Scholars have been studying the films of Stanley Kubrick for decades. This book, however, breaks new ground by bringing together recent empirical approaches to Kubrick with earlier, formalist approaches to arrive at a broader understanding of the ways in which Kubrick's methods were developed to create the unique aesthetic creation that is 2001: A Space Odyssey. As the fiftieth anniversary of the film nears, the contributors explore its still striking design, vision, and philosophical structure, offering new insights and analyses that will give even dedicated Kubrick fans new ways of thinking about the director and his masterpiece.
Visualizzazione post con etichetta 50 years ago. Mostra tutti i post
Visualizzazione post con etichetta 50 years ago. Mostra tutti i post
sabato 20 gennaio 2018
A couple of 50th anniversary-related events
The main event for 2018 - the year that marks the 50th anniversary of 2001: A Space Odyssey - will surely be the Official exhibition that will be hosted at the Deutsches Filmmuseum in Frankfurt, Germany, from March 21 to September 16. On show there will be the largest collection of original designs, models, costumes, props, shooting schedules, production documents and photos from Kubrick's archive, accompanied by a series of talks and events. Watch out this space for the official information as soon as I get it, as the lecture series may as well involve a familiar face... The official site, only in german so far: http://2001.deutsches-filmmuseum.de.
In the meantime, those of you who follow me on Facebook and Twitter will already know that the book "Understanding Kubrick's 2001: a Space Odyssey - Representation and Interpretation" (Intellect Books, Bristol, 2018) for which I wrote the first chapter ('God, it’ll be hard topping the H-bomb’: Kubrick’s search for a new obsession in the path from Dr. Strangelove to 2001) has been announced on Amazon (UK, USA, ITA) it will be available from April 15, 2018. Here's the official publicity blurb:
sabato 21 febbraio 2015
Today, fifty years ago, '2001' was officially announced for the first time
Today, fifty years ago, the movie that became '2001: A Space Odyssey' was announced for the first time. The New York Times, with a two-day advance on the release of the February 23, 1965 official press statement from MGM, revealed in an article titled "Beyond the Blue Horizon" that Stanley Kubrick was preparing to delve into the future with a movie to be called "Journey Beyond The Stars".
The Variety press release (from the February 22, 1965 issue)
As Peter Kramer points out in his great 2001 book from BFI, MGM's press released announced, (somewhat misleadingly as it turned out), that the film would have "a cast of international importance", and "be filmed in Switzerland and Germany" among the other settings.
As I wrote in my previous article about the many tentative titles of 2001, a 15-minute 70 mm. space documentary called Journey to the stars had already been shown at the Seattle World Fair in 1962; there is ample evidence, in the Kubrick Archive in London, showing that the director was aware of it and was interested in the camera techniques used to depict space and project it on a large screen.
The original press statement from February 23, 1965 appeared on Piers Bizony's "Filming The Future" and is now available here.
UPDATE Thanks to the blog Kubrick En Castellano, here are the scans of the Bizony book (pp.10 & 11) with the original MGM press release.
UPDATE Thanks to the blog Kubrick En Castellano, here are the scans of the Bizony book (pp.10 & 11) with the original MGM press release.
martedì 20 maggio 2014
50 years ago: The Kubrick-Arthur Clarke UFO incident
May 17, 1964. After a day of hard work on the 2001 script (the project was still known as "Journey Beyond The Stars") Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke took a break in the veranda of Kubrick's penthouse in New York.
They had just reached an important agreement: reluctantly, Clarke accepted to push back his return to Ceylon in order to polish the last treatment of the movie for its crucial presentation to MGM. After shaking hands, together with Kubrick's wife Christiane, they wanted to catch some fresh air and went out in the veranda; the sky was clear and there was a full moon.
They had just reached an important agreement: reluctantly, Clarke accepted to push back his return to Ceylon in order to polish the last treatment of the movie for its crucial presentation to MGM. After shaking hands, together with Kubrick's wife Christiane, they wanted to catch some fresh air and went out in the veranda; the sky was clear and there was a full moon.
