2001: A Space Odyssey re-issue 2018

[St_Eddie]

It's a brand new pan and scan version...

...supervised by a blind dog.

[Dex Sawash]

One of the cinemas up from Union Square in Manhattan (I forget the name) was showing it last week. Think it might still be showing up to Thursday.

Was hoping for something closer to home here in Possum Holler

[phantom_power]

...supervised by a blind dog.

With new FX supervised by George Lucas

[buzby]

It looked great, despite the original source obviously not being in the best condition (there's a very visible taped-over tear at a cut during the Dawn Of Man section, and visible dirt and scratches). There's also some very slight changes in quality in places, which is presumably where duplicate sections have been cut in at points over the years where the original negative had been worn out or damaged in the print-striking process.

The biggest thing that blew me away was the colour, particularly on board the Discovery and during the Stargate sequence - it's very warm and vibrant, a lot more so than any other version I've seen (on the Discovery, for example, the interior panels on the centrifuge section in particular show a lot more variation in tone rather than being homogeneous white or light grey).

The only disappointment was the sound unfortunately. A combination of very little bass and too much background noise (from FACT's crappy aircon system wheezing away at max fan speed plus two additional 3-foot fans placed under the screen, all of which was not really doing anything to reduce the temperature). The lack of bass may just be a local issue with the cinema though.

[Howj Begg]

It looked great, despite the original source obviously not being in the best condition (there's a very visible taped-over tear at a cut during the Dawn Of Man section, and visible dirt and scratches). There's also some very slight changes in quality in places, which is presumably where duplicate sections have been cut in at points over the years where the original negative had been worn out or damaged in the print-striking process.

The biggest thing that blew me away was the colour, particularly on board the Discovery and during the Stargate sequence - it's very warm and vibrant, a lot more so than any other version I've seen (on the Discovery, for example, the interior panels on the centrifuge section in particular show a lot more variation in tone rather than being homogeneous white or light grey).

The only disappointment was the sound unfortunately. A combination of very little bass and too much background noise (from FACT's crappy aircon system wheezing away at max fan speed plus two additional 3-foot fans placed under the screen, all of which was not really doing anything to reduce the temperature). The lack of bass may just be a local issue with the cinema though.

Was the film any good?

Nah, great review thanks. I'll let you know what the sound is like at the IMAX, which in theory should be better...

[Attila]

I saw it at the 1750 showing at the IMAX this evening -- sat right up in the back row (and had a lovely pre show and intermission chat with the guy next to me). Colour and image and that were fab -- as mentioend above, the print was kind of beat up in places, but it was super neat to see it on a giant screen and with such vibrant colours. For the most part the audience was respectful, too -- it was so quiet during the scenes with no music/effects/dialogue that you could hear the projector whirring away. (Only two minor annoyances: dude in front of me who had to switch on his giant fuck-off phone the moment the credits started, even though the theatre remained dark for those of us who wanted to stay til the end, and the woman who stumbled her way into the row in front of me about 30 minutes into the film -- she was asking people during the intermission if she'd missed anything important).

But neither of these were enough to diminish the real pleasure of seeing the film on the big screen for the first time in a long, long time.

Random comment: why do people clap at the end of films? It wasn't the entire audience who did, but maybe 1/3 of the audience as scattered throughout the theatre. Habit from going to live theatre, maybe?

[mothman]

Great write-up, Attila. Well jel. But I had another once-in-a-lifetime opportunity today, and the meeting I might have used as as an excuse to go to London was cancelled anyway...

[Attila]

Howj will probably have a better write up than I did -- I'm not good with words to describe how it made me feel. Was  humming the Blue Danube on my walk down to Waterloo Station and all the way across town on the Tube, tho.

[Howj Begg]

I was at the 17:50 showing too. Some people very badly needeed lozenges didn't they?  and one was right behind me. Plus yes people were still wandering in after the intermission ended several minutes later, but ultimately the blame for this lies with the cinema - should have been a 15 minute intermission at least, not 2 minutes. 

Anyway, yeah what a different experience that was ! I'm so glad I got to see it. From the first few moments, you're aware you're watching something that's coming from the dawn of modern cinema - the very first scene, the sunrise, feels like an ancient document, like images on parchment almost, because it's so dirty and dark in comparison. Immediately with the Dawn of Man sequence you are subjected to scratches all over the film, which multiply and spring out all over, and this visible kinetic energy bizarrely matches and mimics the jumping primates, particularly bringing alive the confrontation scenes. We also see scene-ending edit marks top right, which is charming and bizarrely thrilling.
The sound was not great, admittedly, but you had the feeling that it fitted the 1968 vintage of the images, nevertheless. You could hear clear differences though: the Monolith's aural attack on Floyd and his moon team was far less piercing and painful, tame in comparison. The dialogue was also occasionally hard to hear, specially as both Dave and Frank like to mumble. HAL's clarity was all the more impressive. 

