This is a great milestone (one might dare say a monolith) in SF movie design, but not one of my favorite movies. I don't care for Kubrick's directorial style, nor for Clarke's fascination with presenting unsolved mysteries to the reader. Twenty minutes of ape men, a giant embryo - its not my cup of tea. All that aside, it is one of the most important movies in SF history. The production quality is excellent, and still holds up today. I particularly like the space suit design. It is very realistic, yet distinct from any other fictional or real suit.

There are some nice ships in this series. Rumor has it that the movie models were smashed after production because Kubrick was worried about pirates stealing the designs. Consequently, there are very few models from the movie. Recently, Polar Lights has re-released the old Orion space cruiser, and there are always a few garage kits floating around.

Links

• The 2001 Exhibit - a very detailed web site with lots of pictures which is the online companion of a physical exhibit at the Tech museum in San Jose, CA (through Sept 2001)
• 2001: Destination Space at the Tech museum
• You can get a Hal eye plate from Monsters in Motion.
• The Aurora models mailing list devoted to models of the (now defunct) Aurora company which are being brought back in part by Polar Lights
• CultTVman's 2001 modeling page
• A celebration of 2001from a reviewer called Underman and a site called underview
• Roger Ebert likes it
• The 2001 internet resource - lots of pictures
• Scott Alexander's 2001 EVA Pod kit
• A great image collection and hardware overview from Starship Modeler

  
  

last updated 03/02/00 srogers1@austin.rr.com