In the book, there are a few pages dedicated to explaining the aliens. They were once flesh and blood like us, but had passed into machines, then pure energy long ago. So by the time of Bowman's encounter there is nothing of them to see.

This was the second movie I saw in my life. I persuaded my Aunt to bring me to it when it was first released. It blew my tiny little young mind and still lingers with me after all these years. While its special effects were truly ground breaking in an era before CGI, its genius was leaving space for the viewer's imagination. And for this reason, it has aged incredibly well compared with other SF movies from its time.

No aliens were necessary for his masterpiece.

Excellent. Thank you for this. I experienced 2001 in Cinerama back in 1968 as a 13 year old kid. 2001 greatly impacted my psyche and inspired me to become a spacecraft systems engineer. Not showing any aliens was brilliant.Yet you could hear them "speak" in the room at the end which was creepy imo.

A Space Odyssey is so incredibly good that even now, after decades, it still is fantastic. The whole story, the characters, the sheer suspense, the way it makes you use your imagination, it's a true masterpiece and it's successor, 2010 The Year we make Contact, is not far behind.

As extravagant as 2001 is, it's also got a minimalism quality to it as well. A very hard balance to strike, even today.

This is very interesting. I'm not sure if it was Kubrick or Clarke that mentioned this, but my understanding of the movie accelerated greatly when someone said: "It's not that the universe is stranger that we imagine. It's that the universe is stranger than we _can_ imagine." Once you realize this film is attempting to depict the unimaginable - it actually makes a lot more sense. Given that objective, having physical alien creatures would have spoiled the intended theme. The unimaginable cannot be men in rubber monster suits filmed in some bizarre light - because we can easily imagine that.

2001 is still the greatest sci fi film ever created and the authentic look still stands above any modern CG film making today.

I like the crystal aliens floating along in the journey thru the star tunnel. Added to a later version.

Years later Carl Sagan come up with the aliens of his own novel "Contact": They scan your mind and appear in front of you in the shape of someone you love.

I read a book on Kubrick as a kid and recall that someone involved with the making of the film explained why attempting to show the aliens failed by comparing it to a production of Harvey they'd seen that partway through had a person in a rabbit costume walk across the stage, which ruined the mystique of the titular character. Some stuff is better left up to the audience's imagination.

The polka dot man concept was kinda recycled in the 1970s TV show The Land of the Lost with an alien character called "The Zarn". However, instead of dots, it was motes of light in a human form and the character was see-through/transparent inbetween the lights as if the character lacked any substance other than the lights. It was probably early green-screen with person in green-man suit with little mirror all over, bathed in bright lights so only the mirrors would show up when the rest of the body was edited out.

Kubrick never consulted with Carl Sagan about anything. What happened was that Clarke took Sagan to Kubrick's apartment for an informal dinner, to meet the director. They were still in the early stages of writing the script, and Clarke thought that Sagan could contribute with some ideas. The problem is that Kubrick took an instant dislike of Sagan and told Clarke to get rid of him and never bring him back again. While Sagan did predict that It would be impossible to convincingly portray an alien, Kubrick ignored him and went on to attempt It anyway, only giving up at the very end. When the film came out and seeing there was no alien, the egocentric Sagan assumed they had followed his advice and tried to take undeserved credit for it. Check out Michael Benson's excelent book on the production of 2001 for the whole story.

1:30- “The Sentinel” was one of at least six short stories that serves as source material for the film. Just as seminal an entry was Clarke’s 1953 story “Encounter at Dawn”, serving as the basis for essentially the entire “Dawn of Man” sequence.

A version of the "figure made of lights" idea eventually showed up as the Zarn in "Land of the Lost", a kid's TV show with big science-fiction ambitions and a tiny budget. In the context of the show, he actually looked freaky and cool, but he probably wouldn't have worked in "2001".

You forgot to mention the diamond shape Alien artifacts seen hovering above the Stargate landscapes, suggesting an advanced intelligence.

There were no aliens described in the book, but in the Dawn of Man sequence Moon Watcher can hear the Monolith being built, but he is too scared to go out and see what is going on.

Excellent concise video however if you want to explore the unused options in greater detail try and find a copy of "The lost worlds of 2001" by Arthur C Clarke, he recounts the seemingly endless attempts create believable aliens and indeed how to end the film

One possibility (one I embraced when I first saw the film as a child) is that the alien race behind the monolith is long extinct.

