1968 saw one of the greatest moments in cinematic history
1989 saw my own birth
2010 saw a meeting of all these events.
On June 25th I turned 21 and decided, unusually, to make something of it (I am often want to not, finding birthdays to be an awkward experience arbitrarily celebrating very little). Currently the Southbank are in collaboration with The Royal Society celebrating their 350th anniversary and, in order to make something of this union, they sat down with the BFI to work out a fitting celebration for this meeting between science, art and music. If you can think of a better example than 2001: A Space Odyssey I'll take my hat off to you, let alone what they actually decided to put on: 2001: A Space Odyssey with the Philharmonia Orchestra and Voices performing the score live: a world premiere, almost certain to never happen again.
2001, being the first Science Fiction film whilst being a stunningly beautiful piece of work, never giving in to the (very often) cheap thrills of contemporary sci-fi and its haunting classical score, is the perfect union between science, art and music.
2001, being the first Science Fiction film whilst being a stunningly beautiful piece of work, never giving in to the (very often) cheap thrills of contemporary sci-fi and its haunting classical score, is the perfect union between science, art and music.
Needless to say I was pretty excited; having been a fan of Kubrick for a long time (one of the best gifts I ever received was the Stanley Kubrick Archives) I love 2001 but have never have the chance to see it on the big screen, so this chance alone was special, let alone the inclusion of a live orchestra and choir performing the incredible score. It seems I was not alone here, as the tickets sold out a couple of days after being released, but I managed to snag myself one in the centre of the 4th row (if you're going to do something, go all out). As a lovely addition to the epic nature of the whole event Christiane Kubrick put in a surprise appearance giving a small talk about Stanley and how impressed and touched he would have been with the event.
Something which until know I've never really appreciated in the film is the overture, I'll always watch/listen to it, but it's normally a process of waiting for it to be over so the real film can start. Not the case here. From the second the orchestra kicked in with it I had full body chills. It was awesome.
One thing I was apprehensive about was the timing of the music to the visuals, as it's so, so crucial in this film, but I wasn't let down once, as the monkeys discover weapons in The Dawn Of Man to the strains of Thus Spoke Zarathustra I thought I was going to cry with just how epic it was.
One thing I've never noticed about this film, most likely due to watching it alone on a small(ish) screen, was just how funny it is. HAL's attempts to stop Dave unplugging him genuinely had me and the rest of the audience in stitches; his pleas of 'Just what do you think you're doing Dave' and 'I can see you're really upset about this. I honestly think you ought to sit down calmly, take a stress pill, and think things over' resembling the cliched, desperate woman after a lover's tiff, was absolutely hilarious, which I've just never noticed before.
The Philharmonia Voices deserve a special mention here, as they're work was simply sublime. So much of that score uses discordant choral work, which should be nigh on impossible to sing live in a group. and yet they were spot on the entire time. They were responsible for 90% of the shivers I got (which were pretty consistent, the other 10% given over entirely to epicness). Also, normally, I'll just sit through the intermission and do the whole thing in one sitting, however on this occasion, I could not have needed a break more. I genuinely felt like I was going to have some sort of bodily reaction, and as we all know, after the intermission is where everything kicks off; I needed a break before all hell broke lose and killed me where I sat.
At the film's end the entire place burst into rapturous applause and I for one was more than happy to join them. Normally I find it incredibly awkward when people applaud after a film, no matter how good it was. But here it was so appropriate, so many people had worked to produce this once in a lifetime experience, and I was definitely going to applaud them for it.
I don't think I could possibly find a better way to celebrate my birthday.