Kubrick the Later Years: Part I

Welcome ladies and gentleman to the first of my four part series on the later work of master filmmaker Stanley Kubrick. Over the past week, I have watched six (6) of Kubricks films: Dr. Strangelove, 2001, A Clockwork Orange, Barry Lyndon, The Shining, and Full Metal Jacket. Before I get into the plots and visuals of these films, I want to spend this first post talking about how I got started on this mission.

Earlier this year, the documentary Room 237 was released. The film is an academic study of Kubrick's masterpiece, The Shining. Throughout the film, six (6) different people talk about their different interpretations of what that movie means. Although they all use certain shots, or other pieces of information about Kubrick or the novel, most of these theories seem slightly overreaching. For example, one of the commenters claims that The Shining is a movie about Kubrick's involvement in the faking of the Apollo 11 footage.

The thesis of the movie, which it does prove, is that Kubrick was an extremely cerebral filmmaker, who spent alot of time putting minor clues into his movie. The interpretation of these clues is up to the viewer. While some viewers may see room #237 as Jack's mind, others see it as the home of the sexually obsessed demons that are haunting this hotel, and some others see it as the "moon room", which is like Vegas in the sense that what happens in the "moon room", stays in the "moon room". The only thing that is clear is that Kubrick is a genius and was trying to make movies that were unlike anything that had come before. Movies as puzzles for the viewer. Movies that tell the story of mankind. Movies where the rich finally get theirs.

So, with this in mind, I watched every movie Kubrick made between 1964-1987. These movies are all very different. They range from comedy to experimental to horror to social commentary to war. However, all of these movies are above average and not only explore interesting topics, but successfully toy with audience emotion and expectations.

Come back tomorrow, where I will go over the plot of each of these movies and try to make some thematic connect between these beautiful films.