Alien or other dimensional, the polka dot guy concept isn't too far off with the ones who are like a watery looking translucence. If one is right near you it's hard to not see because as they move along, their bodies 'ripple' in almost transparent waves. Their bodies blend in with whatever is behind them and the rippled wavy movement stands out while at the same time, making the outline of their body stand out.

Very good - and concise without being abrupt.

Reading about 2001 in 2023. I never thought the day would come...

Great work, I never get tired of hearing about the making of 2001, and learned something here.

The audience's imagination is usually the most powerful and varied source of ideas, as evidenced by the plethora of fan theories and documentaries about "what Kubrick really meant" in this movie and "The Shining", and "Eyes Wide Shut".

That was an interesting and well put together video. Yhanks for taking the time to make and upload it!

The props, art design and practical special effects were a big jump forward at that time. Considering the limitation of movie technology in the 60s.

Near the end of the film when the astronaut David Bowman inside that strange Room you can hear whispering sound that is the Aliens but the human can only hear it but it incomprehensible to us like animals in a zoo 2001 A space Odyssey doesn't show the Alien specie but only there technology

This movie literally changed me at age 12. At 66 I am just beginning to get answers to the questions this filmmaker raised. Thanks for reviewing this aspect. Nicely done.

I believe the "catch" behind Kubricks' movie and the monolith are 4th dimension aliens. See the monolith is the 3d representation that can be seen and touch by 3d beings. So the monolith itself in this sense would be the alien (not its representation). I took that way at least.

My father took me with him to see this movie when I was very young. Less than five, it is one of those movies I r=have memories of seeing in fragments. I couldn't begin to tell you how many times I've seen it since. I read the book once when I was in middle school and what I remember was Dave flying through space in his capsule and seeing evidence of the Aliens that had evolved or died off millennia before. The one example that stuck in my mind was a giant city/spaceport in the middle of space, long abandoned.

Just watched 2010 again a couple of days ago. An amazing sequel to an astonishing movie.

Kubrick was genius, his mind created perfect scenarios, and he compelled actors in his films, to complete his visions perfectly. Was interesting that most of the A-list actors, who performed in his films, swore to never work with him again. Nicholson claimed he was crazier than Jack was, and could be terrifying. Kubrick was a very interesting person, who was usually the smartest man in the room, even if people like Clarke and Sagan were in there with him.

Fascinating! This video deserves a lot more views

It would have been neat to include near-subliminal glimpses of something that might have been alien life, or might have been some other kind of phenomenon. Leaving some tantalizing mystery. I liked the analog video experiments. Just a flash of one of those, and the viewer is left wondering if we've just seen an alien, or a ship, or something else entirely.

The film that changed cinema. It stands on its on even today.

There were some aliens in movies and tv looking outerworldly. Like in Star Trek sometimes they showed us lights floating in the air. The Blob was a slimepuddle. And in the german scifi series "Raumpatrouille" from the sixties they showed sillhouettes filled with lightning effects.

There was a book written about how the film developed thru time. I don't know why it wasn't mentioned in the video but it is called The Lost Worlds of 2001. It has Clarke writing Bout the different screen plays that he and Kubrick toyed with. Very good read.

Kubrick's "NASA Moonwalk" prequel was hilarious though.

Read the book, the Star Child is Bowman being reborn. Reborn as an evolved being, made up of energy. Throw away all the nonsense that was said by Clark and Kubrick, you need the book and the movie to understand 2001. And then if you read all 4 books it becomes very easy to understand.

Ultimately, it is a human story. It's about us. Not the aliens.

I'm thinking many did not read the book or later books as I don't remember there being any description of the races or race involved with Bowmen and his journey at all. I do remember something that was explained that many species take the same journey as at one point he passes through some massive ship graveyard and that the beings in question are beyond the natural. They evolved past the body to machines/robots and then past that of sorts. The monoliths are the aliens or one alien in a version of them.

The movie still stands the test of time. It looks incredible, especially when you see it in a movie theater.

