2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY IS A HALL OF MIRRORS ~ A video essay by Anton Halldin

Our good friend Anton Halldin, from Gothenburg, Sweden, the man behind the epic work of obsessive Kubrickean analysis known as Space5001Odyssey.com, has been kind enough to send along his latest creative work. 

2001: A Space Odyssey is a Hall of Mirrors is a hypnotic video essay in which he posits that Stanley's well-known penchant for symmetry and matching shots is far more than a mere stylistic conceit, and that a more accurate cataloging of all the instances in which he uses his mirroring techniques could possibly lead to a better understanding of the myriad mysteries contained within his films... 2001 in particular, of course. Enjoy!

A COLLECTION OF KUBRICK VIDEOS

Did you ever wonder what The Shining would have been like if it had been directed by Sam Raimi instead of Kubrick? Well now, thanks to the magic of the Interwebs, you need ponder no longer! Enjoy!

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Here's a beautiful collection of images that inspired Stanley Kubrick's vision for The Shining, as assembled by Candice Drouet.

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Here's a little bit of dance fluff in that weird art installation thing where they re-created the Human Zoo Room from 2001: A Space Odyssey.

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And finally, is Chicago weirdo rapper Danny Brown's latest really "like Kubrick with two bricks"? I'm going to let YOU be the judge of that. Watch his strange new offering, below.

THE DIRECTORS SERIES: A THREE HOUR VIDEO ESSAY ON KUBRICK'S WORK

THE SHINING AND THE UNCANNY (GREAT SHORT VIDEO)

From the video's description on Youtube: "In this video essay we'll be looking at how Stanley Kubrick using Sigmund Freud's theory of the uncanny to great effect in his 1980 film, The Shining, based on the novel by Stephen King."

TRAPPED BY KUBRICK'S FRAME

I lost count of the number of times I've seen The Shining a long time ago, and yet I still occasionally find myself discovering new things and/or encountering new insights about it. One case in point is from this Pink Smoke article about Rodney Ascher's Room 237, which contains the following paragraph:

I should also mention that the reason I asked Adam to join Marcus and myself for this panel is that, other than knowing he's a huge Shining and Kubrick fan, he once proposed the most compelling insight I've ever heard about the movie: the fact that none of the characters exit the frame under their own power until the very end, when Wendy and Danny escape in the Snow Cat. The characters are trapped, not just geographically in the snowbound hotel, but inside Kubrick's unrelenting lens. I've never sat and paid attention to the film closely enough to see how consistently Adam's theory sticks, but every time I happen to catch part of the film on TV it seems close enough, and makes for a much more palpable origin for the film's inescapable tension that undoubtedly compelled the Room 237 talking heads to over-analyze it in the first place.

Now, I also have yet to personally verify this theory, but I can't think of any exceptions off the top of my head, and you can bet I'll have a note pad and pencil with me the next time I watch The Shining, which shouldn't be too long from now.

BARRY LYNDON: KUBRICK'S OVERLOOKED MASTERPIECE

Barry Lyndon Film Analysis - The Forgotten Masterpiece from MUST SEE FILMS on Vimeo.

From the "Must See Films" series comes this wonderful 19-minute analysis of Kubrick's beautiful adaptation of Thackeray's picaresque novel The Luck of Barry Lyndon. Some people may think Kubrick made Barry Lyndon as some kind of personal consolation project after Napoleon fell through at MGM--I mean, why let all those years of research go to waste, right?--but simply watching the film is enough to dispel that ridiculous notion.

SCHOLARLY ANALYSIS OF BARRY LYNDON

Having recently seen Barry Lyndon with a jam-packed audience in the plush opulence of the premiere screening room at Toronto's glorious TIFF/Bell Lightbox theater, I can definitely say that its reputation is on the rise. This analysis touches on a few of the reasons why that is.