My parents loved Spartacus. I had friends who worshiped Dr. Strangelove or: (etc.). So I took it for granted that Mr. Kubrick was some kind of movie savant genius.
2001 came around, and I'm going, well, it plods, but it makes its points, and it's pretty creative, and then that "trip" made me think that I was watching some weird random-direction strategy. May I have the last 25 minutes of my life back?
Clockwork Orange. I had loved the book, dear droogs. Kubrick ripped out its soul and hung a Jack-O-Lantern on it, and not a good-looking one, either, but one that was kinda withered and amateurishly carved. Was not impressed.
By the mid-'70s, I still believed that Kubrick was kind of a genius, but it had more to do with his press than the awful realities I had watched. Then Barry Lyndon, which should've been taken out and shot.
That movie went on for three and a half years, give or take a decade, and made me weep for humanity.
I saw the trailer for The Shining (hey, I hope you believe I was going to address the topic at some point) with the Niagara of blood bursting through the room or whatever. Well, that's interesting. But unlike Mr. Kubrick, I am (usually) a fan of Mr. King's writing, and the movie did not hold up for me either as an adaptation or a horror movie on its own.
I remember reading Scatman Crothers talking wonderingly of Kubrick's "perfectionism" ordering dozens of takes of him walking across the street. Dude, at some point, and well before it was all over, it's no longer perfectionism. It's dysfunction.
To me, Kubrick as a director was Andy Kaufman as a comedian. True believers try to impress upon me how genius this is. I admit, I'm not cool enough. I don't get it. I'd rather spend my money on a different auteur.
2001 came around, and I'm going, well, it plods, but it makes its points, and it's pretty creative, and then that "trip" made me think that I was watching some weird random-direction strategy. May I have the last 25 minutes of my life back?
Clockwork Orange. I had loved the book, dear droogs. Kubrick ripped out its soul and hung a Jack-O-Lantern on it, and not a good-looking one, either, but one that was kinda withered and amateurishly carved. Was not impressed.
By the mid-'70s, I still believed that Kubrick was kind of a genius, but it had more to do with his press than the awful realities I had watched. Then Barry Lyndon, which should've been taken out and shot.
Well, he was, but much too late, and in the wrong place.
I saw the trailer for The Shining (hey, I hope you believe I was going to address the topic at some point) with the Niagara of blood bursting through the room or whatever. Well, that's interesting. But unlike Mr. Kubrick, I am (usually) a fan of Mr. King's writing, and the movie did not hold up for me either as an adaptation or a horror movie on its own.
I remember reading Scatman Crothers talking wonderingly of Kubrick's "perfectionism" ordering dozens of takes of him walking across the street. Dude, at some point, and well before it was all over, it's no longer perfectionism. It's dysfunction.
To me, Kubrick as a director was Andy Kaufman as a comedian. True believers try to impress upon me how genius this is. I admit, I'm not cool enough. I don't get it. I'd rather spend my money on a different auteur.
