I saw Full Metal Jacket in the theater as a young lad. Mind. Blown. Wide. Open. It's still probably the most intense experience I've ever had at the movies.
SK is my favorite director and my answer would probably be different in a week, but I've never tired of watching Strangelove even though I've seen it a million times. Barry Lyndon is my dark horse. Such a beautiful movie.
Full Metal Jacket for me, though it's a tough choice with so much great work. I also happen to love what he did with The Shining. Interesting how much of it was filmed around the UK. See: Full Metal Jacket filmed in England? WHERE?!
Oh, but it is. Very much so. When he took over directing the film changed, technically and aesthetically. His lensmanship and lighting and camera set-ups don't look like anyone else's. It is a Kubrick film. Perhaps not entirely, but there's no mistaking his eye and hand in it.
SPARTACUS might be among my least-preferred Kubrick films. I've only watched it a couple of times, but it just doesn't feel like Kubrick to me. My other candidate for least favorite is FULL METAL JACKET. The first half is amazing, but the latter war footage left me cold.
All this is true BUT the cast, script, crew was all on board before Douglas brought him in. I agree there are Kubrick touches all over the film, but it's also a script filled with trite, cliche passages that would never pass muster in a genuine SK flick.
Which is why Kirk Douglas called him in to replace Mann. SPARTACUS is more Kubrickian that you are willing to admit, but suit yourself.
If Kubrick had been hired at the beginning of the project, been given total control over cast, crew and script, then and only then would it be a proper Kubrick film. As it was, Kubrick was constantly feuding with Douglas and Trumbo, and denied final cut, an indignity that convinced him to renounce Hollywood forever and set up shop in England. Kubrick is often quoted as saying Spartacus was the most miserable experience of his life. I've acknowledged the Kubrickian touches in the film. But the film itself is much inferior to everything he did later. You can't tell me this is the film Kubrick would've made if he'd had the control he insisted on for the rest of his career.
I'm not telling you any such thing. I never said that. I'm aware of all the details you mentioned. It doesn't alter my own observations. Anthony Mann was a fine filmmaker, even a great filmmaker. You under-estimate the core of the film, I think, but that's your business. Kubrick's contribution is all I care about in SPARTACUS and it's significant.
' Spartacus ' looks like a movie any competent director could have made. Most Kubrick films ( the best ones anyway ) look like films only he could have made. It's been many a year since I've seen ' Spartacus ' but I can't recall any specific Kubrickian touches in it.
In order; 2001 Dr. strangelove A Clockwoek Orange The Shining Paths of Glory Full Metal Jacket Lolita The Killing
Yes, it was written while Saturn was the focus not Jupiter and there are some minor differences between the novel and the film that are interesting.
Kubrick rarely left England after he moved here in 1961. All his films post that date were shot here. If exterior location shots were needed, such as the helicopter shots in The Shining, he would send a second unit crew to make them. He even went so far as to recreate Greenwich Village street locations for Eyes Wide Shut at Pinewood Studios, rather than have to travel to NYC.
Yes, I've read 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY and its three sequel novels: - 2010: ODYSSEY TWO - 2061: ODYSSEY THREE - 3001: THE FINAL ODYSSEY It was in the early fall of 1968 when I read the first novel. I'd seen the film in the Philadelphia Cinerama theater that summer, but came away somewhat unimpressed and confused. Yet the film gnawed at me, so that when I saw the hardback novelization in a bookstore, I picked it up and read it. Memories flooded my brain, and I knew I had to see the film again, this time with a better understanding of where things were going. I dragged a buddy off to that same Philadelphia Cinerama theater and we sat in the front row of the balcony and had one of those frozen moments in time as the movie displayed its brilliance. Back in those days there was no home video, no practical way for a fan to own a movie. So when we wanted to see it again over the next ten years, we had to wait for local theaters to book the film and battle the $1 matinee kiddie crowds. But over those years, I managed to see the film in a theater around twenty times. When NBC finally showed it in the mid 70s, I audio taped it. (Try listening to 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY sometime!) It wasn't until a showing on HBO in the 80s that I finally got a videotaped copy of it - in 4:3 pan & scan of course. Late 80s got me to purchase a LaserDisc player and a widescreen LD. Then came DVDs and Blu-rays and 4K discs. I've still got 'em all.
It's harder to see Kubrick through the veil of the somewhat standardized sword-and-sandal movie look, I grant you. But having seen it after ages again recently, he is all over it. The complete absence of biblical worship, the mechanics of power and cruel 'fate', the necessity of people to fight each other, the nihilistic merciless ending (and beginning of an endless cycle). If you can toss the look aside, it's closer to Lolita and Strangelove than to Cleopatra.
Me too. I read 2001 though after I saw the movie. What amazed me was how clear the film was (of course I saw it as an 8 year old and without the benefit of drugs).
I am the angel of the bottomless pit and the wrath of the lamb. I am the fool for Christ, the Paraclete of Caborca!