Kubrick and Clarke with the director's Questar 3.5 telescope (1964?) Photo source: Catalogue of the Stanley Kubrick Exhibition
One of the most debated topics during their first month of their acquaintance was the real existence and true nature of UFOs. Clarke had persuaded Kubrick, in their initial conversations, that they were simply that - yet unidentified flying objects - and had nothing to do with outer space and extraterrestrials. In Clarke's own words, from his biography Visionary:
Stanley was in some danger of believing in flying saucers. I felt I had arrived just in time to save him from this gruesome fate.Imagine the surprise of the writer when, at 9 p.m., an object brighter than the surroundings stars appeared high in the sky. Kubrick and Clarke rushed to the director's Questar 3.5 telescope and moved it to the roof, to have a better view of the object. Again, Clarke's recollection, from Visionary:
"I can still remember, rather sheepishly, my feelings of awe and excitement, and also the thought that flashed through my mind: This is altogether too much of a coincidence. They are out to stop us from making this movie."
Kubrick and Clarke both continued to stare at the bright object. It appeared to come to rest at the zenith, remain in that position above Manhatthan for about a minute, and then sink down to the north.It looked like a brilliant satellite to Clarke, possibly Echo (the first passive communications satellite experiment, a concept Clarke himself had proposed back in 1945) yet the listing of satellite passes in the New York Times included no such transit at nine in the evening, but one at 23.03.
What could it be? Clarke (that in his life had seen at least ten UFOs) kept on arguing that there was a simple explanation, but he couldn't come up with one - even his friends from the Hayden Planetarium he called a couple of days later were unaware of a satellite passing at such time. Reluctantly they contacted the Pentagon (reluctantly because the Air Force was still smarting from Kubrick's acclaimed satire on the military, Dr.Strangelove) and a month later, on June 16, 1964, Kubrick filled out and submitted the standard sighting form, "U.S. Air Force Technical Information" :
The standard UFO sighting form from USAF compiled by Kubrick, and his original drawing with his reconstruction. Photo sources: Catalogue of the Stanley Kubrick Exhibition ; Antony Frewin's book Are We Alone?
When the USAF answered, it turned out the simplest answer was the right one. Kubrick found out that the New York Times was in error when they listed only the 23.03 of Echo over New York, and that might have got the Hayden Planetarium wrong as well. It was Echo all along, as its highly reflective aluminium surface caused it to shine more than any star on the night sky; in his first appearance, his curious behavior was caused - just as Clarke had suspected - by his azimuthal position over New York.
Echo inflation test, 1960 (source)
The mystery was solved, but as Kubrick observed, if he and Arthur had not pushed hard to find the solution, they would have spent the rest of their lives talking about UFOs or even an extra-terrestrial spaceship, fostering popular beliefs in it.Clarke came back on the topic years later in his book Greetings, Carbon-based bipeds:
I'm embarrassed to say that the brilliant light we watched moving across the sky turned out to be the ECHO balloon satellite, seen under rather unusual circumstances. Also, Stanley and I were in a rather exalted mood, and perhaps not as critical as we should have been.Kubrick did not abandon his suspicion that there was something out there; never too prudent, shortly before the Mariner IV Mars fly-by in June 1965 he contacted Lloyds of London to price an insurance policy against Martians being discovered before the release of his film in 1968 (such a discovery would have rendered the plot of the film outdated in an instant). Always the pragmatist, he dropped the idea when he found out how much the premium would be. "Stanley decided," wrote Clarke, "to take his chance with the Universe".
Stanley Kubrick, circa 1967 (source)
PLAYBOY: Although flying saucers are frequently an object of public derision, there has been a good deal of serious discussion in the scientific community about the possibility that UFOs could be alien spacecraft. What's your opinion?
STANLEY KUBRICK: The most significant analysis of UFOs I've seen recently was written by L.M. Chassin, a French air force general who had been a high-ranking NATO officer. He argues that by any legal rules of evidence, there is now sufficient sighting data amassed from reputable sources—astronomers, pilots, radar operators and the like—to initiate a serious and thorough worldwide investigation of UFO phenomena. Actually, if you examine even a fraction of the extant testimony you will find that people have been sent to the gas chamber on far less substantial evidence. Of course, it's possible that all the governments in the world really do take UFOs seriously and perhaps are already engaging in secret study projects to determine their origin, nature and intentions. If so, they may not be disclosing their findings for fear that the public would be alarmed—the danger of cultural shock deriving from confrontation with the unknown which we discussed earlier, and which is an element of 2001, when news of the monolith's discovery on the moon is suppressed. But I think even the 2 percent of sightings that the Air Force's Project Blue Book admits is unexplainable by conventional means should dictate a serious, searching probe. From all indications, the current government-authorized investigation at the University of Colorado is neither serious nor searching.