Everything about this suggested a 'first viewing': something close to this is what i must have seen in (I think) 1987 on British television. My VHS recording was kept for years. What you sacrifice in detail is compensated for by 'autheticity': this film must have looked light years ahead to its original viewers, but to us, this print highlights the Lost in Space kind of ancestry of the modelwork and its manipulation against background screens/material. It is what it is. But the visceral shock and excitement of seeing it in 1968 was conveyed in spades. It's like reading the OG 1818 version of Frankenstein or something, a total clearing of the perceptual filters which have been encrusted with dusty familiarity from viewing the successive remasters and upgrades of this Warner Brothers jewel in the crown property. The digital print was a meditation in total awe-inspiring power and beauty, whereas this unrestored  print feels like a tighter, more action oriented film, partly because there is so much less detail to gape at. But the scale of the print allows you to look at the edges, and it was the first time I really noticed all the groups of people in the vast space station, at left right top and bottom, going about their business behind the huge glass curved windows, in the vertical pod landing sequence when Floyd arrives. As the print felt so 1960s, so that emphasised the 60-ness of the lobby furniture as opposite to its retro-futurity. You can sometimes see the paint effects more dramatically, like for example when Poole is floating in the middle distance, I fancied I could see applications of yellow.The various tricks that Kubrick pulls with our vision of Bowman defying gravity while punch-running around the deck felt new and refreshing. You never know which way up he is, and it doesn't matter - but it does to your brain, which is still trying to work it out.  I can't believe I didn't mention last time the best gag in the film, the 'ANTI-GRAVITY TOILET, PLEASE READ INSTRUCTIONS CAREFULLY' followed by a virtual Apple terms and conditions form, and a very worried face peering at it (is that Floyd?)

The beyond the infinite section is incredibly renewed again, buzby is absolutely right. I need to read about how this was created (will buy the recent book), but the early digital graphics of the stargate stood out as incongruously special amidst the tunnels of stellar light. It's funny to me how the light show is so often mentioned, and yet what follows is not, comparatively eg the great clouds of swirling galactic dust, incorporating worlds which resemble giant bloody foetuses and silver channels. And then, for me the most exciting part, the arrival on the alien planet, where alien landscapes are only delivered to human optics via the treacherously foreign atmosphere, rendering everything negatively in green and pink hues. I was reminded of the rotoscoping effects in the Bakshi Lord of the Rings film, but I know there are other films, probably same time or early 70s, that did the same thing. They may well have had Pink Floyd playing on the soundtrack. Anyway that journey on the planet, which is basically photography of – the Rocky mountains and other American landscapes, plus the Kalahari, the moon? I don't know for sure, just guessing. But that whole arrival sequence goes on for a deliciously long time. It's also the first time I noticed how much alien chatter (whether it's the noise of their voices or of their civilisation) we hear, both while the ship is travelling over the planet and when Frank drops into the zoo cage. These sounds have now become almost archetypal, in terms of what they are meant to be depicting. But it's interesting that while we never see them, we hear them.

Ultimately I will take the digital print in my future viewings, but I'd still buy this unrestoration.

Random comment: why do people clap at the end of films? It wasn't the entire audience who did, but maybe 1/3 of the audience as scattered throughout the theatre. Habit from going to live theatre, maybe?

Haha, so I started clapping as well after it started breaking out, and said out loud, "yeah, why not". It's not every day you see this. It was hard  - for me – not put my hands together in awe and gratitude after that...

...you could hear the projector whirring away.....the theatre remained dark for those of us who wanted to stay til the end

Yes re the projector, that was wonderful. I wasn't happy with the end though, the lights were brought up way before the Blue Danube finished... It's part of the film you monsters!

[Attila]

Thanks, Howj -- it's really really neat to read your response since we were at the same show (we should have coordinated a tiny CAB meeting!)

I realised about 5 miutes into the Dawn of Man sequence that I needed my cardigan, but no way was i going to rustle in my bag for it (did so at the intermission!) I had a cougher somewhere in front of me but quickly sorted it out -- it was the dude munching endlessly away at popcorn over somewhere to my right who was in dire peril, but he soon stopped.

