Platicsco Good story, Not enough for a whole film

Claysaba Excellent, Without a doubt!!

Zlatica One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Haven Kaycee It is encouraging that the film ends so strongly.Otherwise, it wouldn't have been a particularly memorable film

Robert J. Maxwell It's a fine, straightforward, and kind biography of film director Stanley Kubrick, from his birth in New York to his death at seventy at his home in Hartfordshire.There are plentiful clips from his movies and many still photos. There are more than a dozen talking heads -- fellow directors, old friends, colleagues, school chums. They all go rather easy on Kubrick. There were some "disagreements" between producer/star Kirk Douglas and Kubrick over "Spartacus." "Disagreements" is a carefully chosen word. Douglas is more candid in his autobiography, "Ragman's Son," in which Kubrick is described as "a talented s***." A head observes that Kubrick was lucky to have had the assistance on "Dr. Strangelove, Or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bomb," of two of the funniest and most creative people of the era: Peter Sellers, who was allowed to ad lib while Kubrick kept the cameras running, and Terry Southern, a font of madcap ideas, the writer who gave us "PRE-vert." One of the writers points out that in his maturity Kubrick tended to think of his stories in several independent "unsinkable units," meaning blocks of scenes, and then only later trying to link them together in the narrative. It's most obviously the case in the astonishing "2001: A Space Odyssey," but it's also apparent in later works like "Full Metal Jacket" and sometimes the seams show.It's not usually remarked on but Kubrick's use of music was highly original too. Before "Dr. Strangelove" and "2001," the score was designed to heighten the emotions being displayed. Classical music was used only rarely, and then as a substitute for the usual background. After "Dr. Strangelove" and especially "2001," new vistas opened for the use of music in films. It's almost impossible to imagine "2001" without the Strauss waltz, or the "stargate" sequence without the unnerving white noise of Gyorgi Ligeti. Who had ever heard of Gyorgi Ligeti? Nobody, whereas everyone knows Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff, whether they know they know it or not. And of course post-1968 everyone had heard Richard Strauss' "Also Sprach Zarathustra." I remember its being used in TV commercials.Like most of his mature movies, "A Clockwork Orange" was "controversial." I think the word was first applied to "Lolita." Anyway, some of the media vilified Kubrick and his "excremental vision." At several showings there were violent incidents after the film was shown. I'm not sure his vision should be called that but it's certainly true that as he got older there was less humanity in his work. Nothing -- before or after -- equals the scene at the end of "Paths of Glory" in which a frightened young girl inexpertly sings a simple German folk song and in doing so enthralls the raucous audience of doomed French soldiers, so that they stop shouting and begin to quietly hum along with her. I can't watch it without being moved. Following that, his characters become less and less involved with one another, cooler and more distant. Maybe his next hard look at warmth and the doubt that lies behind it is in his last film, "Eyes Wide Shut." There won't be any more Kubrick movies and it's the film world's loss, just as it lost Fellini, Hitchcock, and David Lean. I mention them because flâneurs talked about their work the same way. When is the next Fellini movie? What's David Lean's next picture about? There won't be any more questions about these directors and it's too bad because much of what we see on the screen now is barely fit for human consumption.

Andre Bortolon When I first watched a Stanley Kubrick film, I was at the age of ten and it was the late eighties. Stanley had already released "Full Metal Jacket" on cinemas, though I was watching for the first time "The Shining", which was a release on VCR at the same time in my homeland. By that period I was shocked by the movie and I considered it one of the scariest movies I'd ever seen, with a curious thing: I could sleep at night (perhaps later than usual) but surely thinking about a frightening Jack Nicholson managing to kill his own family and all the suspense and horror that emerged from that attitude. It was like love at first sight. I was already a film buff in development, and I glimpsed to other movies Stanley had made. Curious as any kid in that age, my next movie was "2001: An Space Odissey", probably recorded in our VCR from a TNT broadcast. Then came "A Clockwork Orange"; I watched it when I was thirteen and it represented really something in my life; not differently from the two films mentioned above, it impacted me in so many ways: its music, the quality of its images, its non-conventional plot and language and so on... For these reasons and for uncountable others that I've watched this documentary about Stanley Kubrick. And I was stroke again by that feeling that he is not here anymore, as said by Tom Cruise in one of the final scenes of the movie; but I also make my words from another genius who participated in the documentary, Martin Scorsese: that Stanley made a few films, although to be viewed as many times as possible, giving us a different perspective in each screening. I think these two commentaries make a lot of sense and it's delightful to know I can share my humble opinion with people inside the movie industry like the two of them. Surely you will agree with many people who appeared in this movie, people such as Sydney Pollack, Matthew Modine, Woody Allen, Jack Nicholson, Arthur C. Clarke, Malcom McDowell, Nicole Kidman... The list is really big. Oh, and there is also his ex-wife and daughters speaking about Stanley the family man, the perfectionist movie-maker...it's really a gripping piece of information. I think it's not a homage, but it could well be. The people in there give their opinions amidst the unfolding of Stanley's story of life, from the beginning of it to its very last days... An absolute must-see, either if you are a casual viewer or a film buff, as I am.

Joshua Warren If you're a Stanley Kubrick fan like me, you're gonna love to see this. it starts with his first film and moves on to his last. Sure, it's more of a documentary about his films than the person himself, but his films were his life, so they work very well together. What more can I say, it shows his as a genius in film and as a loving father and husband, it simply summarises his life in a very simple and informative way.now to complain, there was a few things I didn't quite understand. They had censored it. Okay, removing the nudity from some of his film i can except, but to bleep the swears? And the funny thing is, they only bleeped one recording of Kubrick yelling at Sjelly Duvall (they had a few arguments, but relax it was nothing sinister), yet all the swears that were featured from "Full Metal Jacket" and "eyes Wide Shut" were not bleeped. And this is not really a complaint, but as mentioned before it is a very simple documentary. I never really felt that they mentioned what made Kubrick such a great director. they treated the matter more like a mystery instead of analysing why. But then again, it's about the man himself, not what he did in detail.My verdict for this bio-documentary is 9/10.

ekisest This impressive documentary covers most of Stanley Kubrick's work, through the recollections of major figures in the film industry that, somehow, came into contact with this legendary director. Tom Cruise's presentation is no good, but all the rest works. Nevertheless, the "great absent" in this picture is Kubrick himself. All the way I was waiting for a glimpse at the real, flesh and blood Stanley Kubrick talking about his work. His voice appears briefly, in a recorded speech about "2001", but he doesn't say anything, really. The absence of significant footage with the central figure of this documentary, enhances the mystery surrounding the resources and hidden agenda behind most of his films. Anyway, while watching carefully one of the many pictures of Kubrick's childhood - the one where he's playing the piano with his sister, you can see something beyond those apparently innocent, childish eyes, something that reminded me of the kid in "The Shining".