Metascore

Universal acclaim - based on 14 Critics What's this?

User Score

Universal acclaim- based on 266 Ratings

  • Starring: Gary Lockwood, Keir Dullea
  • Summary: 2001: A Space Odyssey is a countdown to tomorrow, a road map to human destiny, a quest for the infinite. To begin his voyage into the future, Kubrick visits our prehistoric ape-ancestry past, then leaps millenia (via one of the most mind-blowing jump cuts ever conceived) into colonized space, and ultimately whisks astronaut Bowman (Dullea) into uncharted realms of space, perhaps even into immortality. "Open the pod bay doors, HAL." Let the awe and mystery of a journey unlike any other begin. (Warner Bros.) Expand
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 11 out of 14
  2. Negative: 1 out of 14
  1. 100
    Only a few films are transcendent, and work upon our minds and imaginations like music or prayer or a vast belittling landscape...Alone among science-fiction movies, 2001 is not concerned with thrilling us, but with inspiring our awe.
  2. A masterpiece that can still leave you dizzy with wonder. As much as any movie ever made, this visionary science-fiction tale of space travel and first contact with extraterrestrial life is a spellbinding experience.
  3. Reviewed by: Renata Adler
    60
    The movie is so completely absorbed in its own problems, its use of color and space, its fanatical devotion to science-fiction detail, that its is somewhere between hypnotic and immensely boring.
  4. A crackpot Looney Tune, pretentious, abysmally slow, amateurishly acted and, above all, wrong.

See all 14 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 64 out of 82
  2. Negative: 15 out of 82
  1. MarcW
    10
    Watched it as a young kid, obviously thought it was just about the most tedious thing I'd ever sat through (ok I only got a third of the way through)......watched it again when I was 24, and haven't looked back since. Simply put it's one of those movies you almost feel obliged to pay homage to once a year. You hunker down in your armchair with a cup of tea, sandwiches, crisps a choco bar or two (it is a long film), dim the lights, lock the door and just devour the imagery. Its a wonderful movie, but I completely understand those who claim it's more like watching a screen saver than a movie, but that's what the cup of tea's for. There are moments when you just feel so completely at ease watching what is essentially artwork, others when you're provoked into thought's like no other movie can provide. It's a journey, sorry to be melodramatic, not a movie watching experience. And one everyone should make, it's not dated, despite it being, what? 40+ years old. Expand
  2. Acclaimed director Stanley Kubrick's SF masterpiece "2001: A Space Odyssey" is a conservative movie, asking the audience not to be amazed by the extraordinary visuals but the maturity and growth of a universal subject. The climax of the movie speeds up consistently and precisely with the breath taking cinematography of silence,and in the end....the movie itself becomes the universal subject. Expand
  3. Stanley Kubrick's epic sci-fi tale involving monkeys, space, monoliths & a Russian Leonard Rossiter.
    The first two hours of the film are fine,
    yes it does drag a little here & there, but builds the story up nicely.
    The parts with HAL & Dave & Frank are, for me, just fantastic.
    You get a great sense of claustrophobia with the space suit scenes & the breathing being the only soundtrack. There's also something very sinister about HAL singing Daisy Daisy, with his voice getting lower & lower.
    Then the last half hour. I watched it again just to make sure I hadn't missed anything. Looking at some of the other reviews, it seems I'm not alone in missing the point of it. Total nonsense.
    Anyway, aside from that, it is still a good film which has stood the test of time 40 years on. Great visuals, brilliant soundtrack & very influential in the way sci-fi films were made afterwards.
    Expand
  4. This movie is very slow, and two hours of ships docking, apes and about 4 minutes of the monoliths that the movie is about. If I hadn't read the book first, I wouldn't know what the hell was happening. Read the book, not the movie. Expand

See all 82 User Reviews