One hopeful sign that this subject may at last be accorded the serious discussion it deserves, however, is the belated but exemplary conversion of Dr. J. Allen Hynek since 1948 the Air Force's consultant on UFOs and currently chairman of the astronomy department at Northwestern University. Hynek, who in his official capacity pooh-poohed UFO sightings, now believes that UFOs deserve top-priority attention—as he wrote in Playboy [December 1967]—and even concedes that the existing evidence may indicate a possible connection with extraterrestrial life. He predicts: "I will be surprised if an intensive study yields nothing. To the contrary, I think that mankind may be in for the greatest adventure since dawning human intelligence turned outward to contemplate the universe." I agree with him.
martedì 22 aprile 2014
"We talked for eight solid hours": Arthur C. Clarke recalls meeting Stanley Kubrick for the first time fifty years ago today, April 22, 1964
When I met Stanley Kubrick for the first time, in Trader Vic's on April 22, 1964, he had already absorbed an immense amount of science fact and science fiction, and was in some danger of believing in flying saucers; I felt I had arrived just in time to save him from this gruesome fate. Even from the beginning, he had a very clear idea of his ultimate goal, and was searching for the best way to approach it. He wanted to make a movie about Man's relation to the universe, something which had never been attempted, still less achieved, in the history of motion pictures.
Of course, there had been innumerable "space" movies, most of them trash. Even the few that had been made with some skill and accuracy had been rather simpleminded, concerned more with the schoolboy excitement of space flight than its profound implications to society, philosophy, and religion.
From Son Of Dr.Strangelove, an essay wrote by Clarke for Report on Planet Three (1972, read it on Google books) and reprinted with small corrections in Greetings, carbon-based bipeds (1998, p.261):
My first meeting with Stanley Kubrick took place at Trader Vic's in the Plaza Hotel. The date - April 22, 1964 - coincided with the opening of the ill-starred New York World'sFair, which, might or might not be regarded as an unfavorable omen. Stanley arrived on time, and turned out to be a rather quite, average-height New Yorker (to be specific, Bronxite) with none of the idiosyncrasies one associates with major Hollywood movie directors.
He had a night-person pallor, and one of our minor problems was that he functions best in the small hours of the morning, whereas I believe that no sane person is awake after 10 p.m. and no law-abiding one after midnight. He never tried with me his usual tactic of phoning at 4 a.m. to discuss an important idea. But his curtesy did non stop him from being absolutely inflexible once he had decided on some course of action. Tears, hysterics, flattery, sulks, threats of lawsuits, will not defect him one millimeter.
"We talked for eight solid hours about science fiction, Dr. Strangelove, flying saucers, politics, the space program, Senator Goldwater - and, of course, the projected next movie."
lunedì 31 marzo 2014
50 years ago, Kubrick and Clarke made their first contact
Today we celebrate another significant anniversary in the history of our favourite movie: as a result of the dinner recounted in my previous post, fifty years ago today (March 31, 1964) Stanley Kubrick sat in front of his typewriter and wrote a letter to Arthur C. Clarke. It was their first direct, personal contact.
I held the original letter in my very hands at the Kubrick Archive in London last January (here's its catalogue entry), here's a picture of it (possibly a reproduction) as shown at the Star Voyager: Exploring Space on Screen exhibition in Australia:
To my knowledge, the full text of the letter was first published on the internet in 2012 by the fine site Letters of Note, although an excerpt was already present in Taschen's 2008 book The Stanley Kubrick Archives and was published in the same year in the Daily Telegraph website). Here it is:
When I first read the letter, I was amazed, but not surprised, to find yet another example of Kubrick's uncanny ability to exploit every chance to extract information from his interlocutor, whether he was a close friend, a relative, an acquaintance, or a total unknown.
The telescope thing was not a pretext to arouse the interest of Clarke: Kubrick was a hobbist astronomer but most of all he was a total 'geek' - he bought every new gadget he could, owned several tape recorders, and when computers came around he was an enthusiast early adopter.
