Kubrick's works before 2001:A Space Odyssey

[lasvidfil]

I just finished watching 2001 on Blu Ray. Been awahile since i had seen it and I definitely have a new appreciation for it. Unbelievable visuals for a 1968 film. I'm acutally curious about Kubrick's older work. Everything since 2001 of his gets the most attention. Clockwork, Shining, FMJ...and aside from Dr. Strangelove, I haven't seen any of his earlier work.
Any reccomendations or thoughts. Would a fan of his 70's and 80's films also enjoy the older ones or are they quite different?

[jojopuppyfish]

I think all of his films are worth watching
That said here are the ones you should certainly rent:
The Killing
Paths of Glory

I think Sparticus is something he never would have made given the choice, and Lolita might be his worst film....even though I like it.
Killer's Kiss I like, but alot of people seem to find it lacking.

[Chip TRG]

Come on up to Albany and you can see SPARTACUS on the big screen at The Palace in a couple of weeks. I haven't seen it yet myself, so I'm looking foward to it.

Saw LOLITA just last year. Was ok. Nothing out of this world, IMHO. Kinda cool to see that some of the outdoor visuals were shot in the NY Capital Region.

Of course, STRANGELOVE is what it is--a classic.

Regarding Kubrick as a person, what made him out to be such a seemingly pesimistic jerk? What was his life like before he hit it big? I saw those clips of THE SHINING in production, and he just comes across as a total prick--especially to Shelly Duvall. I just don't get it.

[8tracks]

The Killing may be my favorite film from the 50s. There's a little over-the-top acting by one or two cast members, but I'm always entertained and fascinated by how timeless this film seems whenever I watch it.

I'm amazed there weren't more references to the influence of this film in all the reviews I read of Pulp Fiction.

[wayneklein]

Iliked "Lolita", "Paths of Glory", "The Killing" all marvelous and worth watching the former if only for James Mason mixing it up with Peter Sellers on screen...

[wayneklein]

Come on up to Albany and you can see SPARTACUS on the big screen at The Palace in a couple of weeks. I haven't seen it yet myself, so I'm looking foward to it.

Saw LOLITA just last year. Was ok. Nothing out of this world, IMHO. Kinda cool to see that some of the outdoor visuals were shot in the NY Capital Region.

Of course, STRANGELOVE is what it is--a classic.

Regarding Kubrick as a person, what made him out to be such a seemingly pesimistic jerk? What was his life like before he hit it big? I saw those clips of THE SHINING in production, and he just comes across as a total prick--especially to Shelly Duvall. I just don't get it.

I seem to recall that Kubrick was never seen as a warm and fuzzy kind of guy...

[antonkk]

Lolita is a masterpiece! Superb - each and every second of it.:righton:

[Rael]

Most of Kubrick's films pre 2001 are well worth watching. Paths of Glory, The Killing and Lolita are my favorites.

Dr. Strangelove, although worthy of its praise, I've always found to be somewhat of an acquired taste. I've never cared for Spartacus, at all.

[jojopuppyfish]

c.

Regarding Kubrick as a person, what made him out to be such a seemingly pesimistic jerk? What was his life like before he hit it big? I saw those clips of THE SHINING in production, and he just comes across as a total prick--especially to Shelly Duvall. I just don't get it.

If you directed a film on any level, you'd understand that its not the director's job to become friends with everyone on the set. Its his/her job to elicit a great performance from an actor.
Look what he got out of Shelly Duvall: A career making performance

In addition, Kubrick, like any director, is very conscious about money spent on a film. Only on his last film did he use unlimited funds. He had a kid on the set who only could be used a certain amount of time per day.
Its a very high pressure job.

[christopher]

What was his life like before he hit it big?

he was a teen-aged photo-journalist. his claim to fame was a shot he took of a news vendor after the death of FDR that was picked up and ran by LOOK magazine.:

http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2005/03/kubrick200503

later, chris

Then, on April 12 of that year, President Franklin D. Roosevelt died. The next day Kubrick went out, camera in hand, and found a corner news vendor surrounded by papers announcing plans for F.D.R.'s funeral. Kubrick made the shot—capturing the vendor's grim and homely face, wrinkled and expressive, set amid headlines (roosevelt dead) that worked like internal picture captions. Kubrick took the photo into Manhattan to sell. At Look magazine, Helen O'Brian ran the picture desk. She offered him $25. At the New York Daily News, he was offered only ten. So Kubrick went for the big bucks, and Look, due to its long, six-week lead time, ran the photo (credit: Stan Kubrick) on June 26, 1945. Kubrick, one month from turning 17, had made real money shooting an artful news picture: succinct, graphic, and humane.

[proufo]

Lolita should be watched having read the book.

[Ken_McAlinden]

If you directed a film on any level, you'd understand that its not the director's job to become friends with everyone on the set. Its his/her job to elicit a great performance from an actor.
Look what he got out of Shelly Duvall: A career making performanceI would not argue that Kubrick got a great performance out of Shelley Duvall. I might even go along with the adjective "iconic". If she had a career-making performance, though, I would say it was in "Three Women" or arguably one of her supporting turns in earlier Altman films.

Regards,

[jstraw]

Kubrick only made one really bad film and he died before he got to edit it...or try to redeem himself.

