was sand which Kubrick visualized as an aspect of the Moon in his MGM Super Panavision and Metrocolor adventure into the future, "2001: A Space Odyssey." Samples of every grade and color of sand available in the British Isles were brought to MGM's British Studios for Kubrick and his art directors to examine. None matched the colors anticipated for the Moon, so 110 cubic meters of fine sand - 90 tons in all - were dyed. A new "first" for movies! |
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Gary Lockwood Becomes An "Upside-Down" Actor |
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Anyone glancing into Gary Lockwood's dressing room at MGM's British Studios
between scenes of Stanley Kubrick's MGM adventure into the future, "2001: A
Space Odyssey," might have been startled to find the actor hanging
upside-down! It was Lockwood's private method of preparing for the physical
demands of his role as an astronaut involved in a deep space probe. For
several sequences in the breathtaking picture, he had to work upside-down,
with his feet on the roof of a circular rotating wheel, a 38-ton centrifuge
which forms the central domestic interior of a futuristic spacecraft which
travels a half-billion miles to Jupiter. |
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FOLLOWING ASTRONAUTS KEIR DULLEA AND GARY LOCKWOOD IN THE WAKE OF STANLEY KUBRICK'S "2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY" |
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 Keir Dullea in his portrayal as Mission Commander Bowman in "2001: A Space
Odyssey," Stanley Kubrick production for MGM, an epic drama of adventure and
exploration taking you to the Moon, the planets and the stars. In Panavision
and color.2001: A Space Odyssey Still 2248-T Mat 1-B BOREHAMWOOD, HERTS, ENGLAND - TIME 7:30 a.m. Out of the dull, early morning mist the black Humber sedan turns off onto the A-1 route heading north out of London and follows the sign indicating Boreham Wood and Elstree. TIME 7:40 a.m. The sedan, turning right off the road, waits before black wrought-iron gates while a uniformed guard swings them open, permitting the car to enter an area otherwise heavily restricted. A tall white tower on the left bears the letters - MGM. TIME 7:42 a.m. The sedan stops in front of building "D" and the chauffeur holds the door open for the lone passenger, a still sleepy young man carrying a worn leather binder stamped with the initials, K.D. TIME 7:43 a.m. Hastily gulping down a cup of black coffee, actor Keir Dullea crosses the studio street and enters an unobtrusive looking building, marked "Make-Up." TIME 7:45 a.m. Waving to his co-star, Gary Lockwood, already being ministered to, Dullea seats himself in a deep, padded barber's chair, momentarily wincing as the bright lights encircling the make-up mirror are turned on. The world outside the MGM studio gates that a few moments before was only too real now belongs to the imagination. For the next ten hours the real world would be found inside the studio, a world 33 years in the future, created by Stanley Kubrick for "2001: A Space Odyssey," his new production for MGM in Super Panavision and Metrocolor. After a hurried conference and a quick glance at some Polaroid snapshots, hairdresser Carol Beckett begins to trim Dullea's hair, and while she works, make-up specialist Stuart Freeborn effects the slight touch-up required for the actor's tanned complexion. TIME 8:00 a.m. Dullea and Lockwood now walk to the department containing the wardrobe they will wear as two astronauts involved in a deep space probe. TIME 8:02 a.m. Inside the wardrobe department, four specially trained "dressers" help each actor into his costume. The fabric for the space suits, consisting of a sheet of metal bonded to a sheet of nylon and manufactured by a new process, is as pliable as silk. TIME 8:15 a.m. An assistant from the Sound Department arrives with a box of complex magnetic induction microphones, which must be partially installed inside the space suits before the actors are completely dressed. TIME 8:20 a.m. Dullea and Lockwood, now fully encased in the shimmering silver fabric, feed each other lines as their bulky space packs are strapped on. On request, they also feed lines into their suit microphones, and a nod from the sound-man assures them that the radios are functioning properly. Prop men now arrive carrying bottles of compressed air. These bottles, which are fitted into the back packs of the suits, provide the actors with a 20-minute air supply. Dullea and Lockwood, receiving the compressed air through small plastic tubes connected to their helmets, will need it because the temperature inside the suits will exceed 100 degrees during their day's work. They take sample breaths and nod "Okay" to the prop men. TIME 8:25 a.m. Now a procession leaves the wardrobe department, crossing the vast studio complex to Stage Seven. The entourage consists of six men, led by the two astronauts, and following them, their dressers carrying the white helmets that will be fitted over the actors' heads seconds before shooting. The strange party cuts its way through the early morning mist, with the two astronauts looking like futuristic knights about to do battle. Rounding the corner of the huge sound stage, they enter a door forty-feet wide and sixty-feet high. Inside, tens of thousands of watts of brilliant light pour down onto a vast spacecraft. TIME 8:27 a.m. Outside the studio, it is today. Inside it is 33 years into the future, for this is one of the massive sets of "2001: A Space Odyssey." Weighing nearly 40 tons, it was constructed by the famed Vickers Armstrong Company of Great Britain. TIME 8:29 a.m. As last minute adjustments are made to the compressed air supply and radio sets, the white helmets are clamped down over the actors' heads. Still feeding each other lines over their radios, Dullea and Lockwood mount the short flight of stairs leading into the spacecraft. The radios inside their suits emit mysterious filtered sounds that match the strange quality of the setting. Now the cameras are ready to turn on Stanley Kubrick's epic adventure. Suddenly, it is the year 2001! |
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 • Go to Background Information on "2001: A Space Odyssey" |
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issues Updated 09-07-26 |