Oct. 10, 2018 Staff Report
- It’s the 50th anniversary of the epic SciFi film 2001: A Space Odyssey, and the Museum of the Moving Image is marking the date with a weekend of special screenings, panel discussions and book signings.
The weekend will kick off with a showing of the 1968 man-versus-machine masterpiece on Friday, Oct. 12, at 7:30 p.m. Struck from new printing elements, this version features brighter images and a richer sound than the original film. Tickets are $20.
The anniversary weekend will continue with a live event on Saturday, Oct. 13, at 1 p.m. After a second showing of Odyssey, Heather Berlin, a cognitive neuroscientist and assistant professor of psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, will lead a discussion on the making of the film and its depiction of artificial intelligence.
Berlin will be joined by Keir Dullea, who played the film’s main character, David Bowman, and Dan Richter, who played Moonwatcher, the man-ape in the opening sequence.
Author Michael Benson will also be on hand to sign and sell his new book, Space Odyssey: Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C. Clarke, and the Making of a Masterpiece (Simon & Schuster, 2018). Tickets for Saturday are $40.
Benson will return to the Museum on Sunday, Oct. 14, at 1 p.m. to offer an illustrated presentation of his book. Benson will share clips, stills, and newly discovered Polaroids by Kubrick, and examine 2001: A Space Odyssey’s uncanny predictions of today’s minimalist devices and artificial intelligence.
The film will screen for the third and final time at 2:00 p.m. on Sunday, and Benson will sign and sell his books afterward.
Tickets for Sunday are $20.
The Museum of the Moving Image is located at 36-01 35th Ave. in Astoria’s Kaufman Arts District.
Rob MacKay is the Director of Public Relations, Marketing & Tourism for It’s in Queens