Actually this post really hasn't got anything to do with Buzz Lightyear (what a simply wonderful name that is) to whom the above title can properly be ascribed. Funnily enough, Alice has interjected (as she does), this was the first multi-word pronouncement she heard her grandson utter as a very young child - which she had to get his older sister to translate from toddler-speak and explain, not at that time being au fait with Toy Story herself. Later, she got to see the film and was enchanted.The saying was actually top in a recent Radio Times poll of favourite film quotes, from a selection of 50. The one Alice voted for, "Tears in rain" scored high as well, at number eight. See somewhere or other below (we will get to it in due course) if you don't know that one.
IF you've already seen the film, you can relive that awesome trip here, and then here. [Update: YouTube has removed these clips!] But don't spoil the experience if you haven't - just go & see it all - soon! (Or get the DVD / Blu-ray if you've missed it on the big screen.)
You may already be aware that we love Science Fiction, both the written (especially Iain M Banks) and the filmed. But I don't think we've told you that Alice has always loved vistas of the stars. When she was only a girl, and before there was so much pollution in city air, she used to spend hours looking at the sky from her bedroom window. Even then, I think she must have known that's where she really came from, and it's true "we are stardust" as Joni Mitchell sang in her Woodstock song. There are notes, by the way, about Yasgur's Farm, where the Festival was held, on the singer's website. And here's some real stardust, in the heavenly Orion nebula. Well, I like appropriate puns, even if Alice thinks I'm being puerile!
Young Alice used to say she wanted to be the first woman Astronomer Royal - not aware then that s/he wasn't in charge of the Greenwich Observatory.
Just in case, however, her parents got her a proper telescope: nothing
like as powerful as you could get yourself today, but good enough to
see the craters on the moon, or (just about) the stripes and satellites of Jupiter.She remembers going out one night in October 1957 to watch the little bright dot that was the Soviet Union's Sputnik, the first earth-orbiting artificial satellite, crossing the sky and launching the start of "The Space Age".
Nowadays, we can find gorgeous images from space at NASA's site, or on the one for the Hubble Telescope, launched in 2002. We take for granted the existence of an International Space Station; deep space probes, and robots on Mars or even the comet Philae.
I've just had to remind Alice that this post was supposed to be about 2001 and Interstellar, and she's let Google carry her away - again! She reminds me that the Moon landings didn't happen until 1969, when one of the crew was Edwin "Buzz" Landrin! So it all links together, she says, and I must be patient. Recently we went to see Interstellar, then shortly afterwards the restored 2001: A Space Oddyssey, which is part of the BFI's Sci-Fi: Days of Fear and Wonder season. The BBC has also had an interesting series of programmes on the Unearthly History of Science Fiction.
It's hard to believe that 2001 originally came out in 1968, and had no access to the CGI of todays' film-makers. (Nor did the original 1982 version of Blade Runner for that matter.) Almost any review we can link to will have spoilers, I'm afraid. You have been warned!
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| I touched it too! |
You can read a very thoughtful 1968 review entitled 2001: the Monolith and the Message at Roger Ebert's blog. It's totally full of spoilers of course, but ends with the words "a beautiful parable about the nature of man." Roger Ebert died in 2013: the Guardian celebrates the critic and reviews a recent documentary about him.
Rotten Tomatoes just lists quotes from each critic, so it's up to you to follow them up or not. Here's an example (from the year 2001!): Awesome, influential, mind-blowing, cool, obsessional, pretentious -- 2001 is all of these. Yup, that as well.
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| Mark Kermode on Radio 5 |
Mark Kermode's recent 5 Live review literally contains a wopping "Wow!" for what he calls the best bit of jump-cut editing in cinema history. [You can see that cut on YouTube.] He also points out how the most sympathetic character is HAL, the onboard computer (spookily given voice by Douglas Rain) with a mind of its own. Nothing like the Star Wars droids R2-D2 or C-3PO. And thereby hangs much of the tale...
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| The Right Stuff |
[P.S. She got it for Christmas: our verdict is that it's extremely long (at over three hours) and the plotting is somewhat slow in places - but it is most informative, plus pretty fast and exciting when the Space Race gets hot. So, it's paws up from us, well worth the watch.]
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| Ripley and Newt in Aliens |
Interestingly, Contact has in common with Interstellar a powerful theme about a father-daughter relationship, while the Alien films have an extremely strong Mother presence.
I hope you're clicking on the images to see them larger.
Most recently, Alice took me to Interstellar yet again - she was so wowed by it.
Well, yeh, OK, I thought it was kind'uh cool, too.
Some of the most interesting, Alice thinks, are the ones that explore the physics behind the plot, and the making of images like the one here.
One of the most comprehensive and illuminating of these is at Wired. [Scroll down to get to the text and video.] It includes an interview with and comments by Kip Thorne, the CalTech physicist who contributed his equations to the visual effects personel, and was surprised himself at the fantastic results. He's published a book for the general public on The Science of Interstellar, and reckons he can get at least two published articles of hard science from his work for the film.
Another article in this vein, which looks at Thorne's book as well, is at Scientific American.
One review (among many) you might find interesting is this by Mark Kermode again. He's not 100% positive, stating that although the film does have heart, it sometimes succumbs to its own sentimentality. He nevertheless praises Nolan as a master of the cinematic spectacle who understands the power of light.Alice admits she had a tear in her eye at several points, but she's not complaining. I'm obliged to be permanently dry-eyed I'm afraid, but that doesn't mean I'm cold-hearted: I thought the personal bits were truely touching.
Both 2001 and Interstellar are very long; both are mind-teasingly mysterious, and both feature ravishingly beautiful, or at the least incredibly stunning, visual sequences. Rowan Righelato of the Guardian makes an excellent comparison of the two films.
Of Interstellar, he says: Its abiding message is also one of hope, but Nolan gives us the fierce faith of familial survival rather than the fulfilment of an existential destiny, celebrates human love rather than spiritual transcendence...
He concludes: for all it’s beauty, it’s myth and music, 2001 is a solitary experience, while Interstellar is a tribute to what holds us together.
Plenty of food for thought, then. Me? I just enjoyed them both - lots.
In 2012 at the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia in Milan, Rutger Hauer, looking his age but still full of life, talked about his delight in playing the part. The actor was largely responsible for tweaking the script into the final words, and attributes them to "the poet in me". The video by televisionet is on YouTube.
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe ... Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those… moments… will be lost in time, like ... tears … in … rain.
Time… to die…
But that special moment does still live for us, both in the original film and the many others inspired and influenced by the urge to travel all the way - to Infinity and Beyond.
