Do you wish we had more non-CGI, visual-focused movies?

I suspect if Kubrick had access to CGI he would have used it. Look at Barry Lyndon, Kubrick used lenses developed for NASA in order to film scenes lit only by candlelight. He was no stranger to using the very latest tech to get the result he wanted.

A lot of movies produced today with CGI are terrible but I suspect a lot of movies produced at the same time as 2001 were also terrible its just we don’t watch them because they’ve sunk into obscurity and this gives maybe a biased view.

Having said that I do think those movies that do their effects / stunts in camera (Christopher Nolan, Mission Impossible etc) have “something” that a lot of CGI heavy movies are missing.

Star Trek was airing around the time this came out. I think after, but point is, it looked terrible. So I am aware of what was kind of the norm for that time (Yes, it is a TV show). It wasn’t all amazing and like you said, Kubrick used latest tech, so I do agree he would probably use CGI.

I guess to me, as tedious and hard the work is, those “hand made” effects put it a step above anything else. Yeah, it can be easier and look better with CGI, but CGI takes some of that charm away.

Knowing how ahead of its time it was really adds to the movie, in my opinion. But I love pretty visuals.

I believe OG Star Wars had very little to no CGI, and that had insane visual moments as well.

In general, yes, but I don’t think it’ll ever happen. Producers and directors have become too used to cgi in their tool boxes. They’ll never go back.

Only filmmakers with no budget will make a true film these days.

I think the problems are not inherent to CGI itself, but with art direction and often time-crunch.
Look at the Enterprises from Strange New Worlds vs the TMP era Movies.
Today they insist on super high contrast, bloom, lensflares, etc.
And together with this horrible, overly metallic hull material, and the exaggerated plating texture, it just becomes too much, and slides into the “this looks so fake” territory.
When you film an actual model, with actual lights, the result is the result, and if you want to make changes, you now have to alter the model, and do a whole new shoot, so the people up top have a lot less power to meddle.
Modern CGI easily has the ability to make it look real, like the TMP era Enterprise shot, but the people in charge choose not to.

I feel there’s too many digital movies with cgi that it’s impossible for me to keep up and see which ones are crap and which ones suit my personal taste in good movies worth watching at least once.

2001 is to me a masterpiece of film craftsmanship but the most impressive feat imo that Kubrick pulled off was simply having to choose that particular story.

Using actual film as medium he did not just tell the story, he made me experience it.

If you like learning about film making you would enjoy reading how Kubrick met with Clarke for the first time in a hotel bar in NY to discuss a yet to be developed idea for a space movie with an alien in it. There’s a book. Kubrick’s biography.

We forget just how BAD special effects were for lower budget films in those pre-CGI days. I also think that we are turning a corner where AI/CGI tools will make film accessible to anyone with good ideas. We are just in that awkward growing phase where a lot of it is shit.