2010
"I don't know if HAL is homicidal, suicidal, neurotic, psychotic, or just plain broken." - Dr. Floyd
release year: 1984
genre: science fiction
viewing setting: home Bluray 2/12/23 and 5/3/17 and home DVD, 9/13/14 and 3/28/12 and 4/7/04 and 1/18/99
synopsis: Nine years after the spacecraft Discovery was lost near Jupiter, the race is on to go back and learn its secrets.
impressions: This was a great sci-fi movie, and it actually had action and dialogue and events - in short, everything that 2001 didn't have. That's not a knock - the first movie did a good job of being revolutionary, not to mention setting up the mysteries explored in this film. My problem with it was simply that it was slow and often plodding, and gave no real answers at the end. That's fine if you want a great debate, but not if you want closure to a movie's plot. As for this one...the effects and sets were suitably futuristic, as was the plot. If you like sci-fi movies, you need to watch this movie after watching its predecessor.
things to watch for: What happens at the end, on Jupiter.
acting: Great performances all around. Roy Schieder is the former American space chief who wants to find out what happened in 2001 and ruined his career. John Lithgow is the engineer who designed the original ship, and Bob Balaban makes a good geek, the one who designed HAL9000. Helen Mirren is the beleagured commander of the Russian ship.
final word: Good sci-fi adventure, exploring the unknown via logic and teamwork; it had the pacing that the original movie lacked.
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