[elevator whirring]
[elevator dings]
["The Blue Danube" from "2001: A Space Odyssey" plays]
[♪♪♪]
[film camera rolling]
["Waltz No. 2" from "Eyes Wide Shut" plays]
[♪♪♪]
News just in, we've just heard
that the film director Stanley Kubrick
has died at the age of 70.
Kubrick, who was an American,
began his career in Hollywood, where he directedSpartacus,
but he decided to move to Britain,
where he directed Lolita, Clockwork Orange,
2001: A Space Odyssey andThe Shining.
Stanley Kubrick was widely regarded
as one of the greatest and most controversial masters of cinema.
He'd just finished what was to be his last film,
Eyes Wide Shut, which took five years to make.
Stanley Kubrick has been called the Howard Hughes of cinema
because he was such a recluse.
I prefer to think him as the Frank Sinatra of cinema
because he always did everything his way.
You can go back to any Kubrick film
and feel rebirth.
Kubrick is at the very least a genuine innovator
who pushes out the boundaries of what it's possible on film,
and there have never been many of those about.
He is also an elusive man
who rarely permits himself to be observed at work.
He was not any of the things
that the newspapers wrote about him.
And...
he himself said, "It's very difficult.
How do I defend myself?
Do I write an article, you know, 'Dear public, I'm charming'?"
Um, that's more difficult than it sounds actually.
'Cause, you know, he never ever does a television show
or very rarely does any press interviews.
[♪♪♪]
MICHEL: Well perhaps the first question would be about
this problem of interview
because, it seems that more and more you feel reluctant
to speak about your films ?
STANLEY: Well, I've never found it meaningful
or even... possible
to talk about film aesthetics in terms of my own films.
I also don't particularly enjoy [chuckles] the interviews
because one always feels under the obligation
to say some witty, brilliant summary
of the intentions of the film.
And...
withDr. Strangelove you could talk about
the problems of nuclear war...
2001 you could talk about
extraterrestrial intelligence, but I've never been--
MICHEL: Clockwork Orange about violence.
STANLEY: Yes, or future social structures.
I mean I don't know what led me
to make any of the films, really, that I've made.
And I realize that my own thought processes are...
very hard to define,
in terms of you know, "What story do you want
to make into a film?"
In the end, it does become this very indefinable thing,
like why do you find one particular girl attractive,
or why did you marry your wife.
MICHEL: Yes, and also I suppose it is more difficult
for you to analyze yourself
because the material comes from somebody else.
So, it's more difficult to see the personal reasons
that were behind it
since you didn't write it yourself
but of obviously the choice of the subject
is a very personal thing, because you can choose
between thousands of books but you chose one.
So, it's-- you become the author of the book,
in a way, by choosing it.
STANLEY Well...
if somebody else has written the story,
you have that one great first reading.
You never again, once you read something for the first time,
can ever have that experience.
And the judgment of the narrative
and the sense of excitement
of what parts of the story reach you emotionally,
is something which doesn't exist if you write a story.
MICHEL: We know, I mean everybody knows,
it's notorious that you love to accumulate information
and do research.
Is it a thrill for you,
like being a reporter or a detective?
STANLEY: It is a little bit like a detective
looking for clues.
On Barry Lyndon, I created a picture file
of thousands of drawings and paintings.
I think I destroyed every art book
that you can buy in a bookshop
by tearing the pages out and sorting them out.
But...
the costumes were all copied from paintings.
I mean none of the costumes were quote "designed".
It's stupid to have quote "a designer"
that interpret the 18th Century
as they may remember it from art school
or from a few pictures they get together.
["Sarabande" from "Barry Lyndon" plays]
MICHEL: Would you agree that the more illusion works,
the more realistic it is?
That cinema has to extremely realistic,
you know, to create illusion?
STANLEY: Well, I would always be attracted
to something which offered
interesting visual possibilities,
but that certainly wouldn't be the only reason.
And, since part of the problem of any story
is to make you believe what you are seeing,
certainly getting a realistic atmosphere,
especially if it's not a contemporary period,
is just necessary as a starting point.
MICHEL: It's why you came to this idea
of shooting with light, natural light.
STANLEY: Well, that's something
that I've always been very bothered by
in period films
is the light on interiors is so false.
MARISA: It was very different to any kind of other movies
as far as photography was concerned,
because the lightning was so--
You know, lot of it was shot by candle light,
a lot of it was shot with equipment
that Stanley Kubrick had found,
that had never been used before really, on film.
