Holstra Boring, long, and too preachy.

CommentsXp Best movie ever!

Fairaher The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

Married Baby Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

ZippysKingdom With the 50th Anniversary of the original film coming up we sat down to watch it a few weeks ago - it still stunned, inspired and left me in awe. So, why not watch the sequel, right? Well, I feel soiled now... even putting aside the fact that 2010 was made before CGI (and obviously so was the first film) the special effects we laughable. The sets were cheap, the costumes unoriginal and cheap, the acting was dreadful and WORST OF ALL the soundtrack was, was, was... I just wanted to drill my ears out. One of the many amazing parts of the film 2001 was the musical score coupled with the absolute lack of sound - as it should be in space... here we had endless canned orchestral tracks to "set the mood" which at times were so distracting it was hard to know what was going on. We had sound in space (which a lot of other films do too), but we already had the precedence of the first film - no one would have faulted Hyams for continuity there.The casting in this film is just so bad - John Lithgow CAN'T be taken seriously, Roy Schneider doesn't fit the role, the "Yakov Smirnoff " look-alike was dreadful. The dialog was idiotic - the lack of professionalism by the crew, their childish expressions, the pointless banter, etc, etc - all so unrealistic, pointless to the film and distracting. I still have no idea who that random female crew member was that popped into Schneider's bunk for the laughably cheesy depiction of the atmospheric deceleration.The entire opening sequence with Schneider and his family could go - especially since later in the film in his overlaid messages to his family, he barely expresses feelings about them or says any lovey-dovey stuff - instead he talks about the mission - so why did we have to suffer through "getting to know" his family? Then there are all the inconsistencies concerning gravity or the lack of. In one scene, Schneider puts two pens into a free float to illustrate the two ships - WAIT, WHAT? All this time I'm working on the assumption that there is false gravity in that module because there is ABSOLUTELY no attempt by the film makers to illustrate zero G! When Dr. Chandra is in HAL's CPU it looks like he is standing on a rotisserie with some low paid stage hand rotating him... and he looks constipated to boot. I could go on and on.And, "SAL"... PLEEAAAASEEEE!I'm so upset by 2010... If you love the first film, STAY AWAY from this one.

Blueghost I went and saw this film with a couple of catholic fundamentalists (yes, I did, hard to believe, but true) whose knowledge of real science and science fiction varied quite a bit. And their one comment regarding Hal's transmission at the end was "It was god!"One is baffled by a lot of things in life, but that moment in time heading south home on the freeway, and hearing them make that statement, was one of the most perplexing things I had ever heard in my entire life. Mike C. and Mark C. were not then, and are not now, deep thinkers, irregardless of their technical training (one a computer scientist, the other chemist). They could not fathom the idea of an alien race seeding life elsewhere and beyond. To them it had to be a supernatural-cum-religious explanation for what was happening to Jupiter and her satellites. I often wondered how many other audience members had that same thought. I'm thinking perhaps a few, but not many. I think you have to be a real numb-skull to draw that specific conclusion, and I say that without apology because it's true.But, to the film; it does explain and clarify the story in Kubrick's efforts some twenty years prior, had far more dramatic tension and less exposition from, again, Kubrick's film. The clash of styles I think makes for an interesting original-sequel dynamic that is kind of interesting and entertaining.But, for all that, I would not have cast Roy Scheider in Dullea's role, the mother having her hair brushed scene was, well, spooky but also strange. How many sons brush their mother's hair? In usual Hollywood fashion the exposition of the story takes precedent over scientific fact, and there's just the usual Hollywood nonsense piquing here and there.I mostly think this is an okay movie. Each science fiction film has its faults, and this one, directed by what appears to be a humanist, places a great deal of emphasis on the character interaction and expression of emotion rather than the telling of the tale. Which, to me, gives it the usual Hollywood 80's sheen that I think a lot of audiences in the 1980s were a bit sick and tired of, though they put up with it because, hey, it's only a movie.As for any deity, or lack thereof, I think it's safe to say that there isn't any in this film, and that it is in all actuality a solid science fiction film from the 1980's, even if it was a bit saccharine in delivering a message about international relations.And I suppose that's the only real fault I find with this film. We were in contention with the Soviet Union for world domination. The Soviets wanted to expand communism, and we and the rest of the world were there to stop them. The idea that we would somehow be awoken with a passion for life because of a new sun strikes me as being naive, along with a lot of other descriptors. To put is in the language of another movie, "You can't make peace with dragons." For as we fought the Soviets in Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, and elsewhere, we were not there to fight them for the sake of fighting them. And if you watch this movie that's probably what you might think had you not been alive at the time this film was made and released.And I suppose that's the best assessment I can make of this film. It's an "anti war" or "anti cold war" film that believes that our rivalry with the Soviets was all a misunderstanding. That thinking is premised on the notion that communism and its permutations via the old Soviet Union, worked and were a good thing. They were not. And that's why this film's drama comes across as more old-guard Hollywood immigrant prattle about international relations, and the naivety thereof. It's why I acknowledge its artistry, but, as per this commentary, will caution the more astute audience member of why this film may come across subconsciously as a little untrue.Enjoyable on a certain level, but a bit of a sales-pitch for a bill of goods.