The recent film "Bird Box" comes to mind. The aliens were supposed to be so scary, it would drive you mad if you saw them. After a number of tests, the filmmakers realized it was better not to show anything, rather than depict something that fell short of expectations. (I have not actually seen the film, but heard this.)

It's still a problem and CGI hasn't helped much IMO. I think the scene in 'The Man Who Fell To Earth' where David Bowie reveals himself as alien is good as even though he is 'almost human' the sheer 'alien-ness' of the character is enough to send the lady over the edge...

2001 IS the alien experience. Not just visual effects, but the production design was so detailed that it transported us. Even the door to Hall's brain was on another level. By the way, when you see all the shots of the space station it becomes apparent there is no space for the Aries 1b, the round ship that lands on the moon, to depart from.

The beauty of cinema and the true genius of Kubrick. To create something that doesn’t have to be defined. After all these years of watching and studying all of his films. I still come away with a different take on The Shining and 2001. Although I see a lot of similarities and understand where other fans derive their theories from. I just see them a little differently. The true definition of a masterpiece.

Stanley Kubrick had attempted to use rubber space alien toys. These toys were molded rubber set on a wire armature, and there was one for each of the planets at one time. He was going to film them then distort the images, pulling them out of shape. In the end, he abandoned it. I know of these toys, because both my brother and I owned one. His was from Neptune, I believe, and was sold as "Colossus Rex". Can't remember where mine was from, but they were pretty cool! 🙂🙂

I was ten years old when I saw the film at the Cinerama movie theater Theran iran Atlantic Movie theater Pahlavi St. I was completely out of my body and couldn't believe what I was seeing!

Quality always stands the test of time...

There's a moment during the stargate sequence where a group of pulsing crystalline structures appear over the horizon (IIRC). I always thought that those were meant to represent the alien observers.

I still cannot believe this film was made in 1965. Its production values are off the scale even by todays standards . In fact because it was FILMED it has a quality all of its own that cannot be done with CGI. Also the design of interiors ,spacecraft ect, are utterly superb

Should do one on Kubricks attempt at Neanderthal prosthetic makeup before switching to apes - or the expensive making of a clear Lucite monolith that Kubrick rejected because it wasn’t invisible enough.

During the final sequence of the film you can actually hear the aliens outside Dave's "apartment" at several points.

Kubrick didn't depict the aliens in 2001: A Space Odyssey visually, but he made up for it by depicting them through György Ligeti's terrifying music. It sounds like the wailing of disembodied souls. It's completely otherworldly. You hear that, and you know the characters are dealing with something that could bend the human mind to the breaking point.

Subbed & Liked! Enjoyed the video! Good work!

The first time I heard they had actually intended to put aliens in the movie was, gosh, a decade after I’d first seen it, and my first reaction was, “where would you even put them?” There was just no need. It would have diminished the sense of wonder and fear. It would have made the film mundane. It’s much better with them inscrutable and offscreen. I take a little exception to the idea that SF prior to 2001 was all bug eyed monsters and whatnot. I mean you’ve got Forbidden Planet and The Day Th Earth Stood Still. I’d put Forbidden Planet in the same category as 2001 and Blade Runner as the three only American SF films that really matter.

2001 A Space Odyssey is the greatest film ever made and it is an indication of Kubrick’s genius that he realised that no alien was necessary.

In the Lost Worlds of 2001 by Clarke (hard to find now) he described the aliens as Nordic like. Tall, blond hair, large rap around eyes, and 5 fingers and a thumb on each hand.

I have this idea for an alien species with helical symmetry that has a top instead of legs, twigs instead of arms, and eyes instead of leaves. If Kubrick ever came across such a concept, I'm pretty sure he would've used it.

“Unused Aliens”. That would be a cool band name. 🎸

2001 is the most horrific adventure you can imagine. Being empty, alone, untold miles from earth facing the total unknown being in the presence of an unseen alien race. To actually SHOW that race would totally undercut the film. The BEST thing Kubrick did was NOT show that race and leave it to our imagination!

At 0:52, you can see a human face inside the robot's helmet.

Even "Alien" had humanlike characteristics and what might be impossible is the concept of an alien that is not a projection of ourselves.

There is a theory that when the screen goes to black for long intervals, the audience in the theatres,were actually, unknowingly, staring at the monolith.

The greatest sci-fi film ever made! Kubrick deserves a special place in Heaven for this one!