So, it was quite an experience working with that.
It was also difficult because there were times
when you just couldn't even move a fraction of an inch.
And...
there were days we would just sit there
and just be lit all day. [chuckles]
You know...
Literally.
[indistinct chatter]
Samuel, I'm going outside for a breath of air.
Yes, My Lady, of course.
[indistinct chatter]
STANLEY: To know about lighting and lenses and composition
has to be a help as a movie director.
["Spartacus" theme plays]
[♪♪♪]
STANLEY: I remember, when I was makingSpartacus ,
the cameraman, Russ Metty, used to think it was very funny
that I used to pick set-ups with a view finder,
and he said to me,
"We are shooting in that direction
and it's a knee figure shot
and just, you know, go and rehearse with the actors
and when you come back
we'll have the shot and the set-up and everything"
He couldn't understand
why I wanted to waste time making a composition.
STANLEY: Certainly, photography gave me the first step
where I could actually try to make a movie
because without that
how could you make a movie by yourself
if you didn't know anything about photography?
MICHEL: What kind of photographs were you doing?
I mean there is the famous photograph
of the newspaper vendor and the--
STANLEY: Photojournalism with natural light.
MICHEL: Mostly things of the street, like Cartier Bresson--
STANLEY: Well unfortunately,
becauseLook always did feature stories,
the subject matter always tended to be idiotic.
They would do a story like
"Is an Athlete Stronger Than a Baby?"
And I would have to go and there'd be some guy
that would have to try to get in the same positions
as a baby and things like that.
They were pretty stupid feature stories,
but occasionally I could do a sort of personality story,
or a story about something like a university,
or something like that, where you had a chance
to take some reasonable photographs.
MICHEL: You worked four years atLook ?
STANLEY: Yeah, about four years. I was about 20.
[camera shutter clicks]
NARRATOR: This forest then, and all that happens now
is outside history.
Only the unchanging shapes of fear,
and doubt
and death
are from our world.
These soldiers that you see keep our language and our time,
but have no other country but the mind.
MICHEL: You started by making almost a home movie, when you were 23,
Fear and Desire, about four men in a patrol.
What was behind this project?
STANLEY: That was a very arrogant, flippant script
put together by myself,
and a boy that I knew who was a poet.
Where we thought that we were geniuses,
and it was so incompetently done...
and undramatic...
and so pompous.
But I learnt a lesson from that.
-[gunshots] -[thuds]
STANLEY: At least it had the ambition of having some ideas in it,
and I suppose you could say in that sense
there is some continuity with the rest of my films,
which I've also tried to make sure that...
you know, they weren't just hollow entertainments.
[grunts]
-[grunts] -[objects clattering]
["Sarabande" plays]
[machine gunfire]
["Sarabande" plays over battle]
MICHEL: You get the feeling from your films
that really the world is not only a stage,
but it's a war,
because man is fighting all the time.
["Sarabande" still playing]
STANLEY: Well, in a work of fiction you have to have conflict.
If there isn't a problem in a story,
it can almost by definition not be a story.
[♪♪♪]
STANLEY: You know, how many happy marriages are there?
And how many stepfathers love their stepsons?
And how many stepsons love their stepfather?
And how often...
do people who have ambitions which only involve money
do they find a satisfying accomplishment?
Corporal Barry.
[coins jingle]
You are a gallant soldier
and have evidently come of good stock.
But you're idle, dissolute and unprincipled.
You've done a great deal of harm to the men...
and for all your talents and bravery
I'm sure you will come to no good.
[♪♪♪]
BARRY: Barry Lyndon tells of the rise and fall
of an Irish adventurer and let's face it, cad,
who becomes a soldier, a deserter, a gambler, a duelist
and eventuallythe husband of a very rich widow.
There is I think deliberately a distance
between the audience and characters.
You are asked to watch the story
of their adventures and misadventures,
but not necessarily to identify with them.
Well, that's a dangerous approach,
but it works.
What also works is the leisurely pace
of the film,
the pace that matches the pace of the novel
and I dare say of the 18th-Century life itself.
So, if you're expecting an all-action, swashbuckler,
forget it.
What Kubrick presents instead
is a hard, unromantic and unsentimental look
at the life and times of a good-looking
but ill-fated opportunist.
