Kubrick's Work - Seminole Cinema: SEHS Film - Home



IB Film 2: W57.2Stanley Kubrick as AuteurYou will be viewing?2001: A Space Odyssey?this week. ?Here is a sneak peek at what you will be seeing.Watch This:'s WorkAll of Stanley Kubrick's films except?The Shining?(1980) were nominated for Oscars, although his only personal win was for the special effects of?2001: A Space Odyssey?(1968).Ironically, special effects are not a particular focus of most films by Stanley Kubrick, who is widely acknowledged as one of the greatest directors of the 20th century.After his death, both his family and critics cited his Jewish ancestry as one of the things that influenced his world view and his film's themes.Frederic Raphael, a British screenwriter, believes one of the sources of his originality was his "respect for scholars," a part of his personality that might be seen as coming from Jewish tradition.Certainly almost all his films were based on literature, both novels and short stories, which served as a springboard for cinematic adaptation. This lead to a common feature of many of his films, a voice-over narration, though at times - for example?2001: A Space Odyssey -?the visuals overwhelm the audience to the point the film plays almost like a silent movie.Frequently, he worked with the writers of his adapted materials on the screenplays of his films.This was certainly true of?2001: A Space Odyssey, which was based on a short story by Arthur C. Clarke called?The Sentinel.?Kubrick and Clarke collaborated on the work that eventually became Kubrick's movie and Clarke's novel. This collaboration was similar to the work Kubrick did with Brian W. Aldiss later in his life, using Aldiss' story?Supertoys Last All Summer Long?as a springboard for the film?A. I. Artificial Intelligence?(2001).Steven Spielberg completed the film after Kubrick's death.Confident with the literary background of his scripts, Kubrick shot each scene over and over again, experimenting with camera movement and angles.Many actors found this method of working exhausting, but it was a significant part of Kubrick's technique. His scripts were a springboard to the visual experimentation that was his forte, inspired by expressionism and surrealism and a visual approach to filmmaking (Kubrick started his career as a press photographer). The fact he had so much coverage allowed him the maximum freedom when editing.He expressed this obsession with editing by saying -“Everything else (in Film) comes from something else.Writing, of course, is writing; acting comes from the theatre; and cinematography comes from photography.Editing is unique to film.You can see something from different points of view almost simultaneously, and it creates a new experience."Kubrick's ApproachStarting with?2001: A Space Odyssey, most of Kubrick's films use classical music as the basis of their score.Some musicians have accused him of "falling in love with his temp track."A temp track is a selection of music a director chooses as the score to his or her film before the final score is written. Significantly, composer Alex North had written a score for?2001: A Space Odyssey, which Kubrick chose not to use, instead going with classical music selections.Occasionally, Kubrick used music as black-humor commenting on the film, such as Vera Lynn singing the popular World War II song?We'll Meet Again,?as the world is destroyed by atomic war at the end of?Dr. Strangelove or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb?(1964) and?Singing In The Rain?in both the film and end credits of?A Clockwork Orange?(1971).Kubrick often keeps an emotional distance from his characters, moving the camera away from their emotions instead of toward them. He lets the camera, and the audience, observe his character's actions from a distance.Described by many critics as a 'pessimist',?some audiences find his work cold and detached; while others find it black humored and almost Swiftian in view of human fallibility.Certainly, unlike many directors, Kubrick does not depend on the level of intimacy created by a camera closely following the point of view of a character with which the audience is meant to relate. In fact, his formal compositions and carefully balanced mise-en-scene seem to emphasize an artificial sterility that overwhelms his characters—like the Overlook Hotel in?The Shining?or the oddly hotel-like construction built by the monoliths in?2001: A Space Odyssey.To the annoyance of some audience and critics, Stanley Kubrick was notoriously close-mouthed about the meaning of his films, hoping the philosophical and allegorical meaning of a film like?2001: A Space Odyssey?would spring from the minds of the audience. This is consistent with Kubrick's visual techniques, as we have noted, which really require the audience to be an active participant in the films, unravelling them rather than watching them.This is particularly true of?2001: A Space Odyssey, which—as we have noted—at times plays almost like a silent film. The significance of events really depends on the interpretation of the viewer, and many of the scenes feature dialogue that is next to meaningless. Sometimes symbolism is almost hidden in the mundane dialogue, like the sequence of birthdays featured in?2001: A Space Odyssey, which includes Heywood Floyd's daughter, Frank Poole, HAL 9000, and ultimately, the birth of the Starchild itself.Ultimately, an auteur must exercise creative control over his or her works in such a way they develop a strong personal style, using lighting, camerawork, staging, and editing to add to their vision.Kubrick's films are unmistakably Kubrick's films, to the delight of some and the chagrin of others. He demands much from his audience, and exerts such a distinctive style dealing consistently with themes that recur again and again, that his influence is unmistakable. In Francois Truffaut's expression of the auteur theory, he distinguished directors whose works show an unmistakable visual style, like Alfred Hitchcock, from directors whose auteur signature is films that reflected a consistent theme (such as the humanism of Jean Renoir).Visit the sites below to explore Kubrick and his role as an auteur in more detail:Review -?Society and Human Nature in the Films of Stanley KubrickReview -?2001 ExplainedIn Kubrick's case, both an epic signature visual style and a constant thematic concern with the over-mechanization of society and our loss of humanity, identify one of the greatest directors of the 20th century.Discussion VL - 2001: A Space OdysseyAfter watching?2001: A Space Odyssey, consider what unique elements of the film indicate the notion of Stanley Kubrick as an auteur.Carefully craft your argument for or against the idea of Kubrick as an auteur, being sure to use appropriate film language.Review -?2001: A Space OdysseyRemember to post twice to the discussion area. ................
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