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The Walter Carlos credit is definitely still there on ACO.

Person wrote:The 2001 doc is hosted by James Cameron and is a bit silly in places. Camille Paglia is interviewed and yes, you guessed it - she talks about sexual symbolism and uses the word 'penis'. Fuck off, woman!

There's an edited version of this doc on YouTube. She's on it and does mention the dreaded phallus. For someone who appears to have no interest in them, she sure does talk about them a lot.

flyonthewall2983 wrote:

Person wrote:The 2001 doc is hosted by James Cameron and is a bit silly in places. Camille Paglia is interviewed and yes, you guessed it - she talks about sexual symbolism and uses the word 'penis'. Fuck off, woman!

There's an edited version of this doc on YouTube. She's on it and does mention the dreaded phallus. For someone who appears to have no interest in them, she sure does talk about them a lot.

Isn't that known as penis envy?

Coming from her, it sounds more like fascination than envy.

Paglia did a commentary for one of the Basic Instinct DVDs. I must get a hold of that (and some cocaine) and hear her out on that modern masterpiece. WHY would a producer of a documentary on Stanley Kubrick's, 2001 think that Camille Paglia's input would be appropriate or worthwhile? She was influenced by Nietzsche, but so what? It's a weird documentary, full of babbling. Arthur is astute and enjoyable, though. I just want to see that 1968 behind-the-scenes piece again. There was also footage of the premiere to 2001 and 52 seconds of it is on You Tube, where a jovial Kubrick talks about intelligent life in the universe.

Person wrote:Paglia did a commentary for one of the Basic Instinct DVDs. I must get a hold of that (and some cocaine) and hear her out on that modern masterpiece. WHY would a producer of a documentary on Stanley Kubrick's, 2001 think that Camille Paglia's input would be appropriate or worthwhile?

Off topic briefly to say that I thought Camille's commentary on the BASIC INSTINCT Special Edition was very good. No dead air and a scene by scene analysis - remember, she is not a feminist, she is a feminist critic, and I found her quite interesting and provocative, which is more than I can say for the movie itself.

She's on it and does mention the dreaded phallus. For someone who appears to have no interest in them, she sure does talk about them a lot.

Might be worth pointing out here that Paglia is an anti-feminist (or at least a post-feminist or something) and thinks phalluses are awesome. That's why she talks about them so much.

Mr Buttle wrote:Might be worth pointing out here that Paglia is an anti-feminist (or at least a post-feminist or something) and thinks phalluses are awesome.

Only in the abstract....

I couldn't care less if she is an anti-fem, a crypto-fem or what she thinks of male genitalia. The fact that her manic, Skeletor face showed up in a doc about 2001 makes me go, "eghyrrrhmmm!". Bad enough having the KING OF THE WORLD!!! hosting the dang thing.

Person wrote:I couldn't care less if she is an anti-fem, a crypto-fem or what she thinks of male genitalia. The fact that her manic, Skeletor face showed up in a doc about 2001 makes me go, "eghyrrrhmmm!". Bad enough having the KING OF THE WORLD!!! hosting the dang thing.

You're right...this doc DOES sound like a car wreck. But those are Stanley's wishes from beyond the grave, I'm sure Harlan would say.

It's bad enough that we can't get more women to post on this forum, so I guess it falls to me to defend poor, helpless, Camille Paglia.

On the one hand, I admit to some trepedation at the very thought of Camille's analysis of real or alleged sexual symbolism in 2001; but this woman knows her stuff and has several well researched books to prove it.

And, let's face it, Kubrick never did that much with his women characters (more on that in a moment), and if an intelligent and intellectually qualified woman (particularly one who is no friend to the woman's movement), has something to say on the subject; I'd like to hear it.

You could make a case that LOLITA and EYES WIDE SHUT have women in central roles, but both may raise more questions than they answer regarding Kubrick's view of women. When LOLITA was first published, the great critic Lionel Trilling said the theme of the book was "rapture", and V.S. Pritchett noted that the humor used throughout the book was "the laughter of self hatred". This is not necessarily to say that Kubrick made this interpretation in the movie version, but his camera loved Sue Lyon and the extended scenes of barely dressed Nicole Kidman in EYES WIDE SHUT caused one lesser critic to conclude that THAT was the reason he made it.

All of this may be bogus, or it may be worth endless discussion.
But I'd like to hear more and I'd be curious to hear it from a woman.

Belmondo wrote:All of this may be bogus, or it may be worth endless discussion.
But I'd like to hear more and I'd be curious to hear it from a woman.

The entire heist in The Killing was fucked up because of a woman, though that was (is?) the norm in "noir" thrillers. Perhaps not a central role, but important.

And I feel like I'm nitpicking now.