MICHEL: Some people get out of the movie and say,
"This character, we have absolutely
no sympathy for him."
STANLEY: Well, I don't see how you can have
no sympathy for him.
On the other hand, we're well aware of the weakness
of his character
and the trap that he places himself in
as a result of his ambitions,
and the limitation of his personality
that arises from the cynicism which develops
from his early relationships with people.
He then becomes a very limited person.
He is completely unsuited for the life,
not only socially but temperamentally.
And so he puts himself into a gilded cage.
And from then on, everything goes sour.
[♪♪♪]
MICHEL: But how did you decide on Ryan O'Neal
for the main role?
STANLEY: Well, I couldn't think of anybody else,
to tell you the truth. I mean...
Obviously, Barry Lyndon has to be physically attractive.
He couldn't be played by Al Pacino or Jack Nicholson.
He had to also be able to, in the beginning,
appear to be young
and yet not look too young at the end.
MICHEL: And the actors, how do you direct actors?
Do you speak with them a lot,
or do you let them feel the text or do you have an explanation?
STANLEY: Well, first of all, you discuss the character in general,
and then you discuss the scene,
what the character's real attitude is in the scene.
Then comes this terrible moment:
the first time that you actually rehearse a scene
in the place you are going to shoot it.
It's always a surprise,
it's never what you thought it would be.
The text usually has to be changed
in some way or another.
Then they have to get it to a level
where it's realistic and interesting.
And at that point, it then becomes relatively easy.
MALCOLM: It was an extraordinary experience
doingClockwork Orange.
A very long and arduous film to shoot.
It was seven months shooting.
And I was injured a couple of times on the film.
I had my ribs dented.
I was off for two weeks with that.
I think I had tonsillitis or something, I...
One disaster after another
as far as I wa-- my health was concerned.
I got a couple of scratched corneas
on my eyes.
But having said all that, of course,
I suppose one can say it was worth it.
And if Stanley trusts you,
if he trusts you, you're all right.
If he doesn't, beware.
Very well, now listen to me carefully.
The base is being put on condition red.
I want this flashed to all sections immediately.
I had the worst time I've ever had on a picture,
and...
Nothing to do with Stanley,
and everything to do, I guess, with my own hang-ups.
I worked the first day at Shepperton,
and I had a great deal of technical jargon, you know?
And so I started to work and I began to blow.
You know those clowns outside
are gonna give me a pretty good going over in a few minutes.
Okay, and so he went something like 38 takes.
I don't know how well I could stand up under torture.
And I was getting worse and worse.
So finally, he began to do pickups. Hmm?
A sentence at a time.
And I mean this is painful, this is embarrassing.
Shit, I'm here and I want to do well, mm?
I know I'll have to answer for what I've done.
And finally I walked up and said, "Stanley I'm sorry,
but there is nothing I can do."
He said, "I know that."
He said, "There's nothing I can do."
I said, "I know that."
He said, "But I'll tell you one thing."
He said, "The terror, the terror that's in your eyes
may just give us the quality that we want."
JACK: He is a perfectionist.
But I mean, on a more approvable level.
I mean, you know, it's different in a movie situation
if you say, "How was it?" to the operator.
Stanley has the teleprompter now, so he knows.
And the amount of reason that he has
why a take is not acceptable...
Quintessentially perfectionist.
GARRETT: We had discussions about the elusive quality
of perfection because down by take 75,
a host of other things start going wrong.
The tape finally gives out
that held something onto the wall,
and entropy takes over,
we're all growing older, you know?
So, the search is extraordinary, he never gives up.
[battle drums beating]
LEONARD: It was during a scene of a great many army people,
or Irish army whatever it was,
but we utilized a lot of material
that was absolutely authentic.
Authentic flutes from museums,
authentic drums, and so on and so forth.
And it was very easy.
I've after all recorded some very avant-garde music
that's very difficult and this was a cinch.
We did a 105 takes on this thing and take two was perfect.
And the orchestra looked at me and I looked at them
as though, "We're dealing with an insane person."
And 105 takes,
and finally, I threw down the baton,
ran into the thing, and grabbed him by the neck.
I wanted to throw him through the window
when everyone started laughing...
kind of nervously.
And he said, "You're crazy."
And I said, "Well, you've driven everybody crazy,
that's... that's the problem."
[battle drums beat]
STANLEY: Directing a movie, if you try to do it properly,
is not always fun,
because you are in conflict with people.