Interesting your reaction to the screen as seeing it as the 'dawn of cinema' and an evocative commentary on your reaction: I saw 2001 before I saw Star Wars (at age 11 in 1977), so for me, seeing the film on the big screen like that again was a 'welcome home' to a time when I just about remember seeing stuff made 'epic' on the big screen as a little girl, but how 2001 was the standout film amongst childhood films (I was only 3 in 1968 but do remember seeing it before the age of 10 probably in some second run cinema with my brother -- totally clueless, but the strange sort of child happy to listen to classical music whilst spaceship swirled around -- to be honest, Silent Running was my big WOW on the screen when I was a little girl -- of course also directed by Trumball, who had perfected his effects on making rings for Saturn by the time of that release).

So you gained an idea for what 1960s audiences might have been wowed with -- coming to it from childhood and the WOW of Silent Running and that, for me, it was a fabulous experience of 'Oh God, yes, this is what these amazing films were like before whiz bang pop of big actioners and CGI and all that -- I remember now!!!'

After a seriously crap week, and increasing issues with depression over the past six months or so, there were impressions and feelings during the showing of the film last night that reminded me of a time when I was a little kid, and what my little world and that were like.

This is probably, too, the first time I had a much better idea what was going on in the stargate sequence (as a kid, I just thought it was lots of amazing lights and sounds and poor Dave being scared and didn't know what was happening to him -- as an adult with a bit more experience (and having read a lot of Vonnegut since) I was able to bring a lot more to the table in the experience.

I am so, so glad it was a more beat up print than the shiny clean digital version, for the reasons you so elegantly describe, and because of my own experiences. To me it was like a window back into a world that's long gone from my life and for a little while felt things I haven't in a long time (immediately shot down as the real-world shit that's affecting my depression was slapped in my face the minute I got back to my digs last night).

YES I do wish they'd kept the house lights down til the Blue Danube was finished -- and I agree that the intermission should have been a proper 15 minutes. Dude told people the 2 mins was just a leg stretching time, and of course half the auditorium got up and went out.

This was one of the best film experiences I've had a in a long time, up there with (if you don't mind a short list),
*seeing Star Wars in the cinema at age 11 in 1977 (with a packed house, huge first-run screen, and the same gawping reaction to the effects that you were wondering about when you mused above about the 1968 audience's response to 2001 -- I'm not into Star wars as a fangirl and have only seen the origina clutch plus one of the newer ones a year or so ago, but that original summer, it was a magical cowboys in space sort of thing with eye-popping effects)

*Seeing Help! on screen at a revival house as a teenager (a horrendous print -- the film has since been marvelously restored, but being able to see my fave Beatles film on the big screen, sometime around 1980, was an important thing for me)

*Abel Gance's Napoleon, with a live orchestra, in London a few years back.

Amazing stuff.


PS -- seeing the fillm last night, and the effects, I had to giggle -- as you say, so much detail properly visible on the screen of people in the shuttles and on the stations -- I can see now exactly why some people thought (and still think) Kubrick concocted all of the moon-landing footage! Although having been a life-long follower of the Voyager programme, it was a delight to see poor old Jupiter in its fuzzy glory, as we did not know then what we know now about the planet :)

[Attila]

Apologies for the double post -- what Howj said about the reel change cues (called 'cue marks'  as they don't mark the end of a scene but rather the end of the reel - first one is the motor cue, second set is the changeover mark -- as for nicknames, I've seen 'cigarette burns' and 'screen candy') -- I miss seeing them in the movies! How the film stock gets really raggedy as they appear and then the slight jump to the next reel and better quality -- took me well back to childhood cinema-going experiences with my brother, and happier times :)

For me it was less quaint/charming than suddenly to find a beloved, well-worn cardie or slippers from childhood that still fit, and to feel them wrapped around you again for a brief, almost painfully happy moment.


Oh! Howj -- some of the scenery in the stargate sequence was one of the Orkneys, I think!

[buzby]

The sound was not great, admittedly, but you had the feeling that it fitted the 1968 vintage of the images, nevertheless. You could hear clear differences though: the Monolith's aural attack on Floyd and his moon team was far less piercing and painful, tame in comparison. The dialogue was also occasionally hard to hear, specially as both Dave and Frank like to mumble. HAL's clarity was all the more impressive.

