The Making of 2001: A Space Odyssey 

Mr Benson’s book is outstanding! So happy i found this video companion

I can't believe this movie is from 1968!!! It's my top 5 best films ever made!

This amazing book blew my mind. The stories behind the making of this film and more so, how it was made, were beyond anything I could have imagined. As a result of reading this book twice I have concluded that photochemical cinema peaked with this film and it happened on majestic Cinerama screens.

"Dark, revolving in silent activity: Unseen in tormenting passions: An activity unknown and horrible, A self-contemplating shadow, In enormous labours occupied." -William Blake

I saw this movie when I was four on opening night. Remains my favorite movie. Gave me wonderful nightmares for years to come. The movie is slow if you go in expecting a typical movie- but if you open up your mind and look at the music and scenes as works of art it is stunning. Kubrick created the movie on several levels but one was that it could appeal to the subconscious. A four year old could pick up on the wonder and terror of the unknown without understanding the details of the script. The lunar bus traveling over the lunar landscape is eerie with hints of cosmic horror and reminded me of the alienness captured in Chesley Bonesteel's Saturn from Titan. The realism and beauty of the spacecraft and outer space made me become an Aerospace Engineer years later. A strangely optimistic movie for Kubrick but somewhat in line with Clarkes Childhoods End. Got the 4k Disc a couple of years ago and saw it on a 77" OLED with a good sound system and it was stunning all over again.

Benson makes an error when he said the budget for 2001 was “sixty five million dollars” and today that’s about 40 million. He meant the budget was 6.5 million which is 40 million equivalent today. Just for the record.

Strange the video description states up to the release of 2001, Kubrick had not yet made a name for himself. Well if you don't count the success of Dr. Strangelove, and the Oscar celebrated "Spartacus", for which Kubrick receive a Golden Globe nomination for best director. It is difficult to comprehend how Kubrick could have commanded so much freedom to make 2001 without yet having made a name for himself. Truly, Kubrick appears to have reached his zenith of recognition between the release of Dr. Strangelove(1964) and Barry Lyndon (1975), for which he received 4 consecutive Best Director Oscar nominations, and 3 Best Picture nominations.

IF Anyone could Fake Apollo 11 it must have been Kubrick! I always come back to this classic especially with commentary. Next will be an upgrade to a 4K Screen with 4k 2001 blu-ray edition. Met the two main actors great thrill. Still one of my favorites films. Kubrick was a master. Camera work on Barry Lydon with candle light was a break through. Respect.

"Till imagination-the dawn of the East-suddenly begining" -William Blake

"Coldness, darkness, obstruction, a Solid Without fluctuation, hard as adamant Black as marble of Egypt; impenetrable Bound in the fierce raging Immortal." -William Blake

When did NASA discover rings around Jupiter = 1979 1:34:37 into the film there is a ring around Jupiter, this film was made in 1968. Strange

Recommend reading The Lost Worlds of 2001 by Arthur C Clarke (1972) It has all the info and behind the scenes of the making of the movie.

Didn't Sony (ir some other Japanese compnlany) have a project to restore the 9-13 minutes Kubrick had trimmed from the film?

James Randi called himself The Amazing Randi, not the magnificent Randi and he was also a celebrated author and skeptic. He lived the most amazing life!

Open the pod bay doors, HAL.

my perception of the cinema at this moment was completly wrong

No one ever mentions the shadow of the airplane faintly visible in psychedelic ocean swells during the split screen sequence.

The presenter seems most interested in Clark's homosexuality.

A great film, but too slow.