If you try to get it right and you care about it,
it isn't something which is the greatest fun in the world.
It's immensely satisfying sometimes,
but it is a lot of hard work
and there is a lot of personal tension
that occurs with everybody.
The analogy would better in a sort of military sense
in that Napoleon,
if he didn't pay as much attention
to the precise details of his marching,
how he brought his troops to the right town
on the right day,
he worked out all the calculations
where they would come from different places,
and did all the mathematics himself,
and got them there at the right time.
He would never have an opportunity
to be a genius on the battlefield.
[military pipes and drums play]
[♪♪♪]
STANLEY: Battles are like the equivalent of making a film.
DANN: The key to his success as a filmmaker is that
he was the ruthless general everyone wanted to march with.
He got everyone on his side and no matter what happened
he expected his cast and crew to keep up with his standard.
In a way, he kind of represented something to all of us
because he was over there on his estate in England,
he was far from Hollywood,
he owned his own cameras, his own editing equipment,
his own sound
and he worked entirely according to his own schedule.
It's kind of inspiring at a time when everybody else seems to be
marching to the drums of commerce and promotion.
["Sarabande" plays]
[♪♪♪]
You know what kind of a camera that is?
- What it's called? - It's...
-A home movie -Arriflex.
Napoleon is still in his grave, waiting...
waiting to be brought back to life.
I wonder what Napoleon would think
of Lew Wasserman and David Picker.
Whether he would have liked to have them passing judgment
on his life.
[film camera rolling]
[♪♪♪]
MICHEL: You worked in a disaffected plant?
STANLEY: Well, the first thing I noticed
was that the architecture in the peripheral areas
where the fighting seemed to be,
was this sort of 1930s industrial functionalism.
And by the sheerest accident we found this area
that is about a square mile,
and it was designed by a German architect
in the 30s,
and it looked exactly like photographs
we'd seen in the Hue and Saigon borders,
you know, the outskirts of the city.
And it just seemed like a miracle,
because I don't know where-- looking back, I don't know
how we could have done those scenes
with a tiny fraction of the reality and interest
that we got from this location.
[rubble crumbling underfoot]
STANLEY: In Hue, we could never have achieved
this vision of hell that actually Hue looked like.
[metal clattering]
[tape whirring]
[ghostly music over TV sounds]
[♪♪♪]
STANLEY: And I had done tremendous research,
I had thousands of stills
and as much documentary footage as we could get from archives.
There was so much wonderful documentary material on Vietnam,
you know, that had not been shot in any other war.
Including scenes of men dying.
So, looking at 100 hours of documentary film,
actually probably tells you more than if you were there
and didn't actually have combat.
[ghostly music plays]
MICHEL: The title,Full Metal Jacket , how did it come?
STANLEY: Full metal jacket is a type of bullet design,
which-- where the led of the bullet
is in encased in copper.
It's done to increase
the reliability of the bullet feeding up the ramp
into the chamber from the magazine,
because it's smoother.
And also, I think
the Geneva Convention has laid down
that it's a more humane type of bullet
because led expands a little bit
and this one just goes and makes a nice clean hole.
[gunfire echoes]
MICHEL: Do you think the problem of a war film
is whatever you do to
not to involve the audience into the battles,
not to give them a vicarious experience.
But isn't it an ethical problem for a filmmaker?
STANLEY: When you read the memoirs of people
that have survived the war,
many of them look back on it as being the greatest moments
of their lives.
So, obviously there must be an aspect to it
that is genuinely inspiring and spectacular
in the real sense of the word.
And the elements of comradeship, loyalty, courage,
those things, in retrospect,
people who take part in are moved.
COMMANDER: It is then with great pride that I note the fine work
done by the soldiers of this command
during the recent operation.
It is with pleasure that I say: a job well done.
[♪♪♪]
MICHEL: If you are interested by war in itself
and the ambiguity of war,
there is no ambiguity in the way you look
at the hierarchy.
I mean whether inDr. Strangelove
or even inPaths of Glory ,
or, in this film, the drill instructor.
STANLEY: Well, the drill instructor in this film is as nalïve
as the boys are.
I mean, he is just programmed to do that.
[shouts] Did your parents have any children that lived?
-Sir, yes, sir. -I bet they regret that.
You're so ugly you can be a modern art masterpiece.