The sound on this new version is DTS sync (i.e. a digital DTS soundtrack synced to a timecode printed on the film). The DTS soundtrack was dubbed from the mutichannel mag soundtrack (as its no longer possible to produce 70mm prints with mag stripe audio tracks). i think part of it is that modern cinema audio systems aren't set up in the same way as they were in 1968, coupled with the loss of analogue 'fuzziness' with the change from mag to sync digital sound.

I can't believe I didn't mention last time the best gag in the film, the 'ANTI-GRAVITY TOILET, PLEASE READ INSTRUCTIONS CAREFULLY' followed by a virtual Apple terms and conditions form, and a very worried face peering at it (is that Floyd?)

Yes it's William Sylvester/Floyd carefully studying the zero-G toilet manual.

I could go on for hours about the model work and photography by Trumbull and his team, Due to difficulty in compositing and optical printing 65mm (there was only one 65mm optical printer in the world at the time) a lot of what ou see was either produced on an animation stand, or in camera,, using the first ever (analogue) motion control system, developed by Trumbull, that allowed multiple passes of the camera and model tracks to be shot and exposed on the same reel of film (including the front-projected films of the people and control rooms that appear in the windows) . This was 10 years before John Dykstra got an Oscar for developing the first digital motion control system for Star Wars. Same with all the screen displays and the tablets Dave and Frank watch the BBC12 report on - they were all back-projected live on the set so they could be captured in-camera.

The beyond the infinite section is incredibly renewed again, buzby is absolutely right. I need to read about how this was created (will buy the recent book), but the early digital graphics of the stargate stood out as incongruously special amidst the tunnels of stellar light. It's funny to me how the light show is so often mentioned, and yet what follows is not, comparatively eg the great clouds of swirling galactic dust, incorporating worlds which resemble giant bloody foetuses and silver channels. And then, for me the most exciting part, the arrival on the alien planet, where alien landscapes are only delivered to human optics via the treacherously foreign atmosphere, rendering everything negatively in green and pink hues. I was reminded of the rotoscoping effects in the Bakshi Lord of the Rings film, but I know there are other films, probably same time or early 70s, that did the same thing. They may well have had Pink Floyd playing on the soundtrack. Anyway that journey on the planet, which is basically photography of – the Rocky mountains and other American landscapes, plus the Kalahari, the moon? I don't know for sure, just guessing.

Scotland (as Attila says) and Monument Valley.

There's no computer graphics involved in the Stargate sequence or in the rest of the film (even the wireframe docking and navigation displays in the ships were hand-animated). It was done by Kubrick, Trumbull and his team, mainly using a technique called Slit-Scan Photography, again using his analogue motion control rig to control the movements of the camera and background plates. There's a good description of the creation of the sequence in this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6EKreQ5HD4w
The entire series of videos that it's part of is well worth a watch.

[Blumf]

And then, for me the most exciting part, the arrival on the alien planet, where alien landscapes are only delivered to human optics via the treacherously foreign atmosphere, rendering everything negatively in green and pink hues. I was reminded of the rotoscoping effects in the Bakshi Lord of the Rings film, but I know there are other films, probably same time or early 70s, that did the same thing.

Using false colour film stock.

I think the film Wolfen (1981) used similar, but I can't think of any other 'proper' film examples, there must be some.

[buzby]

Using false colour film stock.

I think the film Wolfen (1981) used similar, but I can't think of any other 'proper' film examples, there must be some.

It was done by making CMYK colour separations of the 65mm film and then reprinting each layer back onto a 65mm negative,  altering the F-stop in the process which changed the colour on the combined negative. It's described at about 17m40s in the video I posted.

[Blumf]

It was done by making CMYK colour separations of the 65mm film and then reprinting each layer back onto a 65mm negative,  altering the F-stop in the process which changed the colour on the combined negative. It's described at about 17m40s in the video I posted.

Got the vid cued up for later, ta.

[Attila]

V interesting stuff, buzby -- thanks!!

