The movie that made James Cameron throw up: “The film made me dizzy”
It must take quite a lot to disturb James Cameron. His movies have covered all sorts of shocking ground, from acid-spewing Xenomorphs to giant blue aliens, robotic assassins from the future to one of the deadliest maritime disasters in history. All this without mentioning his hobby of deep sea exploration, which has taken him to some of the most remote and strangest places on Earth.
Even a mind as visionary as Cameron’s can be overwhelmed sometimes. Considering how big an impact he’s had on the world of sci-fi movies, it’s only fitting that the director has a special place in his heart for Stanley Kubrick’s genre-defining masterpiece, 2001: A Space Odyssey. Cameron is a big fan, but he’s also incredibly wary of how powerful a piece of art on that scale can be.
“I still think it’s an amazing film,” he told the Los Angeles Times. “I learned so much about what the power of a movie could be from that. The cut from the bone sailing through the air to the spaceship – I got it, you know?”
Unfortunately, Cameron’s admiration for Kubrick’s work came at a cost. “It’s also the only film that I’ve ever gotten physically sick from watching,” he continued. “The film made me dizzy. But what it did for me as a filmmaker was get me interested in technique. I was fascinated by the effects because I had no idea how they were done. I just couldn’t believe my eyes. It was dazzling.”
The 1968 epic, which Kubrick co-wrote with legendary science fiction novelist Arthur C Clarke, was revolutionary in multiple different ways. Aside from its then-accurate depictions of space travel and eerily prophetic depiction of modern artificial intelligence, 2001 was made using a raft of groundbreaking new special effects techniques. Huge rotating sets were built to simulate life aboard an interplanetary craft, and an elaborate system of wires was set up to recreate the weightlessness of floating in space. There’s also the small matter of the ‘Star Gate’.
When astronaut David Bowman (Keir Dullea) reaches Jupiter, he discovers a gigantic monolith orbiting the planet. This leads him through what is known as a ‘Star Gate’, a psychedelic portal that transports him to a brand new plane of existence. To create the sensation of ascending to a higher level of consciousness, Kubrick and his effects team put together an intoxicating sequence of lights, colours, and images to bombard Bowman and the audience. This included electron-microscope photos of crystals, optical illusion paintings, and aerial shots of the Scottish highlands. Cameron didn’t specify whether or not this was the part that made him feel unwell, but it wouldn’t be surprising if this was it.
As well as being a hero of his, Kubrick also proved to be a massive inspiration for when Cameron began his own filmmaking career. He has always been at the forefront of movie effects. Terminator 2; Judgment Day redefined what CGI could do for a movie and the ‘Avatar’ series continues to push boundaries; boundaries first broken by Kubrick the better part of six decades ago.
Some critics complain that Cameron’s films are all about style over substance. While that isn’t entirely untrue, his ambitions make a lot more sense when you realise that he’s just trying to recreate the bestial, nauseating feeling he encountered when he first watched 2001.