STANLEY: Lee Ermey was a Parris Island drill instructor.
He actually was what he played.
He was hired as a technical adviser,
and I was looking for an actor for the part.
But when we started interviewing boys
for the recruits at Parris Island,
we had the idea that Lee would do
an improvisation with them.
Originally this was just to see how they would react,
and he did what he did in the scene:
the most bizarre, off-the-wall dialogue
you could ever imagine.
He asked one guy what his name was,
and he said, "Lawrence", and he actually said to him...
[shouts] Lawrence? Lawrence, what, of Arabia?
Sir, no, sir.
That name sounds like royalty.
-Are you royalty? -Sir, no, sir.
Do you suck dicks?
-Sir, no, sir. -Bullshit!
I'll bet you could suck a golf ball through a hose!
STANLEY: So, I suppose drill instructors
are in some way or another actors,
but Lee of course I think is special.
I don't like the name Lawrence!
Only faggots and sailors are called Lawrence!
-From now on you're Gomer Pyle! -Sir, yes, sir.
Tell me, you were in Vietnam. Is this realistic?
When you look at the movie, is that...?
It's very realistic. I have a cross section...
When somebody hires me to give technical advice,
I like technical advice
because I like putting the realism in there.
It's good for me.
-Why? -Good therapy maybe, I think.
When you look at it, does it ring true with you?
Is it hard for you to watch?
'Cause you didn't even like talking
about your experiences in Vietnam.
It's really not that difficult for me to watch
because I know it's not...
it's not something that directly...
that I was involved with, okay?
I don't see the face of my friend or...
I don't have any problem with this.
But realism is there.
And you can take a circle of ten Vietnam vets
and give them each a situation
and they will have ten different ways
to solve the problem.
So what's real, you know?
[ghostly music plays]
[♪♪♪]
[distant explosions]
STANLEY: One of the other central features of the war
was the manipulation of the reality of the war
by technocrats and quote "intellectuals" in Washington,
who were always finding light at the end of the tunnel
and...
encouraging the men there to lie and to exaggerate kill ratios.
There was an arrogance back in Washington
by these quote "intellectuals",
who ran the war like an advertising campaign,
when they suffered terrific casualties
and accomplished nothing they thought they would.
You know, they thought people would actually rise up
and join them.
But, because of the lying,
the press and the public were so shocked.
Well, it's a bit like the generals and the men
inPaths of Glory.
But in this case it was more
than just the ambition of the generals
versus the men's lives.
I ordered an attack.
Your troops refused to attack.
My troops did attack, sir, but they could make no headway.
Because they didn't try, Colonel.
I saw it myself.
Half of your men never left the trenches.
A third of my men were pinned down
because the fire was so intense.
Don't quibble over fractions, Colonel.
The fact remains
that a good part of your men never left their own trenches.
Colonel Dax, I'm going to have ten men
from each company in your regiment
tried under penalty of death for cowardice.
-Penalty of death? -GENERAL: For cowardice!
[rhythmic gunfire]
[shouts] Aim!
-Fire! -[gunshots]
MICHEL: ButPaths of Glory was not fundamentally different
- in philosophy from this film. -STANLEY: Hmm.
MICHEL: WWI was really a fight
- for nothing. -STANLEY: For nothing.
MICHEL: Certainly WWI was a big turning point.
Certainly the Vietnam War for Americans,
because it was the first time that America really lost a war.
So, it's a big trauma.
STANLEY: Well, I think it taught America that you don't fight a war
because some intellectuals decide
that it might be a good thing, you know?
I don't think you're gonna get Americans to fight a war again
unless they think it really means something to them.
Now, how far...
that kind of isolationism will go, I don't know.
Colonel.
Marine, what is that button on your body armor?
A peace symbol, sir.
-COLONEL: Where d'ya get it? -I don't remember, sir.
What is that you've got written on your helmet?
"Born to kill", sir.
You write "Born to kill" on your helmet
and you wear a peace button.
What's that supposed to be, some kind of sick joke?
-No, sir. -What is it supposed to mean?
STANLEY: And that, of course, is playing off on the Jungian ideas
of the duality of man.
Altruism and cooperation
versus xenophobia and aggression, you know?
The fact that people do not see the dark side of themselves,
and tend to externalize evil.
People do only see themselves as good
and everybody else as either weak or evil.
I mean...
there is always a problem
when people are confronted with the shadow of the side.