[Astronaut Omens]

Things I thought seeing it last night, like many other posters above informed by having my mind bended by seeing this on the telly this as a 10 year old
1)The interval totally changes the pace of the thing and turned it from the ponderous thing of my memory into two extremely zippy films with loads of plot per minute. Having the break begin just at the moment where Hal lip-reads is delightfully spooky, and the second half beginning with Hal chucking Poole into space gives the whole of the second half a lot more adreniline, giving the Jupiter sequence a totally different, rollercoaster-like feel.
2) I never thought before about how little of the films time is given over to any characterisation of Dave Bowman- he seems deliberately blank; it seems deliberate that Floyd and Poole both get shown speaking to their families, and we even get to learn about HAL's birth-date and his creator and that he has a twin on earth, but we learn nothing at all about Bowman's life or past.
3) Obviously, the Ligeti music is supposed to be a theme for the monolith, even as the monolith's voice, but I hadn't thought before about how the two Strauss bits act like "human" counter-themes that work in the same way,acting as a voice for the ape's developement and the elegance of the spacecraft.
4) I thought a lot about how or if the two stories are supposed to play off each other, if Kubrik had in mind some sort analogy between flawed humans creating a malfunctioning and violent computer and god-like creatures 'creating' flawed humans.
5) Pleasures I wasn't expecting- the really sarky look the dark haired Russian woman is giving Floyd in the scene with Leonard Rossiter.
The weirdly stage-play-like atmosphere of the ape sequence.
The surprisingly scary moment where the screen is filled with the LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEM TERMINATED caption.

[buzby]

Things I thought seeing it last night, like many other posters above informed by having my mind bended by seeing this on the telly this as a 10 year old
1)The interval totally changes the pace of the thing and turned it from the ponderous thing of my memory into two extremely zippy films with loads of plot per minute. Having the break begin just at the moment where Hal lip-reads is delightfully spooky, and the second half beginning with Hal chucking Poole into space gives the whole of the second half a lot more adreniline, giving the Jupiter sequence a totally different, rollercoaster-like feel.

The Intermission really does help ratchet up the tension in the second half of the film - it almost becomes an action thriller during the HAL vs. Dave section.

2) I never thought before about how little of the films time is given over to any characterisation of Dave Bowman- he seems deliberately blank; it seems deliberate that Floyd and Poole both get shown speaking to their families, and we even get to learn about HAL's birth-date and his creator and that he has a twin on earth, but we learn nothing at all about Bowman's life or past.

It's interesting and no doubt a deliberate decision by Kubrick. In earlier drafts of the script it was Bowman who got the video message from his parents on his birthday, not Poole (interestingly, in the earlier drafts, their conversation with Mission Control also includes the detail that HAL's error in predicting the failure of the AO-35 unit may be down to obsessional behaviour equivalent to human neuroses  that has been observed in other HAL 9000s and they have never found the cause).

In the story as filmed, the difference between Frank and Dave's characters is largely defined by how they treat HAL. Frank is largely dismissive of him, treating him like a glorified mechanical butler (and is the one to bring up the plan to disconnect him). Dave is far more accepting of HAL and treats him as an equal. You could read into that what could be a reason why HAL plots to get rid of Frank first.

Another interesting note in the earlier iterations of the script is he inference that Frank and Dave were expendable and may not be returning on the Discovery. During Frank's message from his parents they mention about trying to get his pay increment sorted out. In he early drafts Frank and Dave have a conversation about how they both got the paperwork saying they were getting mission payments prior to launch but the payments aren't being made, and the payroll office wouldn't answer any questions about it when Frank asked them why.

It's not HAL's creator we learn about - it's his instructor, Mr. Langley. Dr. Chandra isn't introduced until the sequel (though it's Chandra in Clarke's novel). The 'Daisy Bell' song HAL was taught was a direct reference to the demonstration of the first computer voice synthesizer, created by Bell Labs in 1961 and demonstrated to Clarke during his research for the script

4) I thought a lot about how or if the two stories are supposed to play off each other, if Kubrik had in mind some sort analogy between flawed humans creating a malfunctioning and violent computer and god-like creatures 'creating' flawed humans.

The way I've always interpreted it is the beings behind the Monoliths seed planets for life (an idea stolen by Scott for Prometheus) and let it develop via evolution, occasionally accelerating that process by sending Monoliths to provide a 'spark' (such as the apes starting to use tools) or as a 'tripwire' (TMA-1 does this, being triggered when human development gets to the point where interplanetary exploration is possible). Competition leading to violence and extinction is all part of the evolutionary process (this is further developed in Clarke's novel and his later books in the series, where the Monolith beings destroyed life on Jupiter by turning it into a star as the development of life on Europa was more promising, and ultimately choose the Europans over the Humans to inherit the solar system.

HAL's problem is that man creates in his own image, so he inherited the evolutionary drives and character traits of humans (arrogance, pride, paranoia and ultimately the propensity for violent acts, though in HAL's view he would rationalise it as 'kill or be killed'). Another interesting point is that early on in the development of the story HAL was a bipedal robot, who directly references Asimov's laws of robotics which would make his subsequent actions harder to rationalise.

