An Odyssey Redux

An old joke defines an intellectual as someone who can hear the William Tell Overture and NOT think of the Lone Ranger. Three days past my sixty-fifth birthday I realize I've lived long enough for that line to be no longer true, at least not for more than half the population. But I’ll give you another one: a film lover is someone who does NOT think of Viennese waltzes when hearing On the Beautiful Blue Danube by Johann Strauss II. No, a film lover thinks of Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece, 2001: A Space Odyssey.

That’s been true since 1968 when the film was released, it was true in February of last year when I wrote about seeing it on the big screen for the first time in years and it was true last night when I once again saw it in a spectacular presentation by the New York Philharmonic.

While the film was projected on a large screen hung above the orchestra, Alan Gilbert conducted the Philharmonic in the musical segments. It was thrilling. No, make that THRILLING! I have loved this film for forty-five years and I fell in love with it all over again in February of 2012, but last night brought me to a new level: rapture. It was simply astonishing. To see those visuals while listening live to that orchestra – words fail.

(Words didn’t fail Anthony Tommasini, music critic of the New York Times; you can read his rave review here).

As he notes, it was a wildly appreciative audience -- and I would add one quick to laugh. I remember sitting in stunned silence for most of the film back in 1968 – alright, there was the chuckle at the image pictured on the left – and it was a very quiet audience last year at the Quick Center as well (you can read my post here) – but last night there were chuckles galore.

I posit two reasons: first, Americans aren’t comfortable with silence; they feel the need to fill the void; we are the giggliest people on the planet I am sure. Secondly, it could well be that this was an audience well versed in the film and its plot. Knowing what they knew, it was hard not to laugh when HAL the computer says “I have a bad feeling about this, Dave.”

But the laughter was appreciative and minimally distracting. At the times when the film demanded rapt attention this audience rose to the challenge. 2001 is not an easy film; there’s very little dialogue, there’s almost no character development and the ending is so opaque that one can spend a lifetime arguing its meaning. But the cinematography and the soundtrack add majesty to a film that is breathtakingly beautiful to watch.

It was especially satisfying to hear one of the world’s great orchestras play the György Ligeti pieces from the score. Kubrick appropriated Ligeti’s music without even asking, jettisoning the score he had commissioned from Alex North. Reportedly MGM’s lawyers agreed that Ligeti would win a threatened lawsuit but promised to tie up the matter in court for years, decades even, according to one source. Ligeti settled for an embarrassing $3500. One cannot imagine the film without his music, so it was especially heartwarming to hear the roar that went up from the crowd when his name appeared in the closing credits.

But that roar paled to one that Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic received when it was all over. The credits had ended, but the orchestra continued playing The Blue Danube in its entirety, probably for five more minutes. At that point the entire audience at Avery Fisher rose as one, thunderingly applauding this amazing experience.

I was thrilled to be there; a sad footnote is that my brother, who teaches film, and with whom I saw 2001: A Space Odyssey last year, was supposed to be with me, but was taken ill. I promise you, Raymond, I loved it enough for both of us, but I wish you had been there.