Therefore when, after asking the well-respected author to consider a possible collaboration for a science-fiction movie, the director takes the opportunity to ask him about his latest gadget as well, we are almost led to believe that the movie was an excuse!
To my knowledge, the full text of the letter was first published on the internet in 2012 by the fine site Letters of Note, although an excerpt was already present in Taschen's 2008 book The Stanley Kubrick Archives and was published in the same year in the Daily Telegraph website). Here it is:
SOLARIS PRODUCTIONS, INC
March 31, 1964
Mr. Arthur C. Clarke
[Address redacted]
Dear Mr Clarke:
It's a very interesting coincidence that our mutual friend Caras mentioned you in a conversation we were having about a Questar telescope. I had been a great admirer of your books for quite a time and had always wanted to discuss with you the possibility of doing the proverbial "really good" science-fiction movie.
My main interest lies along these broad areas, naturally assuming great plot and character:
Roger tells me you are planning to come to New York this summer. Do you have an inflexible schedule? If not, would you consider coming sooner with a view to a meeting, the purpose of which would be to determine whether an idea might exist or arise which could sufficiently interest both of us enough to want to collaborate on a screenplay?
- The reasons for believing in the existence of intelligent extra-terrestrial life.
- The impact (and perhaps even lack of impact in some quarters) such discovery would have on Earth in the near future.
- A space probe with a landing and exploration of the Moon and Mars.
Incidentally, "Sky & Telescope" advertise a number of scopes. If one has the room for a medium size scope on a pedestal, say the size of a camera tripod, is there any particular model in a class by itself, as the Questar is for small portable scopes?
Best regards,
(Signed)
Stanley Kubrick
When I first read the letter, I was amazed, but not surprised, to find yet another example of Kubrick's uncanny ability to exploit every chance to extract information from his interlocutor, whether he was a close friend, a relative, an acquaintance, or a total unknown.
The telescope thing was not a pretext to arouse the interest of Clarke: Kubrick was a hobbist astronomer but most of all he was a total 'geek' - he bought every new gadget he could, owned several tape recorders, and when computers came around he was an enthusiast early adopter.
Therefore when, after asking the well-respected author to consider a possible collaboration for a science-fiction movie, the director takes the opportunity to ask him about his latest gadget as well, we are almost led to believe that the movie was an excuse!
What was Clarke's reaction to Kubrick's letter? The sci-fi author was aware of the director's interest (he had already answered to Roger Caras' telegram, as we saw in my previous post), and, as we read in his biography Odyssey,
the letter further aroused Clarke's interest in the project. [...] "Kubrick is obviously an astonishing man", he wrote to Caras. [...] "By a fortunate coincidence, I was due in New York almost immediately, to complete work on the Time-Life Science's Library Man in Space". [...] Before the trip (Clarke) searched through his published fiction for ideas that could be used in the film.What he came up with, a short story wrote for a 1948 BBC contest that did not win or even place - The Sentinel (here it is as a pdf)- somehow set the tone for the whole project (despite the enormous differences between it and the final movie, compared by the same Clarke to the differences between an acorn to a full-grown oak tree).
Cover and first page of The Sentinel in its first published version, in the english magazine 10 Story Fantasy in 1951, under the title "Sentinel of Eternity". Source: ebay
Arthur C Clarke with a Questar telescope, Sri Lanka, 1970s. Source: tipsimages.com
Kubrick's Questar telescope will feature again in the 2001 story, in a purported UFO sighting event that the director and Clarke experienced while developing the plot for the movie, in the same year 1964. We'll deal about that in a future article.
lunedì 17 febbraio 2014
Aliens on a napkin: 50 years ago today, the birth of '2001' in a polynesian restaurant in New York
The legend of 2001: A Space Odyssey was born fifty years ago today ...
... on the cocktail napkin of a polynesian restaurant in New York, with a little help from an animal-loving movie industry executive.
His love of nature, travel and diving had already befriended him a famous science fiction author who shared his passions, Arthur C. Clarke : the two had first met in 1959, when Clarke spent a weekend with Jacques Cousteau in Boston.