5)The surprisingly scary moment where the screen is filled with the LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEM TERMINATED caption.

[phantom_power]

This thread has made me really want to watch 2001 again. I haven't seen it for years and think I would appreciate it a lot more now than I did before

[mothman]

I just finished my rewatch on Blu-Ray and the years just fell away. There's all sorts of meaning you can find in it, or concoct out of thin air. Bowman is certainly meant to be a bit of a cold fish, but his evolution as an individual takes place more than just the Ultimate Trip and his sojourn in the zoo pen. His becoming emotional as he realises that Frank is dead, and that is is HAL that has betrayed them, is all part of that journey. And indeed most of the humans remain pretty dull characters...

Another thing that few seem to notice is the food. You go from Moonwatcher eating raw meat, to the range of exciting soups and broths on the lunar transfer pod, to the sandwiches on the unar rover, to the pastes on Discovery. The evolving Bowman at the end is the only one to eat a civilised meal, on a plate, with napkin and cutlery etc. Just another way Kubrick underscores the ways that Bowman is being gradually manipulated towards Subliming to another state of consciousness.

[Howj Begg]

So many fantastic posts above, including yours Attila and buzby.,which I will respond to when Im settled, busy right now. But I'd just like to point out something for us London verbwhores:

https://princecharlescinema.com/PrinceCharlesCinema.dll/WhatsOn?s=409

My 3rd screening of the summer? Why not?

[St_Eddie]

There's some wonderful posts within this thread.  I haven't revisited 2001: A Space Odyssey for a long time because in the past, it's always left me cold (despite Kubrick easily being one of my favourite directors) but some of the love that it's receiving in this thread has convinced me that it's high time for a rewatch.

[mothman]

But if you DO still hate it, keep it to yourself and let's not spend the next 35 pages hearing about it, eh? ;-)

[Attila]

So many fantastic posts above, including yours Attila and buzby.,which I will respond to when Im settled, busy right now. But I'd just like to point out something for us London verbwhores:

https://princecharlescinema.com/PrinceCharlesCinema.dll/WhatsOn?s=409

My 3rd screening of the summer? Why not?

Cool -- thanks for that link! I'm on the south coast, but might seriously consider hitting up town for one of those Saturday matinees when the weather cools down a bit.

[St_Eddie]

But if you DO still hate it, keep it to yourself and let's not spend the next 35 pages hearing about it, eh? ;-)

I never said that I hate 2001: A Space Odyssey.  This is literally the only other thing that I've said about the film within this thread...

I'm truly hopeful that one day I'll be able to experience 2001: A Space Odyssey like this.  None of my prior viewings have left much of an impact on me but I really feel as though that's more a case of myself, having not quite been in the correct frame of mind, previously.  One day, it'll click, I'm sure of it.

[hedgehog90]

Apparently some unearthed audio of a phone conversation with Kubrick from 1980 has been uploaded to the internet, in which Kubrick explains the ending to 2001.
Sounds pretty far-fetched, but on listening to it seems pretty legit.

https://www.cnet.com/news/watch-stanley-kubrick-explain-the-ending-of-2001-a-space-odyssey/

It chimes with a general sense of what I understood it to mean. Nothing extraordinary, but nonetheless quite interesting.

[St_Eddie]

Apparently some unearthed audio of a phone conversation with Kubrick from 1980 has been uploaded to the internet, in which Kubrick explains the ending to 2001.
Sounds pretty far-fetched, but on listening to it seems pretty legit.

https://www.cnet.com/news/watch-stanley-kubrick-explain-the-ending-of-2001-a-space-odyssey/

It chimes with a general sense of what I understood it to mean. Nothing extraordinary, but nonetheless quite interesting.

I watched this last week.  I don't particularly doubt that's Kubrick on the other end of the phone but either way, what's being said is absolutely nothing that fans of the film/novel aren't already aware of.  Still, like you say, it made for an interesting watch.

[Howj Begg]

Yeah, Kubrick explained it several times! including once offhand to Playboy, i think.

[St_Eddie]

Yeah, Kubrick explained it several times! including once, one-handed to Playboy, i think.

Fixed that for you.

[Alberon]

His explanation is pretty much how the book runs. Since the book and the film were written together by Kubrick and Clarke that shouldn't be too surprising.

I would recommend The Lost Worlds of 2001 in which Clarke shows how the story evolved into the finished product.