Jak 60 The fundamental problem I have with the movie is that it should not have produced; but the fact that some film-makers in search of easy money try to piggy-bag on a big success is not surprising to me. What amazes me is that A C Clarke, the creator of the original story, was behind this thing and wrote the book that gave birth to this movie. Now, if you have not watched (or read) 2001 a Space Odyssey, this might still work for you as an OK film. As a matter of fact, in most synopsis, 2010 is defined as the sequel to 2001; the simple reality is that there was not and there will never be a logical possibility to give 2001 a sequel. It is simply wrong, a huge mistake. 2001 is the epic of mankind from its very beginning to its future. The first "man" (actually, an ape) was selected by an external intelligence 4 millions of years ago to lead the specie from an animal level to a human one. The very same intelligence selects now another man to transition humankind as we know it to its next level - as we don't yet know it. Then instead what happens in this book? Only 9 years later, in2010, we discover that nothing has changed, good old earth is still the same good old thing, good old mankind is still hanging there as it was 9 years before... So what? The phenomenal cosmic fetus floating in the space at the end of 2001, the cathartic promise of the next step of humankind was a joke? Was it an hallucination? Come on, please...this was a huge mistake that I cannot justify...I'll try to recover by watching again 2001 a space Odyssey.

arminhage Despite the common belief, this movie has no answer to unanswered questions of the 2001 nor it helps the audience to better understand the original movie. This a cheap flick, an attempt to make some money on the success of the 2001. I would say it is something like Terminator 3 or 4, cheap movies based on awesomeness of the originals however it was good entertainment on it's own. Plays were cheesy, Roy Scheider appears as "NAGGING MR ALWAYS RIGHT" which why I despise him because he had absolutely no talent, playing 100 movies and he has the same character in all of them! The opening scene is probably the most ridiculous when Dr Moisevitch approaches Floyd (Scheider) on the telescope. There is no way that someone could hear Moisevitch's voice while standing on top of the giant telescope! Seriously, how a director or screen writer can make such an obvious mistake? Movie is too noisy, inside spaceships are too dark as of most sci-fi of the period and instead of having an imitation of futuristic electronics, there are monitor screens straight from mid 80s but probably the ending was what made me go ballistic! A new sun was created in the solar system! Sounds cool except that in reality, such phenomena would cause the earth to be over heated and almost all life on planet earth would be destroyed! I'm a great fan of Sci-Fi and I hate open ended movies in which the ending would be left open to be guessed by the audience but what I hate more is cheesy and obviously unscientific answers. I believe an open ended is far better than a sham like this. If you watch this movie as a sequel to the 2001, you'll despise it immediately but if you try to forget about the 2001 and what it as a stand alone sci-fi, there is some entertainment value in it.