Excerpts from the reviews (via Wikipedia)
Pauline Kael said it was "a monumentally unimaginative movie,"[143] and Stanley Kauffmann of The New Republic called it "a film that is so dull, it even dulls our interest in the technical ingenuity for the sake of which Kubrick has allowed it to become dull."[144] Renata Adler of The New York Times wrote that it was "somewhere between hypnotic and immensely boring."[145] Variety's 'Robe' believed the film was a "Big, beautiful, but plodding sci-fi epic ... A major achievement in cinematography and special effects, 2001 lacks dramatic appeal to a large degree and only conveys suspense after the halfway mark."[146] Andrew Sarris called it "one of the grimmest films I have ever seen in my life ...2001 is a disaster because it is much too abstract to make its abstract points."[147] (Sarris reversed his opinion upon a second viewing of the film, and declared "2001 is indeed a major work by a major artist."[148]) John Simon felt it was "a regrettable failure, although not a total one. This film is fascinating when it concentrates on apes or machines ... and dreadful when it deals with the in-betweens: humans ...2001, for all its lively visual and mechanical spectacle, is a kind of space-Spartacus and, more pretentious still, a shaggy God story."[149] Eminent historian Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. deemed the film "morally pretentious, intellectually obscure and inordinately long ... a film out of control".[150] It has been noted that its slow pacing often alienates modern audiences more than it did upon its initial release.[151]
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wakeupandsmellthebacon, Thu 23 Oct 2014, 13:52,
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"a film that is so dull, it even dulls our interest in the technical ingenuity for the sake of which Kubrick has allowed it to become dull."
^this
There is a modern fad for 'Director's cuts,' of films, generally when there is a fan base fanatical enough to spend more money on any such rubbish released prolonging their interest in something. Also, ANYTHING Kevin Costner has directed and/or starred in; I have absolutely no interest in seeing them.
There is a very good reason why other people should edit any cinematic work you do, because it is almost natural to get a bit lost up your own bum hole. That long forty second panoramic shot of the ocean, Kevin, does the audience really need to see that? Just saying because your film is already three and a half hours long. Kubrick's films by and large seem much the same sort of thing. Someone who really wasn't challenged enough to edit a bit more and be less extravagant (with time).
Though that is not to say I don't admire much of what he has done immensely. His use of lenses in Barry Lyndon was a visual feast.
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Jahled Three shades of black, Thu 23 Oct 2014, 14:18,
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The only long shot / bit that annoys me in "2001" is the jump sequence at the end because the section after the walls of lights is just a bad showreel of what are now old school effects
but the pacing of the rest of the film doesn't bother me at all
I'm usually not interested in extended versions / director's cuts, but some not-extended versions of films get cut so much that they don't make any sense (like Kingdom of Heaven)
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custard, Thu 23 Oct 2014, 15:05,
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