Stanley Kubrick
My encounter with "2001" was shocking.
Stylish and cool graphics, realistic mechanical design, and amazing special effects. I first came across this work when I happened to open a movie magazine when I was 15 years old. It was a movie called “2001: A Space Odyssey” directed by Stanley Kubrick.
Soon after I came across the magazine article, in 1978, I was lucky enough to see a revival screening of 2001: A Space Odyssey at a cinema in Nagoya. Even more fortunately, the cinema had a CINERAMA screen. I was overwhelmed by the images projected on the giant screen and fascinated by the beauty of the sound image space.
After that, Cinerama projection equipment disappeared from movie theaters around the world, and unfortunately there are none left in Japan. I will probably never have that overwhelming experience again.
After that mind-blowing experience, I started following Stanley Kubrick and eventually I was able to see all of his films.
“The Shining” is also one of my favorites.
In 2013, I had the opportunity to see his debut film "Fear and Desire", made in 1953, at a cinema in Osaka.
And of course, my smartphone is equipped with “HAL 9000”.
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I can’t do that, Dave.
I'm so old I saw 2001 first-run. 2001, Star Trek, the Moon landing: that was top-dead-center for the USA, a period with problems but confident optimism: 2001 seemed like an entirely reasonable prediction. Then we started on the long slide to where we are now, on our way to bankrupt failed-state status.
I wonder what life in Japan was like then.