I feel that there's a time and a place for pop-intellectuals like Camille Paglia. She fits "Basic Instinct" like a glove because that film is populist trash masquerading as art (or is it the other way around? I can never remember...). And I love her book on "The Birds" for the same reason.

But "2001"? I would love to hear a woman's view on Kubrick, but I'd like to hear a real thinker who is less keen to be OUTRAGEOUS!! and SHOCKING!! and ICONOCLASTIC!! all the time. It just doesn't fit the film's style.

BTW, my wife is a feminist and loved "Eyes Wide Shut". She fell asleep in "2001" though...

I was researching the Kuleshov effect and found an interesting article about the use of it with HAL in 2001, and thought I'd share it here...

Belmondo wrote:On the one hand, I admit to some trepedation at the very thought of Camille's analysis of real or alleged sexual symbolism in 2001...

Isn't it enough that the spaceship Dave inhabits is long and erect, that it stores inside its hull smaller versions of itself (called pods), that Dave's departure in one of these pods results in an orgasmic climax that has a few fairly sperm-like images, and the end result is a baby? Or does that offend the Sontag-ites whose attitude towards interpretation seems to be "Don't Ask, Don't Tell?" I don't know what Paglia has to say about it, could be worthless, but I've always seen some sexual imagery in 2001, as well as a million other things, seeing as how the film is so dense.

Belmondo wrote:And, let's face it, Kubrick never did that much with his women characters...

I think Full Metal Jacket is an amazingly obvious counterpoint to your statement. The three women in the film are vital to its purpose: the first two are sex objects, and the third is acting as a male, and therefore must be destroyed. The movie makes a big deal about the interplay between dualities like feminine and masculine, plus let's not forget "the duality of man, the Jungian thing" and the two-half structure of the film.

"Never did that much" implies that Kubrick didn't intend women to mean that much in his films, or didn't let his actresses act. To answer both halves of that idea I give you Shelley Winters and Shelley Duvall as victims in their respective Kubrick films, Nicole Kidman as a monogamous yet aggressive sex object in Eyes Wide Shut, Vinessa Shaw's HIV-infected prostitute in EWS, and Christiane Kubrick herself in Paths of Glory. Marisa Berenson and the rape victims of A Clockwork Orange may be harder to defend, but surely Kubrick did more than "[not] that much" with women in his movies.

Belmondo wrote:You could make a case that LOLITA and EYES WIDE SHUT have women in central roles, but both may raise more questions than they answer regarding Kubrick's view of women.

What does Kubrick's view of women have to do with anything? Why do we care to pick the brain of a dead man? Perhaps it's simple semantics, but it seems to me the placement and status of women in a film is ten times more important than the director's view, and then it only matters if those films have feminine issues actually in them and not read into them. In this case, FMJ, Lolita, and EWS all have serious questions about the relationship between men and women, or femininity and masculinity, and that alone says more about "Kubrick's view" than the fact that some of his movies have female nudity, rape, and pedophilia.

Svevan wrote:

Belmondo wrote:On the one hand, I admit to some trepedation at the very thought of Camille's analysis of real or alleged sexual symbolism in 2001...

Isn't it enough that the spaceship Dave inhabits is long and erect, that it stores inside its hull smaller versions of itself (called pods), that Dave's departure in one of these pods results in an orgasmic climax that has a few fairly sperm-like images, and the end result is a baby? Or does that offend the Sontag-ites whose attitude towards interpretation seems to be "Don't Ask, Don't Tell?" I don't know what Paglia has to say about it, could be worthless, but I've always seen some sexual imagery in 2001, as well as a million other things, seeing as how the film is so dense.

I think Camille, from what little I've seen of the doc, talks more in terms of the sexual undertones of the "Dawn of Man" sequence. But you bring up a great point about the end of the film being a rather epic (not to mention trippy) metaphor for sex.

Not to mention the many docking sequences!

Wait a minute. Somebody help me out here. The only way I can watch this new set is with and HD-DVD player? Is that what I hear? They're not going to release the box in any other format?

oldsheperd wrote:Wait a minute. Somebody help me out here. The only way I can watch this new set is with and HD-DVD player? Is that what I hear? They're not going to release the box in any other format?

No, it's being released in all formats I believe.

I hope so. Amazon only lists the HD-DVD set. Same for the 5 disc Balde Runner set. The only one listed without the briefcase is the HDDVD. I want the Dvds, I can live without the case.

Both releases are going to be available on DVD and both high-def formats, no need to get upset.

I wonder, getting back to the sexual undertones of 2001, if it was purely Stanley's doing. Whether or not Clarke was in on it, is rather uncertain to me anyway. It actually wouldn't surprise me if he was in on it. One of the main characters in the novel of 2010 is described as bisexual, and actually carries on an affair with one of the members of the Russian crew.

Okay.... who starred in Lolita?

Pre-order for Barry Lyndon with the same release date as Lolita (23 October)