["La Gazza Ladra" from "Clockwork Orange" plays]
[Alex cries out]
[♪♪♪]
-[screams] -[loud thud]
[sirens wailing in distance]
STANLEY: Certainly in the case of Alex, he must be aware of his duality
and he must be aware of his own weakness
in order to be good,
or to prevent the worst kinds of personal and social evil.
What crime did you commit?
The accidental killing of a person, sir.
He brutally murdered a woman, sir,
in furtherance of theft.
[shouts] Fourteen years, sir!
Excellent.
He's enterprising, aggressive,
outgoing, young, bold...
vicious.
He'll do.
STANLEY: InClockwork Orange, he was in conflict with people
who, in a way, were just as bad as he was in a different sense
and I suppose, in an emotional way,
seemed less sympathetic.
[screams]
No... No!
[shouts] Stop it! Stop it, please! I beg you!
It's a sin!
It's a sin! It's a sin!
Sin? What's all this about sin?
[piano music plays]
[crowd shouts indistinctly]
STANLEY: One of the really most puzzling social problems today
is how can authority maintain itself
without becoming repressive?
You have an ever-increasing feeling
among young people that...
politics and legal means of social change
are too slow and may be useless.
On the other hand, you have authority
that feels threatened by terrorism
and this growing sense of anarchy
that they can feel.
And the question is, how do you achieve,
uh, if it is possible anymore, some kind of...
balance?
It certainly doesn't lie in this very utopian
sort of optimistic view that if you destroy authority,
then something good will come of it.
And it equally doesn't lie by saying, you know,
authority must impose its will with greater and greater force.
It's a dilemma.
[menacing drums]
[piano music]
The Scala Cinema in London is in court today
accused of a breach of copyright after allegedly showing
the controversial film Clockwork Orange.
The film has been banned in Britain for 20 years
at the request of its director,
after critics claimed it glamorized violence.
MALCOLM: You see more violence on a news program.
You know, you see more violence in a John Wayne film,
'cause John Wayne always shoots and you always feel,
"Oh, good old John Wayne.
He is the goody and he shot the baddy."
And it's an emotional response, you know?
I personally feel that it's more violence
of the imagination, of the mind.
I think the film is very important
because the statement it makes
is about the freedom of human beings to choose.
And that's more important
than any of these sensational elements
that the press and people have been talking about.
STANLEY: Nobody, except people who were trying to prove
thatClockwork Orange was an evil film,
nobody could believe that one was in favor of Alex.
It's only that in telling a story like that,
you want to present Alex as he feels
and as he is to himself.
And in analyzing the film, you could think
that there was more sympathy for Alex
but, since it is satirical story,
and since the nature of satire is that
you state the opposite of the truth
as if it is the truth...
I don't see how anybody of any intelligence,
or even any ordinary person,
could think that you really thought Alex was the hero.
It's probably what attracted me to the book.
It was this strange duality of a character
who is plainly evil,
and yet, because of him operating
on this unconscious level,
makes you aware of things within your own personality
which you then identify with him.
[suspenseful music]
MICHEL: You are more attracted by evil characters
than by good ones.
I was thinking of Milton,
makingParadise Lost much more interesting.
STANLEY: Uh...
"Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven."
[suspenseful music grows in volume]
[♪♪♪]
[typewriter keys tapping]
[eerie tinkling music plays]
[♪♪♪]
MICHEL: How do you see your character in this film?
How do you see the reason of his behavior?
It's very ironical because he wants to write,
to be creative and he wants to be free
and he is a slave in fact of his own neurosis.
STANLEY: Well, you can only fill in the details
of Jack's personality.
He is bitterly disappointed with himself,
he is a person who... who obviously has immense rage.
He is married to a woman whom he obviously has nothing
but contempt for and he doesn't like his son.
You then put him in a situation
where he then is exposed to evil forces in the hotel.
Now, you are getting into the supernatural side
of the story.
And all those other factors simply serve to prepare him,
to make him a suitable servant of their wishes.
[suspenseful music plays]
-[screams] -[wood cracking]
-No! -[wood cracking]
Please!
[screams]
[woman shrieks] Please!
[♪♪♪]
MICHEL: In this story,
I mean at least the way you have shot it
there is always the possibility that everything is in the mind.
STANLEY: Well, this is what I found so ingenious
about the way the novel was written.