His acquaintance with Clarke proved to be nothing less than providential during that dinner, as
In that same day, February 17, Caras sent a letter to Arthur Clarke mentioning his dinner with Kubrick and his interest in a possible collaboration. The letter is mentioned in Peter Kramer's book 2001: A Space Odyssey, and here's the related entry in the online Kubrick Archive Catalogue.
Caras famously recalled the words of a cable he later sent to Clarke in Ceylon with a more explicit offer, probably pushed by Kubrick after another meeting:
Let's ponder a little more on the consequences of that polynesian lunch. As Kubrick biographer John Baxter rightly observed, had Caras suggested Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Ray Bradbury or any other among the other half dozen science fiction writers, 2001 would have been a vastly different movie.
It would probably not have featured the discovery of an alien artifact as the core element of the plot, because the concept came from Arthur Clarke's short story The Sentinel, though the idea was, of course, not entirely original in sci-fi history. The famous "monolith", therefore, might have turned up in the story anyway, in another fashion or form; it is indeed important to note that Kubrick was looking for a way to describe, in cinematic form, mankind's future in space and the potentially most seismic event in human history: the 'first contact' with extraterrestrial intelligence.
Therefore, although is undoubtedly fascinating to imagine Kubrick tackling other sci-fi concepts, like Bradbury's romantic, very human vision of the the martians in Martian Chronicles, or the futuristic warfare imagined by Heinlein in Starship Troopers, the theme of the 'first contact' was not as much in the style of the Asimovs, Bradburys and Heinleins, but it was prominent in Arthur Clarke's vision, expecially in a novel that indirectly influenced 2001, as shown in my previous post: Childhood's end (1951).
So, considering their similar vision and intellectual affinity (Caras himself describe their relation as a good "cerebral marriage"), Clarke proved to be the perfect fit for Kubrick, as Gene Phillips in The Encylopedia of Stanley Kubrick sums up:
The next chapter of our story will be written on March 31, 1964, the day Kubrick and Clarke made 'first contact'. In that article and the ones which will follow, we'll explore in deep the relationship between the duo, and the other instances in which Caras proved himself a worthy companion for the dynamic duo, and a key player in the making of our favorite movie. See you then - fifty years ago!
1 lime
1/2 ounce orange curacao
1/4 ounce rock candy syrup
1/4 ounce orgeat syrup
1 ounce dark Jamaica rum
1 ounce Martinique rum
Cut lime in half; squeeze juice over shaved ice in a double old fashioned glass; save one spent shell. Add remaining ingredients and enough shaved ice to fill glass. Hand shake. Decorate with spent lime shell, fresh mint, and a fruit stick.
February 17, 1964 is a date of paramount importance in the history of 2001; it's the day when the seeds of the movie as we know it were planted. That Monday, Stanley Kubrick was to have lunch with his friend Roger Caras in his favorite New York restaurant, the Trader Vic's at Fifth Avenue and 59th Street (at that time the director lived in a nearby apartment in Central Park West).
Trader Vic's in New York at the Savoy Plaza (source, via tikiroom.com)
Trader Vic's, still in operation in the States, is a polynesian-themed restaurant chain that was very fashionable in the mid 60's due in part to the so-called 'Tiki culture' fad. In this rather pictoresque setting (war clubs, carved masks, Japanese fishing floats hanging from the ceilings), at one point during the lunch Roger Caras asked Kubrick the fateful question: after the success of Dr. Strangelove, what was he going to do next?
As recalled in Neil McAleer's Arthur C.Clarke's biography Odyssey of a Visionary,
As recalled in Neil McAleer's Arthur C.Clarke's biography Odyssey of a Visionary,
"You'd laugh", answered Kubrick.
"No, I wouldn't. What are you going to do?"
"I'm going to do something on extraterrestrials", Kubrick said, looking to see if Cares knew what that meant.
"That's fantastic", said Caras. "As a matter of fact I'm doing a radio show on extraterrestrials tonight."
Being in such an early stage of the pre-production, the director only had fuzzy ideas about the possible story of the movie, and between a Mai Tai cocktail and a grilled appetizer, according to an interview given by Caras to Lee Pfeiffer,
[...] Kubrick scribbled some cartoons on cocktail napkins that depicted man's first meeting with aliens, an element he wanted to base 2001 on, but would later drop.