It looks like kubrick was getting to know or learn things which culminated in Eyes wide shut kabal rituals shown in the movie which cost him his life.

'Polka dot man" was used in Land of the Lost, as the Zarn character. Except they bumped it up to chromakey.

I recommend reading The Lost Worlds of 2001. When I ordered the book I erroneously believed that it was going to be behind-the-scenes journal by Arthur C. Clarke and the evolution of the film. It has a bit of that but mostly it is discarded chapters that Clarke submitted to Kubrick and were rejected. Thankfully Kubrick saw how bad these ideas were and gave them a pass. One would have seen Bowman during his journey though the Star Gate and passing over an alien village. A young alien on the ground spots the craft costing above him and aims his toy ray gun to shoot it down. I don't recall if there was much detail into the appearance of the alien child but this just embarrassing to read. I've read the entire Odyssey series and found them dreadful , with the last, 3001, being among the worst books I have ever read. It involves finding Poole floating in space in a state of suspended animation and revived a thousand years since his attack by HAL. But I digress. Thankfully Kubrick was wise enough to leave the aliens unseen. It might disappoint some but I think it gives them an omnipotent and "godlike" presence. I always assumed that the monoliths were the aliens and they had advanced to such a state were there was no distinguishing between them and their technology, having a mastery of time and space that humans can not comprehend. I don't care for the ending of the novel which has the Star Child detonating the weaponry orbiting the Earth. In the film his destiny is more ambiguous and left open to us what happens next. Surely not the silly events of the sequel.

Well, it is interesting to look inside a merger sponge a 3D pathagerus rug cut it diametrically in half and come to find it is full of stars, 6-pointed stars and wonder if they thought of that in the movie or not.

What I don’t understand when they made the film Independence Day the Alien didn’t look like they had a physical appearance to built a spaceship 🚀 unless they had human like aliens engineers on their home planet

ah how much things have changed, you got so much evidence and tapes of ufos today

It shits me that 2001 was 22 years ago lol

0:51 You wonder whether he ever heard of _The Day The Earth Stood Still_ ...

“You cannot imagine the unimaginable” was one of the rare instances of Stanley Kubrick being creatively closed minded

Kubrick absolutely made the best decision - to show the aliens would have been a huge letdown. Allow each member of the audience the freedom to fill in that detail to the best of their ability with their own imagination, and the mystery and wonder will persist for as long as people watch this movie. This is just one of many details that make _2001: A Space Odyssey_ arguably the greatest movie ever made, and not just the greatest sci-fi movie.

I get that in 2001 the monolith alone implies a completely unknown alien intelligence, and that's fine. It works just great in that film. Now, some will want to show alien lifeforms anyway, especially ones that have not been designed in human special effects departments. One would be hard-pressed indeed to find alien creatures more alien than those found at the bottom of the sea. They weren't designed within the limited imaginations of men. Their origin is far beyond that.

It's funny but the same year 2001 came out another sci fi film was made starring Darren McGavin and Nick Adams called Mission Mars. It uses obscure looking aliens as well. One film is considered a masterpiece and the other trash. I enjoyed both.

The best part of the film was those meteoroids coming so close to scuttling the whole lash-up!

I've watched 2001 many times over the years. To this day, I wouldn't say I like the first and last portions of the film. After being warned not to go to Europa, a better ending would show him disregarding that warning, going to that moon, and sending a message to Earth, "You won't believe this, but I saw..." The transmission cuts off.

Excellent job ❤😂

2:15 Of course you had to illustrate "Actors in Rubber Suits" with a clip executed using Ray Harryhausen's stop-motion animation from _First Men in the Moon._

Why was the black pyramid replaced by a black monolith ?

To the poor, starving artist who endured hours of makeup, completely covered in absurd polka dots, we salute you. I hope to god the fifty-bucks they paid you was worth it.