And you assume as you read it
that the things that are happening
are probably going to be a product of his imagination.
And I think this allows you to start accepting them.
MICHEL: Do you think there's an interaction
between the souls in the hotel
and it's not purely a projection of his mental thing?
Well, you can interpret that.
STANLEY: Well, I mean I interpret the story as being real.
I mean I just accept for the story purposes
that everything is true.
[suspenseful music buzzes]
[♪♪♪]
[wind blows]
[trees creak]
[pants]
MICHEL: There are three mazes if I remember well.
There is the real maze,
there is a kind of map or plan of the maze,
and it's also the maze is in a way
that the hotel in reduction
because hotels are full of corridors
and things like that.
So this idea is extremely powerful
and it goes with the imaginary dimension
of the film.
[suspenseful music buzzes]
[wind blowing]
[pants]
[♪♪♪]
STANLEY: I remember once reading something about
which were maze seem the perfect kind of metaphor for many things
about life and that somebody was describing how in a maze
everybody is giving advice to each other,
and misleading each other completely by their advice.
So nobody knows quite what to do,
they are all giving each other ideas which are all wrong.
[pants]
[suspenseful music buzzes]
[♪♪♪]
STANLEY: Many types of genre material
are really ways of thinking about death.
[♪♪♪]
STANLEY: So that in a way it is, on a psychological level,
possibly a way of exploring attitudes towards death.
MICHEL: Your films give a feeling of great despair.
STANLEY: If you make certain assumptions about the nature of man
and you build a social situation on false assumptions,
if you assume that man is fundamentally good,
it will disappoint you.
[suspenseful music crescendos]
[♪♪♪]
ARTHUR: What we are doing in the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey
is showing some of the things
we will develop in the world of the future
as a result of our present first steps into space.
The next generation will explore the planets,
bring back new knowledge, answering old questions,
and of course asking fresh ones.
It's really the next stage in the evolution of mankind.
About half a century ago,
the great Russian space pioneer, Tsiolkovsky said,
"Earth is the cradle of mankind
but you cannot live in the cradle forever."
And that is very true.
And out here among the stars, lies the destiny of mankind.
[♪♪♪]
STANLEY: The human species hasn't changed
since Cro-Magnon men,
and, in terms of evolutionary time,
we're not going to change much in the next 100 or 200 years.
The critical problem of our survival
is going to have to be settled long before 100 or 200 years.
Now, where is this source of intelligence
going to come from?
-HAL: Good evening, Dave. -How you doin', HAL?
HAL: Everything's running smoothly. And you?
Oh, not too bad.
HAL: Have you been doing more work?
-DAVE: A few sketches. -HAL: May I see them?
Sure.
HAL: That's a very nice rendering, Dave.
I think you've improved a great deal.
STANLEY: There is something that's happening already today,
you might say, "a mechaniarchy" or whatever the word would be.
The love that we have now for machines.
The smell and the feel of a beautiful camera,
or a tape recorder.
There is an aesthetic,
an almost sensuous aesthetic about machines.
I'm sure it will be useful to them to know
what human feelings are
because it will help them understand us.
HAL: The 9000 series is the most reliable computer
ever made.
No 9000 computer has ever made a mistake
or distorted information.
We are all, by any practical definition
of the words,
foolproof and incapable of error.
INTERVIEWER: HAL, despite your enormous intellect
are you ever frustrated by your dependence on people
to carry out actions?
HAL: Not in the slightest bit.
I enjoy working with people.
STANLEY: We do now obviously need some source of intelligence
of a magnitude considerably greater
than seems to exist at the moment.
And you could say that man's survival depends
on the ultra-intelligent machine.
I can't think of any reason why it's a frightening prospect,
because intelligence seems to me to be something which is good,
and so I can't see
how your ultra-intelligent machine
is going to be any worse than a man.
Open the pod bay doors, HAL.
HAL: I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that.
What's the problem?
HAL: I think you know what the problem is
just as well as I do.
What are you talking about, HAL?
HAL: This mission is too important for me
to allow you to jeopardize it.
I don't know what you're talking about, HAL.
[♪♪♪]
[air hisses]
[breathes steadily]
HAL: I'm afraid.
I'm afraid, Dave.
STANLEY: At the moment, the problems of the world
appear to be problems only because man seems to lack
the intelligence to think his wayout of the present trap
that we seem to be in.
HAL: Dave.
My mind is going.
