Category Archives: overrated

Stanley Kubrick @ 80

Kubrick For Look

Stanley Kubrick would have been 80 today if he hadn’t died in 1999, aged 70. So today marks the 10th anniversary of his death.

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBT__4ldjAs&]

The dark tower monolith scene, sound: Requiem by György Ligeti

I’ve previously mentioned[1] my disenchantment with Kubrick and “modernist film” in general (an exception needs to be made for its deviant siblings). His work is of course incontournable, as the French say, but 2001 is one of the most boring films I’ve ever seen and only comes close in tediousness to Citizen Kane.

Nevertheless, as all flawed products, 2001 has one or two redeeming elements:

2001′s soundtrack did much to introduce the modern classical composer György Ligeti to a wider public, using extracts from his Requiem (the Kyrie), Atmosphères, Lux Aeterna and (in an altered form) Aventures (though without his permission).

To conclude: a good YouTumentary the significance of 2001[4] by Collective Learning by Rob Ager