[...] Upon telling me this story, Caras went to a filing cabinet and took out a folder. He said that Kubrick and Clarke were the only two men he ever met who could literally be called geniuses. He knew that their prospective collaboration would insure that anything they created should be preserved.
Out of the file, he produced the cocktail napkins from Trader Vic's that still bore Kubrick's cartoons showing his concepts for 2001 - four years before the film would actually be released.
Kubrick during the production of 'Dr. Strangelove' (1963). (Source)
Sadly, Roger Caras is one of the many of the 2001 cast & crew no longer with us: born in 1928 and passed away almost exactly thirteen years ago (February 18 of the fateful year 2001), he was, as Jan Parker told me in a previous interview,
a larger than life, cigar-smoking, Hollywood producer type - but a nice human being!Only apparently the stereotypical movie business executive, Caras was a generous and caring person, a keen nature and animal lover, a passion that led him to leave the movie business in the late '60s and become a respected wildlife photographer-writer-preservationist and one of TV's best-regarded animal authorities. He also was a good match for Kubrick's intellectual vivacity, as described by Anthony Frewin in Are we alone? The Stanley Kubrick Extra-terrestrial interviews,
(Caras) was the only member of the 2001 crew besides Kubrick who had read the whole Proust's 'In search of lost time'.
Roger Caras and one of his furry friends. Source: www.historyforsale.com
His love of nature, travel and diving had already befriended him a famous science fiction author who shared his passions, Arthur C. Clarke : the two had first met in 1959, when Clarke spent a weekend with Jacques Cousteau in Boston.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCl4cdJrpUWbwk7eur609ZdiJfq52j6U93iW9WGsFJHxayWPaZfRgt6YqXsQ6cjJb23sGrHp-756Yu3dVwjFBkjp1a7W43JrTv6PIsi4dmPxtxzdRs2bZXmrRS_AVRaDRAnUA6w__w4V8/s1600/clarke.png)
Arthur C. Clarke in 1964 (Source)
Caras eventually asked Kubrick who the writer [of the next movie] was going to be, but Kubrick didn't know yet.
"I'm reading everything by everybody".
This, Caras knew, was the thorough way Kubrick approached his projects. He'd pick the top twenty-five science fiction writers, have his assistant pull together everything they'd ever written, and read it.
"Why waste your time?" Caras asked. "Why not just start with the best?"Kubrick was immediately interested and asked Caras to get in contact with Clarke:
"Who?" Kubrick asked him.
"Arthur C.Clarke", Caras replied.
"But I understand he's a recluse, a nut who lives in a tree in India some place" said Kubrick.
Roger Caras put that rumor to rest. "Like hell. He's not a recluse or a nut. He just lives quietly in Ceylon."
"Jesus, get in touch with him, will you?"
Caras famously recalled the words of a cable he later sent to Clarke in Ceylon with a more explicit offer, probably pushed by Kubrick after another meeting:
STANLEY KUBRICK - "DR STRANGELOVE," "PATHS OF GLORY," ETCETERA, INTERESTED IN DOING FILM ON ET'S. INTERESTED IN YOU. ARE YOU INTERESTED? THOUGHT YOU WERE RECLUSE.Clarke replied rather promptly:
FRIGHTFULLY INTERESTED IN WORKING WITH ENFANT TERRIBLE STOP CONTACT MY AGENT STOP WHAT MAKES KUBRICK THINK I'M A RECLUSE?
The rest, as they say, is history: Roger Caras passed the information to Scott Meredith, Clarke's agent, who began to define the next stage of the project; Caras would later leave Columbia to
manage Kubrick's independent production company, Polaris, during the
first part of the production of 2001, and served as director of publicity for the movie.
A nice picture of Roger Caras taken by Stanley Kubrick during the production of 2001 (source: Moonwatcher's Memoir)
* * *
Let's ponder a little more on the consequences of that polynesian lunch. As Kubrick biographer John Baxter rightly observed, had Caras suggested Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Ray Bradbury or any other among the other half dozen science fiction writers, 2001 would have been a vastly different movie.