[Squealy]

Only on his last film did he use unlimited funds. He had a kid on the set who only could be used a certain amount of time per day.
In Eyes Wide Shut? You mean Tom and Nicole's kid? How many scenes is he (she? I can't even remember) in, two?

[Squealy]

Kubrick only made one really bad film and he died before he got to edit it...or try to redeem himself.

He may not have fine tuned the movie but Kubrick showed his first cut to Cruise and Kidman himself.

[jstraw]

He may not have fine tuned the movie but Kubrick showed his first cut to Cruise and Kidman himself.

And then pleaded with them to let him shelve it?

[jojopuppyfish]

In Eyes Wide Shut? You mean Tom and Nicole's kid? How many scenes is he (she? I can't even remember) in, two?

I poorly worded my sentence. I was referring to the kid in The Shinning.

[alanb]

I recently watched 2001 all the way thru properly for the 1st time (hard to believe maybe) and i was BLOWN away by it---amazing now --but can you imagine watching it in 68 or 69 when it came out--people musta been stunned by it.

Now i'm turning my apartment into a futuristic modern all white set!

[8tracks]

I recently watched 2001 ... can you imagine watching it in 68 or 69 when it came out--people musta been stunned by it.
My folks, who had just turned 30 at the time, were quite bored by it. :(

[christopher]

but can you imagine watching it in 68 or 69 when it came out--people musta been stunned by it.

pauline kael wasn't and said as much in a lengthy article, trash, art and the movies, for HARPER'S in feburary, 1969.

http://www.paulrossen.com/paulinekael/trashartandthemovies.html

later, chris

an excerpt:

It isn’t accidental that we don’t care if the characters live or die; if Kubrick has made his people so uninteresting, it is partly because characters and individual fates just aren’t big enough for certain kinds of big movie directors. Big movie directors become generals in the arts; and they want subjects to match their new importance. Kubrick has announced that his next project is “Napoleon”—which, for a movie director, is the equivalent of Joan of Arc for an actress. [Dick] Lester’s “savage” comments about affluence and malaise, Kubrick’s inspirational banality about how we will become as gods through machinery, are big-shot show-business deep thinking. This isn’t a new show-business phenomenon; it belongs to the genius tradition of the theatre. Big entrepreneurs, producers, and directors who stage big spectacular shows, even designers of large sets have traditionally begun to play the role of visionaries and thinkers and men with answers. They get too big for art. Is a work of art possible if pseudoscience and the technology of movie-making become more important to the “artist” than man? This is central to the failure of “2001.” It’s a monumentally unimaginative movie: Kubrick, with his $750,000 centrifuge, and in love with gigantic hardware and control panels, is the Belasco of science fiction. The special effects—though straight from the drawing board—are good and big and awesomely, expensively detailed. There’s a little more that’s good in the movie, when Kubrick doesn’t take himself too seriously—like the comic moment when the gliding space vehicles begin their Johann Strauss walk; that is to say, when the director shows a bit of a sense of proportion about what he’s doing, and sees things momentarily as comic when the movie doesn’t take itself with such idiot solemnity. The light-show trip is of no great distinction; compared to the work of experimental filmmakers like Jordan Belson, it’s third-rate. If big film directors are to get credit for doing badly what others have been doing brilliantly for years with no money, just because they’ve put it on a big screen, then businessmen are greater than poets and theft is art.

[gd0]

Well, gee – what great movies did Kael make?... am I to believe she actually thinks 2001 would have been better as a stage play?... with her favorite relate-able human personalities delivering thoughtful soliloquies on the story points?

Lotsa people didn't get it in the day... few could understand why there wasn't a cylindrical rocket with smoke pouring out of the back, with Leslie Neilsen in command, facing a planet full of green-skinned people with antennae, one with big eyes and nice curves so The Leading Man could chew up the scenery at the end... and then everybody would be happy upon exiting the theatre, brains entirely unnourished.

The guy delivered a freakin' world-beater way ahead of its time.

I feel privileged to have seen it on the big Cinerama screen in '69.

[tommy-thewho]

Dr. Strangelove is one my favorite comedies of all time....

[Chip TRG]

pauline kael wasn't and said as much in a lengthy article, trash, art and the movies, for HARPER'S in feburary, 1969.

http://www.paulrossen.com/paulinekael/trashartandthemovies.html

later, chris

an excerpt:

Interesting take on it.. I kinda agree.

The theatre where I hang out and occasional work at ran 2001 a few months back, and having only seen bits and pieces of it, I was looking foward to seeing it on the big screen.

Some of it bored me to tears, while some other parts were downright brilliant.

The light show near the end had me saying "ok...ok...ok....when is this going to end?"

In my opinion, I think it could have been much better with some heavy editing.

[leGrandOrange]

I vaguely remember that 2001 received a mixed reception when it came out and many criticized it for being too cerebral. I think there were what, 150 sentences (or was it words?) spoken throughout the whole film. I personally think it's visual poetry.

As an aside--my mom was a photographer and knew Kubrick when he was a Look photographer and both were in New Orleans in the late 40s/early 50s. I think he was quite the jazz buff, as was my mother, who was also a photographer.

[jojopuppyfish]

Pauline Kael is the most overrrated movie critic around. May she rest in peace