Great video...👍

Interesting, thanks. Also, you spelled "actually" incorrectly in the title graphics

Kubrick didn't want to use the 'invisible aliens' and 'aliens look almost like us' that everyone else used. That would imply that he was limited in the same way as all other directors. That sculpture of the alien with the awkward multiple arms faces the problem all such creatures have; how are such shapes even born, how can something so awkward become lords of space and time? I mean, humans are flexible, but still very limited (especially when their space helmets don't let them look up, as in 2001). The attempt to make Arthur C Clarke's idea of the aliens being 'frozen lattices of light' came closest with the 'paper sculpture people' mentioned here as being generated like shapes on an oscilloscope (something actually done in Nigel Kneale's The Stone Tape', worth looking up, as they also cross space and time, being visible in the opening titles as well as at the denoument). I personally, would have gone with them, but I'm not a director.

It's a far better film for NOT depicting any aliens. The tension and mystery are not resolved and linger long in the mind.

It's interesting that by the time '2010' came around, the technology to show convincing aliens on screen existed... yet the filmmakers opted not to show any. Any word on whether a film version of the third novel is pending?

Exactly right. 2001 will always be great to me partially because I never understood WTF was going on . . and my imagination had to do the work of aliens or whatever. So, he made the right move IMO. And, the sequel was far less alluring: it tried to explain things.

It might be slightly unfair to use a still from " When Worlds Collide" when describing Shlocky Monster driven Sci Fi Tropes as WWC was relatively High brow in comparison. There is a monster but it's Capatalism and Human Nature.

Dismissing the monster from It Came from Outer Space as a "Bug Eyed Monster' is short sighted. The monster was quite innovative for the time.

What are “munsters”?

This film didn't need aliens in the first place.

With great films, the process of making the film becomes as integral to the final story as the scripted plot (e.g. "Apocalypse Now"). In this case, Kubrick and his esteemed experts were unable to put on film an alien entity beyond human comprehension. They themselves could not come to a conclusion as to what it was. Enigmatic. Inscrutable.

Douglas Trumbull had offered to render the aliens as a slit scan effect, but production was too far along. Later, he'd get his chance on Star Trek: The Motion Picture when V-Ger sends a probe to the bridge. Chekov even asks if it's one of the ship's crew.

No Aliens means more intelligent audience needed which he achieved . Without Clarke concept would never occurred , Kubrick gave it life so two genius's created a piece of art not just a movie. Best movie and always will be.............

Good analysis. Great film, I actually saw in "Cinerama" format when it came out in 1968. And the sound, of course, who could forget that iconic opening!! The best sci fi films seem to show little of the "aliens", and in this case none of them, only their vast age and abilities. And, like the Krell, only their long-ago abandoned super technology, in "Forbidden Planet", which is arguably one of the best sci fi films of all time. Or they show only a few glimpses of them like in "Alien", and not pouncing around all over the place terrifying and eating poor humans or smashing their big cities, like in "Godzilla", for example. Or they take on human form like in "It Came From Outer Space", but are really big cyclops-ish shaggy beasts, in that one shot of them revealing their true form. Lots of good examples, but mostly from movies made long ago. Bad ones too of course, as you showed in the clips. You can go too far with this trop though, like in the inexplicable movie recently "the Arrival". Anyway, good stuff in all the movies. One more thing about 2001, the final approach to what appears to be their planet is it seems that Dave is being escorted down with a couple of diamond like ships and then we seem to hear them talking, "discordantly", while he is in his room, aging away. Anyway, only my imaginings, I guess. The fact they buried the moon monolith 4 million years ago and we see the monolith when we were at the earliest stages of our ape-ish development is genius too, as is the bone, as a weapon, flung high into sky; and it turns into a space craft in orbit, millions of years later. "2010" is good too, and still does not show the aliens, but again, their unimaginable technology and "magic"! Forcrissakes, why oh why oh why do they not make movies like that anymore. Geeeeeeeeeeezuuuuz!!! ;D

I wish filmmakers today would learn from the past greats. Jaws is the best, and literally only good, shark movie because the shark isn't on screen much. 2001 is the greatest sci-fi alien movie because the aliens never appear on screen. Books are great because of what we don't see, and I think CGI has pushed filmmakers to try and defy that recently, but it's impossible to beat the human imagination.

Actually, Clarke's book has no defined aliens in it, just their tech shows up, they're mentioned but not defined... the book is perfect as it is, it was Kubrick trying to invent some aliens all along and then giving up I guess.

at 4:25 .... I wonder how they filmed this shot, with no camera reflected in the visor. I'm a vfx artist, and today we would digitally clean it up, or put the visor in afterward