B (142)

111

“Observation is a

dying art.”

-Stanley Kubrick

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Kubrick’s images

combine elements

of drama, irony and

often times a sense

of mystery.

Better PHotograPHy

great masters

marCH 2015

In Full Metal Jacket, Kubrick shows the

filmgoer two disjointed halves of a story,

told through the eyes of Private Joker

(later Sergeant). Each half could easily be

considered an individual film in itself.

However, by combining them without

giving any real explanation, he makes the

audience choose what dots to connect and

consequently, what meaning to derive.

Not Quite the Nihilist

Given his choice of subjects, it is easy to look

at Kubrick’s work as that of a misanthrope.

Admittedly, he wasn’t a sunshine-and-

rainbows kind of guy. However, when asked,

“If life is so purposeless, do you feel it is

worth living?” in an interview with Playboy,

Kubrick said, “However vast the darkness,

we must supply our own light.”

A major influence on Stanley Kubrick and

Arthur C Clarke were the ideas of Robert

Ardery, when they were developing 20 01: A

Space Odyssey. In a way, Kubrick’s creations

may be best described through Arderey’s

quote, “We were born of risen apes, not

fallen angels, and the apes were armed

killers besides.... The miracle of man is not

how far he has sunk but how magnificently

he has risen. We are known among the stars

for our poems, not our corpses.”

That he was always going to be a

filmmaker was something Kubrick said

he realised early on in his childhood. At

the same time, he knew the leg up that

photography gave him.

“To make a film entirely by yourself,

which initially I did, you may not have

to know very much about anything else,

but you must know about photography.”

A notion confirmed by Jan Harlan, Kubrick’s

executive producer, who says, “He always

stayed a photographer.”