Mid-century Modernism and the Spacesuits of 2001

I forgot to add a detail to my last post re: screening a 70mm print of 2001 recently. At some point in the evening it occurred to me that the three spacesuits (red, yellow, blue) on the ship Discovery looked exactly like our Fiestaware!

Instead of the puffy white marshmallow suits we’re used to, these strange and beautiful suits wore their exuberant non-primary mid-century color palettes proudly! I’d never noticed it watching the pan-and-scan VHS version of this film, but the red is more like a brick red, the yellow a mustard yellow, and the blue approaches something more of a cobalt blue. Just like our plates!

I like that each astronaut has his a different color suit; they are easy to tell apart that way. Bowman gets the red one, no doubt due to the violence and rebirth that accompanies killing off HAL. Or something like that. The blue dude died already in peaceful hibernation. Poole wears an innocent yellow before HAL cuts his breathing cord while working on the “broken” dish out in space.

These vibrant suits are an interesting choice, especially within the blank white context of Discovery. Once could say these suits have way more personality than the astronauts themselves, which seems to be much of the point of the movie (that AI computers have evolved past humans – HAL is irrational, breaks the rules, is vindictive, etc.. more human than the blank-slate astronauts). Perhaps it’s when the astronauts put on the colorful suits that they begin the transition toward (more evolved) machines?

Oh, and did I mention we have a Fiestaware gravy boat that looks like this:

Sleepy E and the Cinema of Flying Machines

K and I went to a few movies this week; kind of unprecedented, really. I also walked in on the 2^nd half of a DVD screening of Twilight, which proved divisive in our household… the debate afterword exterminated our entire evening. But we shall not focus on that.

First was District 9, which was terrific and ultraviolent and completely satisfying. “More stressful than work even!” K exulted later. We loved the economical storytelling: No time is wasted explaining why the ship from V broke down over Johannesburg or why aliens were cruising over to begin with. It also doesn’t really explain why exactly the man’s hand is transforming into something nasty (whoops, spoiler!). No time for explanations, full speed ahead! No backstory, no problem…. Bravo!

Last night we caught a screening of a 70mm print of 2001, which K had never seen. It was beautiful and impenetrable, just like in 1968, no doubt. I did some reading online afterword when Karen was relentlessly demanding a literal interpretation of the film, and discovered that Clarke’s story, “The Sentinel,” which is what 2001 was based upon, is reportedly very clear about all of the weird and opaque story elements that populate the narrative, especially the last third.

From Wikipedia: “Clarke's novel explicitly identifies the monolith as a tool created by an alien race that has been through many stages of evolution, moving from organic forms, through biomechanics, and finally has achieved a state of pure energy. These aliens travel the cosmos assisting lesser species to take evolutionary steps. The novel explains the hotel room sequence as a kind of alien zoo—fabricated from information derived from intercepted television transmissions from Earth—in which Dave Bowman is studied by the invisible alien entities. Kubrick's film leaves all this unstated.”

I love that last line: Kubrick’s film leaves all this UNSTATED. I love that.

Kubrick to the world: “Fuck you!”

Too funny.

This film would never be made today… not even close.

What I really want to write about though, is Philip Kaufman’s “The Right Stuff,” which screened at the Aero last weekend. I was twelve when this came out in 1983 and probably watched it the following year on laserdisc.

I was quite shocked to be blown away by this movie. Three hours and fifteen minutes long and never a dull moment. Terrific writing, lush long-lens cinematography, an incredible ensemble of actors, wonderful documentary and stock footage, a great score, a lyrical side and an art film side as well, and most of all, a rowdy sense of humor that I did not remember at all. Who remembers that Jeff Goldblum and Harry Shearer are in this movie? Hilarous!

I did some reading after this as well, and discovered that Roger Ebert is a huge champion of this movie and included it in his Overlooked Film Festival. Ebert also gave Terry Gilliam’s Brazil two stars, so what does that prove…

Anyway, this made me think Kaufman is some kind of genius, being the sole writer and director of this film (okay, he had some good Tom Wolfe source material to start with, but still… there was no list of 7 credited writers like you see these days). Kaufman made the exquisite Unbearable Lightness of Being but he also was responsible for Rising Sun (with Connery and Snipes), and other abominations. One can’t be perfect I guess.

I’m surprised this movie doesn’t get more respect, especially among film directors. It really is a tour de force. It’s got a huge canvas and a stable of brilliant actors and it’s epic in scope and certainly in length, way up over three hours long. One would think this movie would have inspired a generation of directors. It’s the Dr. Zhivago of the early 80s! But no. Perhaps it’s no surprise that Terms of Endearment won best picture that year.