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This would have been great if Kubrick had made it as he intended

posted 9 years ago by HeathJMac
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I kept thinking whilst watching this how it would have looked if Kubrick had made it. I don't remember the hotel room from the book, but it's 20 years since I've read it, it's clearly an idea they nicked from 2001?

I thought the use of The Lark Ascending was lovely, but so much could have been better. Kubrick would have been more perfectionist about the devil like appearance of the Overlords. They were too awkward looking, and the Hollywood teeth on Charles Dance were stupid.

A two hour film with less of the ex wife subplot could have been really great.

[–] jbaddock 9 years ago

it's clearly an idea they nicked from 2001?

Undoubtedly - but it's worth remembering that Clarke wrote Childhood's End over a decade before 2001 and, along with the short story The Sentinel, CE was a starting point for the film itself, so maybe it's not surprising that they included echoes of the film here. As regards Kubrick doing a better job on the aliens' appearance, he made a deliberate decision not to show the aliens who had left the monolith in 2001, preferring to leave it to the viewers' imaginations. Also, bear in mind that he could have made a film of Childhood's End, but chose to adapt its basic idea and made 2001 instead (possibly because he didn't like the devils?)

[–] HeathJMac 9 years ago

Oh yeah, not instead of 2001. I was being greedy, thinking how he could have made a great follow up film if he'd made both.

But then again Kubrick didn't really ever do two films that were alike, so it wouldn't have happened!