I can feel it
I was struck by the visual similarities between a picture of Google servers and the (symbolic) spaceship in Stanley Kubrick’s movie.There are a number of ideas emerging from this, all relating to juxtapositions of utopian/distopian.
The (simulated) experience Hal verbalises, is perhaps resonating among these servers, with similar anxieties expressed by Google users. Google is trying to help by directing them to the correct helpline or website. At the same time, engineers push buttons and pull switches to save. Cloud trends verbalised the nation’s mood via social networking.
Machines have no feelings, despite Hal claiming otherwise. In the clip ‘the computer talks’ and the human is silent, except for the laborious breathing. We know man’s action is to control the machine, humans program (computer language) but there is always a threat of losing that control. After all Dave was programmed too.
Can Google be silenced? How do governments control corporates?
Hal’s actions were unethical, to destroy. Search engines support a capitalistic drive, in support of consumerism and economic growth. How can we be certain that technological developments will be ‘for the best’…?
2/4/2013, note: in all this I got Dave and Hal muddled up… for the record: Dave is the person, Hal the computer, now corrected…
Great post!
For me the laboured breathing was a really interesting feature. It gave an eery sensation of the computer coming to life – despite the fact it was actually from the human.
yes i agree, such deliberate use of sound is a great way of adding another narrative. The breathing is like a rhythm, parallel to the beating of the heart, and of course Dave does not have one.
In the film, there is a gradual escalation, but we know it will somehow reach a conclusion. The sound makes the whole experience very tense and the imagery dense.
The words Dave utters are like the entries from a databank. Not unlike a search engine…
just for clarification – I think Dave is the guy, and the computer is HAL. (I remember this because the acronym is shifted one letter back from IBM)
indeed, slip of the tongue (keyboard) there…. perhaps I see HAL more as a ‘person’ and ‘Dave’ seemed more personal…
ah, now that is interesting!