I can feel it.
["Masked Ball" from "Eyes Wide Shut" plays]
[♪♪♪]
[indistinct chatter]
MICHEL: You have no other projects now? As usual?
STANLEY: No, I wish I did.
MICHEL: But Schnitzler, you still don't want to do that:
Traumnovelle.
STANLEY: I am not sure, I might, it is interesting.
-You've read it? -MICHEL: It's extraordinary.
["Masked Ball" plays]
[♪♪♪]
[thumps]
TOM: It's not about sex.
Stanley never said it was about sex.
It's about sexual obsession.
It's a thriller about sexual obsession, and jealousy.
And all the rumors that surfaced about just the wildest stories
you could ever imagine that were...
It's not pornography.
If he wanted to do that he would have done that.
If you men only knew.
I tell you what I do know,
is you got a little stoned tonight,
you've been trying to pick a fight with me,
and now you're trying to make me jealous.
But you're not the jealous type, are you?
No, I'm not.
You've never been jealous about me, have you?
No, I haven't.
And why haven't you ever been jealous about me?
Well, I don't know, Alice. Maybe because you're my wife.
["Masked Ball" plays]
Do you think monogamy is a natural state?
I think it's a choice.
Uh...
I mean... if it was just a natural state
why would people desire other people?
INTERVIEWER: Do you think that there is in everybody a...
a thin edge?
A depravity or extreme danger of desire, I suppose?
Is it in everyone?
Sure.
Yeah.
Uhm...
How honest people are about it is a different thing,
but I think we all have it.
STANLEY: Most situations where somebody is hopelessly in love
with someone who they shouldn't be,
it always is really, it tends to be physical.
And most tragic
masochistic relationships that I'm aware of
are essentially physical attraction
and this seemed to say it.
This sort of primitive part of your mind
that is just fascinated by the mystery
of what's going on.
It's all part of the sort of gigantic fantasy,
that the male sex fantasy.
I think that the story would become impossible
if you tried to give reasons for it.
[♪♪♪]
MICHEL: I think that you are an innovator.
I mean you like very much to break things, new things.
But sometimes you are very conscious on traditions.
STANLEY: Well, I think that one of the things
that characterizes some of the failures
of 20th-Century art, in all art forms,
is an obsession with total originality.
Innovation means moving it forward,
but not abandoning the classical form,
the art form that you are working with.
But I do think that the real explosion will come
when someone finally liberates the narrative structure.
["Sarabande" plays]
MICHEL: What surprises me is that you have absolutely no prejudice
towards choice of a subject.
I mean, anything can happen.
STANLEY: Well I might, but I am not aware of it,
I mean...
A good story you can make into a film is a miracle,
and it is very hard to work miracles.
[♪♪♪]
STANLEY: Someone sent me an article about Schnitzler.
He died in the most wonderful way.
He was sitting, writing at the type writer.
Somebody was in the next room and he got up to give him a page
and he just fell over, and that was it.
He hadn't been ill or anything, he was just working,
and dying.
TOM: I was supposed to talk to him on Sunday.
And sometimes Stanley would call,
you know, in the middle of the night.
I remember thinking...
The phone rang, it was either Nick or Stanley,
the only people who usually call in the middle of the night.
And it was Leon, and he said,
"Tom, you know, Stanley Kubrick...
died in his sleep."
And...
And I remember just thinking, "This just isn't happening."
-[lights shut] -[electricity crackles]
[film camera whirring]
["Midnight, the Stars & You" from "The Shining" plays]
[♪♪♪]
STANLEY: How disappointing you make the end of a film
is a matter of, I suppose, taste or artistic balance,
whatever it is, but you always are faced with the problem
of are you going to try to reinforce
this illusion which melodrama fosters
or are you going to try to reflect
what one sees about life?
Melodrama uses all the problems of the world
and all the disasters which befall the main characters
to finally show you that...
the world is a benevolent and fair place,
and all the tests and trials and seeming misfortunes
which occur, in the end just reinforce this belief.
But tragedy, or honesty,
or an attempt at presenting life
in a way that seems closer to reality than melodrama...
can leave you with a feeling of desolation.
But certainly, the formula approach,
which presents the world in a way other than it is,
doesn't seem to have a great deal of merit
unless you're just...
making entertainment.
MICHEL: Thank you very much.
["Midnight, the Stars & You" continues to play]
[♪♪♪]