Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey by Albert Halstead

Author:Albert Halstead [Halstead, Albert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: -
Publisher: Leonine Productions
Published: 2018-12-24T00:00:00+00:00

Conclusion - Kubrick’s Gift

For my final topic, I will take a closer look at what I believe is Kubrick’s most original and important innovation not only to the science fiction genre, but to narrative film in general. This is a stylistic technique that I have referred to earlier as music-driven imagery in 2001: A Space Odyssey. We need to replace this rather vague phrase with one that is more precise and scientific. My term for this kind of phenomena is musicography or the musicographic image.42 A musicographic image is one in which the formal or abstract qualities of the image, such as subject size, color, velocity, shape of path, speed of rotation, darkness or lightness, are integrated with the music so completely that the aesthetic experience of the audience is amplified non-linearly. It is also important to understand that musicography is not the same as the phenomenon known as synesthesia or chromesthesia. This has been investigated and defined as response or visualization that occurs within the subject’s mind when listening to music.43 Musicographic images are created outside of the mind and perceived through our senses of hearing and sight. Although a thorough discussion of this fascinating topic would be far beyond the scope of this essay, I hope to give the reader a basic idea of the concept and its importance to film and many of the other visual arts.

Given its intense aesthetic impact, the musicographic image is easy to recognize, but difficult to describe in words. As a phenomenon better understood through demonstration rather than explanation, I would encourage the reader to review and study three prime examples and a fourth very brief, but nonetheless striking example that occurs near the very end of the film. These are the opening title, the Orion’s voyage to the space station that opens Act II, the star gate sequence in Act IV, and the full shot of the Star-Child that occurs at the end of Act IV. Hopefully, as it becomes better understood, the use of musicographic imagery will expand in film and other visual media in the future.

The opening title of 2001: A Space Odyssey clearly demonstrates that timing and rhythm of movement of the visual components are extremely critical in the presentation of a musicographic image. The title begins with an extremely deep C played on an organ, the first note of Also Sprach Zarathustra. Observe how this is integrated with the dimness, visual mass, and velocity of the celestial bodies as they begin to rise. Accompanying their ascent are the first three notes of the fanfare, C G C8va. This is punctuated by a C minor chord, just as the brilliant light of the sun breaks over the earth’s horizon. The visual image reinforces the great tension created by the sudden major-to-minor chord change at the end of the first fanfare. The second fanfare ends on a brighter, C major chord, as the sun continues to rise, shedding more light on the scene. At the beginning of the third

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