Kubrick Week on SBS

Stanley Kubrick movies frustrate and fascinate in equal measure. His eccentricity andobsessive nature are legendary – much to his widow Christiane\'s dismay.

Kubrick\'s meticulous nature may have drawn out the filmmaking process, affected his output, put a few actors offside, and broken up a celebrity marriage, but it also resulted in some of the most memorable screen moments of the century. This week SBS is bringing you six of his best...

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

Sunday November 16, 9.35pm

In spite of its title, Kubrick’s study of evolution hasn’t dated one bit and is still as engrossing as ever - not just for his (and co-writer Arthur C. Clarke’s) vision of human evolution, but also for its creation of the one of the great screen villains: the calm, cunning and calculating computer, HAL.9000.

Dark Side of the Moon (1998)

Monday November 17, 10.55pm

Director William Karel originally set out to make a film about Stanley Kubrick, one year after his death. A conversation with Christiane Kubrick reveals unknown facts about Kubrick’s involvement in assisting with theatrical elements of the US space program (positioning of the rocket launcher, spacesuit design etc). The information causes the filmmaker to ponder how far a person would go to pursue a powerful image. The result is an intriguing and provocative documentary that encourages critical thinking.

Lolita (1962)

Tuesday November 18, 11.40pm

Kubrick’s adaptation of Nabakov’s Lolita (1962) stands up as a timeless example of understatement and restraint. The stranglehold of the censors may have aged the title character from a tween to a teen, and prevented Kubrick from delving into the novel’s most confronting elements, but his deft use of irony and double entendre leaves an indelible impression.

Barry Lyndon (1975)

Wednesday November 19, 10.35pm

Kubrick could never be pinned down to a single genre and after the futuristic set pieces of 2001 and A Clockwork Orange, he turned his attention to the past, to an 18^th Century costume drama. Barry Lyndon is remarkable for its cinematography and staging, and Kubrick’s desire to shoot scenes by candle light pioneered new camera lens technology.

The Shining (1980)

Thursday November 20, 10.10pm

Again defying genre, Kubrick tackled madness, isolation and really, really creepy little kids in his adaptation of Stephen King’s The Shining. The unsettling stillness of an abandoned hotel is captured in long-held, smooth camera movements that give an uneasy feeling, and portend of troubled times ahead for the winter caretaker and his kin...they find out the true meaning of horror when he’s unable to shake his writer’s block.

Friday November 21, 10.05pm

A Clockwork Orange (1971)

A Clockwork Orange is Kubrick’s most divisive film, for its depiction of an Orwellian society in which criminal instincts are reconditioned by state-administered 'aversion therapy". A darkly funny parody of crime and punishment, it divided critics and audiences and was unavailable in the UK for 26 years, at Kubrick’s insistence.

Full Metal Jacket (1987)

Saturday November 22, 10pm

There’s an air of familiarity to Full Metal Jacket and Kubrick’s Vietnam film comes off second best in the inevitable comparisons with Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now. However, its strengths lie in the scenes revolving around the gruelling Marine induction training course, and the archetypal drill sergeant’s efforts to harness the adrenalin of rage and sex drive and turn the rookie recruits into Uncle Samurais.

- Fiona Williams