Page 1 of OK - can anyone explain the ending of 2001: A Space Odyssey?!?

(PLEASE!!)

you mean you didn`t drop some acid when you watched it? Would have made perfect sense then :-)

My take is Dave Bowman`s last words "My god..it`s full of stars!" means that the monolith is a giver of life as it creates suns(stars) which are the source of energy in the universe that sustains life as we know it. You should watch 2010 back to back with 2001. Don`t read the book 3001 Odyssey though...ending makes no sense really in light of the previous stories.

What did you think it was then Mr Banner??

This is without a doubt the best film ever made, and during my degree ive had to write about a thousand essay`s on it.

Bascially there is no one explanation, Kubrick made the film so that we all have to think deeply about our place in the world etc. Whatever you think the ending means, thats right.

In my opinion its a film thats shows the evolution of man, and how an "alien" or "supernatural" monolith (the big black rectangle) watches over us as we constantly change and evolve into what we think is the height of our humanity, space travel.

Ill break it down, when we were primates, we looked at the monolith with a sense of wonder, fear and excitment. However, when we next see it, when we are fully evoled, there is no wonder the curiosity remains but our own sense of arrogence has made us feel invincible. The cut from the ape throwing the bone into the air (the first man made tool) goes straight to another man made tool (HAL)

The purpose of HAL is to show us two things, firstly how our tools have risen above us. In our arrogence we create a perfect tool, one that can think for itself and dont question that if it had a mind of its own, why would it need us. Look at it from HAL`s point of view all he sees are people sleeping, eating, sun bathing.... losing to him at chess. He see`s us as weak primates, just as we were in the beginning. The second reason for HAL, and space travel, is to show how man has regressed back to his own beginnings. In space man needs to learn how to walk again, eat again, even use the loo again, just as babies do. In space we are out of place.

Then we go the the end, and the "star child" The old man, is the same man as the space traveller. He is the same person. He sees himself grow and then reach the final stage of evolution, death. Watch at the dinner table as we see him drop a glass of wine, the galss smashes but the wine remains, (container/contents = body/spirit)

He faces death, a stage in which we all believe to be the end, but then finds himself evolve into the most perfect creature, the Star Child.

Arthur C Clarkes idea for the film came from the idea that there are 30,000 dead people for every person living on earth today (well back then) And there are more then 50 times of that amount of stars in the sky, so if we really wanted, every person could have their own.

hope this has cleared this up, ive typed it really quickly so ignore mistakes etc... but as i said, the end is whatever you think it is. Thats the point with the great films, they become yours.

One more thing, the monolith was never meant to make us evolve or be the giver of stars, its simply watching us, seeing where we go and testing our reaction to it.

And I thought it was just a big cool subwoofer!

Tikly, how do you explain the monolith`s role in the end of 2010? Trying not to be too revealing in this so as not spoil the ending for others

imho, this film has to be the most overrated film of all time, its the most boring film i have ever seen and i haven`t wasted any energy trying to understand the `ending`. i remember it was re-released recently so i went along seeing as i had never seen it in its entirety and also never on any sort of big screen, and was hoping that all the `kubrick`s masterpiece` hype would provide me with an evening`s amazement... then it finished after a mind numbing how many hours? if you want a science fiction flick that ignites an interest in where we come from and who we are, look no further than `contact` whose opening sequence says more about who and what we are than any number of space travesties...

This item was edited on Wednesday, 28th August 2002, 16:55

Yes, `Contact` is also a great film, however it is much more literal which, in my opinion reduces it`s impact when compared to `2001`.

IMHO what Clarke and Kubrick set out to do was to make the audience think about our origins, contemplate the existence or non-existence of a God and accept the fact that there has to be intelligent life out there somewhere and that it may well have played some part in our past, and maybe even our future.
The fact is that to give a credible face to that life would be impossible.
If some higher lifeform or intelligence does exist you could not portray it on film without making it look, well, a bit silly.*
Hence the monolith and the general vagueness of the scenes involving alien contact.

*To get an idea of what I mean, take a look at the end of `The Abyss`

It is rumored that the image of the star-child came to him from the "Spirit of the Earth" in Shelley`s "Prometheus Unbound":

"Within the orb itself, Pillowed upon its alabaster arms, Like to a child o`erwearied with sweet toil, On its own folded wings and wavy hair The Spirit of the Earth is laid asleep..."

My dad hadn`t read the book for a long long time and was shocked that the mission was to Saturn and not Jupiter.

He said he knew what was going on cos he read the book, if he hadn`t then he would of been lost. So best read the book.

Floyd

I always felt that the repeated images of Dave as old man, then foetus, then man again represented a circular, timeless view of the universe - with Dave quite literally dissappering up his own arse.

"Open the pod bay doors Hal"

:D