It would probably not have featured the discovery of an alien artifact as the core element of the plot, because the concept came from Arthur Clarke's short story The Sentinel, though the idea was, of course, not entirely original in sci-fi history. The famous "monolith", therefore, might have turned up in the story anyway, in another fashion or form; it is indeed important to note that Kubrick was looking for a way to describe, in cinematic form, mankind's future in space and the potentially most seismic event in human history: the 'first contact' with extraterrestrial intelligence.
Therefore, although is undoubtedly fascinating to imagine Kubrick tackling other sci-fi concepts, like Bradbury's romantic, very human vision of the the martians in Martian Chronicles, or the futuristic warfare imagined by Heinlein in Starship Troopers, the theme of the 'first contact' was not as much in the style of the Asimovs, Bradburys and Heinleins, but it was prominent in Arthur Clarke's vision, expecially in a novel that indirectly influenced 2001, as shown in my previous post: Childhood's end (1951).
So, considering their similar vision and intellectual affinity (Caras himself describe their relation as a good "cerebral marriage"), Clarke proved to be the perfect fit for Kubrick, as Gene Phillips in The Encylopedia of Stanley Kubrick sums up:
Clarke shared Kubrick’s vision of science “as savior of mankind and of mankind as a race of potential gods destined for the stars,” as science fiction writer Brian Aldiss states in Baxter’s Kubrick biography. In sum, Roger Caras was responsible for bringing together two artists for one of the genuinely legendary collaborations of director and screenwriter in cinema history.
* * *
The next chapter of our story will be written on March 31, 1964, the day Kubrick and Clarke made 'first contact'. In that article and the ones which will follow, we'll explore in deep the relationship between the duo, and the other instances in which Caras proved himself a worthy companion for the dynamic duo, and a key player in the making of our favorite movie. See you then - fifty years ago!
But, before parting ways, here's something for the trip:
Some more famous cocktail napkin notes ...
.... 7 other brilliant ideas scribbled on cocktail napkins and toilet papers ....
...and the original MAI TAI Trader Vic's cocktail recipe (source):
Some more famous cocktail napkin notes ...
.... 7 other brilliant ideas scribbled on cocktail napkins and toilet papers ....
...and the original MAI TAI Trader Vic's cocktail recipe (source):
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvoUlvy7pJzcmuSAah9iSKbVWBjXqsUYxcT1W01lAF6KxAOSQRqjQg56NHScG-0c6TI-VXwpJwbuboDQJFbtJNXyz4LGQpysUywwAYiogBZB8L9i6bKXY9sggZiTMGiFG_SVIfTXeYSt8/s1600/mai-tai-su-1835314-x.jpg)
1 lime
1/2 ounce orange curacao
1/4 ounce rock candy syrup
1/4 ounce orgeat syrup
1 ounce dark Jamaica rum
1 ounce Martinique rum
Cut lime in half; squeeze juice over shaved ice in a double old fashioned glass; save one spent shell. Add remaining ingredients and enough shaved ice to fill glass. Hand shake. Decorate with spent lime shell, fresh mint, and a fruit stick.
sources
- Baxter, John; Stanley Kubrick: A Biography, Da Capo Press, 1997; p.246 (italian translation)
- Frewin, Anthony (ed.); Are we alone? The Stanley Kubrick Extra-terrestrial interviews, Elliott&Thompson, 2005; p.XVI
- Krämer, Peter; 2001: A Space Odyssey, British Film Institute, 2010; pp.18-20
- McAleer, Neil; Sir Arthur C. Clarke: Odyssey of a Visionary: A Biography, RosettaBooks, 2013; pp.190-191
- Phillips, Gene; Hill, Rodney (ed.); The Encylopedia of Stanley Kubrick, Phillips & Hill, 2002; p.40
- http://ny.eater.com/archives/2013/10/trader_vics_1.php
- http://www.tikiroom.com/tikicentral/bb/viewtopic.php?topic=27236&forum=2
- http://critiki.com/cgi-bin/location.cgi?loc_id=119
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trader_Vic's
- http://tikiarchitecture.blogspot.it/2010/10/trader-vics-architecture-part-2.html
- http://www.cinemaretro.com/index.php?/archives/1686-BREAKING-NEWS!-ARTHUR-C.-CLARKE-DEAD-AT-AGE-90;-CREATED-2001-A-SPACE-ODYSSEY-WITH-STANLEY-KUBRICK.html
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