I. Introduction/Disclaimer
The difficulties that arise from examining the “character” of HAL 9000, or any other element of the narrative in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, are hazardous and abundant. 2001 is a film whose plot is constructed in a deliberately opaque manner, defying most, if not all, of the classical
Indeed, this poses a problem in trying to pin down anything coherent about a purposefully enigmatic narrative in twelve pages, but despite this challenge, an attempt will be made to elucidate the narrative function of the HAL 9000 character.
II. Introduction/Thesis
Philosophers, scientists, theists, and atheists throughout human history have spent their entire lives musing on the eternal question, “Why?” Why man? Why earth? Why the universe? Why anything? It is this self-consciousness, perhaps, that separates us from any other living thing known to mankind -- it is, perhaps, the only thing that makes us special. If this is true, then what does one make of an artificially created conscious, invented and molded by the hands of man, HAL 9000? Most viewers of the film agree that HAL is more than just an action prop with an electronic voice, more than just a machine; he (not it) is a full-fledged character in the narrative. But as the pinnacle of man’s creativity and technological achievement, what kind of character is he? How human is he? Is he a hero or villain?
On a smaller, more literal level, HAL is unquestionably human, and perhaps a tragic villain in the vein of Mary Shelley’s monster in Frankenstein. However, as a symbol for what technology means in relation to man, and as the pinnacle of what technology can achieve, a tool that replicates all the complexities of the human mind, HAL 9000 is a character that transcends the question of humanity and the paradigm of good and evil to achieve a more cosmically significant status in the narrative, not as a representation of man’s follies, but as simply another stepping stone to walk over in man’s evolution.
III. HAL’s Humanity
Even before HAL 9000 ever enters the narrative, the notion of latent humanity being buried or constructed within man’s technological creations is explored. Various images or objects suggest the idea that technology, something most people view as cold, mechanical, and inhuman, is actually a very human, even organic thing.
During the “Dawn of Man” section, in fact, the first tool, the first technological idea for man, is a bone, part of something that used to be alive. Bones are something very vital to higher life forms such as mammals, and the fact that the first ape-man uses this object that was once alive as a tool, as a technology, inextricably ties life and technology together, from technology’s very birth onward. The notion that technology is also tied to death, by way of violence, is also suggested by the use of a dead bone from a dead animal, but this idea will be explored more thoroughly later in the paper.
This idea doesn’t die when the technologies become more complex, as the famous match cut that brings us from bone to space ship suggests. Ships float through space elegantly, enhanced by the classical music soundtrack, and their graceful movements seem to have a life of their own. The spaceships movements have been described by others as anywhere from “ballet” to “a cosmic, coital dance,” and regardless of one’s interpretation, they are all human descriptions, and certainly not simple mechanical motions (Verniere 2). One particular spaceship, in fact, is a round, planet-like sphere, which we see descending into a station; it looks exactly like a human head, complete with lights for eyes. Clearly in this shot, the face of technology is human.
When the film reaches the “Jupiter Mission” section, and we are introduced to HAL 9000 for the first time, we see just exactly how human that face is. The face is actually just one big red luminous circle, like an unblinking eye that watches everything. HAL’s “eye” seems almost more human than the human crew’s eyes; the three in hibernation are virtually frozen dead bodies that don’t even get to participate in the distinctly human activity of dreaming, and the two conscious ones, Dave Bowman and Frank Poole, have extremely expressionless, blank, robotic faces, with dull eyes that do not shine with nearly as much life and vitality as HAL’s red light.
During a BBC interview with the two astronauts, much is revealed about how human HAL actually is. We are told by the interviewer, “The crew of Discovery 1 consists of five men and one of the latest generation of the HAL 9000 computers,” and it is interesting that he is even considered a component of the crew, normally understood to be a human grouping; indeed, he is more part of the “crew” of the ship than any one human, as he runs every aspect of ship operations. One particular shot from the interview frames the two astronauts side by side, with HAL right in the middle between them, as if he were not just part of the crew, but captain of the crew. In fact, it is interesting that he is even referred to as “he” at all, instead of “it.” HAL’s humanity is so inherently intuitive, that it is basically automatic to assume to call him a “he,” and not once is he ever referred to as “it.” Even when you call him by his name, you are supposed to say “Hal,” like the human name, and not say the letters “H-A-L.”
Granted, the question arises as to whether HAL can actually feel real human emotions, if he indeed is actually a replication, not just a synthetic mimicry, of the human brain. However, even in the content and manner in which HAL speaks, there seems to be a whole well full of motivations derived from truly human emotions. He states, “I enjoy working with people,” a response grounded by emotion (“enjoy”) rather than logic or mechanics. After Frank views a birthday message from his family, HAL chimes in with a, “Happy birthday, Frank,” which seems to come out of nowhere, completely unmotivated, and therefore unusually genuine. When HAL tries to persuade Dave that there’s nothing wrong, even after HAL has murdered Frank, he tries to appeal to Dave on a basic human level, citing distinctly human traits when he says, “I’ve still got the greatest enthusiasm and confidence in the mission.” Also, it’s noteworthy that he says “still got,” as if he’s lost everything else -- the logic, the computational abilities, the rationality -- and all that’s left deep down, at his core, is his inherent humanity, his “enthusiasm and confidence.” Even if phrases like that are just well-calculated moves to get Dave to stop his attempt at dismantling him, they reveal a deep, urgent need for self preservation that goes beyond the programmed parameters of completing this mission.
Finally, if HAL’s positive attributes do not point to his humanity, then the manner in which he contrasts with “real humans” certainly does. The “banality of Bowman and
IV. HAL as Tragic Villain
If HAL is indeed established to be, if not downright human, then virtually human, what kind of character does he have? What sort of human is he? The most common and immediate reaction is that he is an evil, intelligent, calculating villain. The American Film Institute listed him as the #13 villain in their “100 Years… 100 Heroes and Villains” best-of list in 2003. His voice has been described as “bland, neutral, reassuring,” but also “ambiguous, sinister, untrustworthy” (
First and foremost, HAL was created by man and given the gift of some form of intelligence, and in fact, consciousness. In this sense, he is a pretty clear descendent of the Frankensteinian monsters of which Mary Shelley first gave seminal vision (Kozlovic 347). These types of villains are indelibly tragic, as they were created without ever asking to be created, and always with some sort of fatal flaw that seems like a gross oversight on the part of the creator that causes the monster to suffer in some unjust way. This notion goes as far back as God’s creation of Adam only to have him expelled from
HAL’s tragic flaw, in a sense, is that he is too human. The programmers who created him did too good of a job in turning this machine into a man, full of human flaws, especially hubris. The interviewer remarks that he can detect a small bit of pride, even arrogance, in HAL’s proclamations of the 9000 series computers’ infallibility. It has been said that “HAL’s biggest crime” was not his “murderous deeds,” but his “conceit” with “claims like, ‘No 9000 computer has ever made a mistake.’ This is more than just arrogant, more than just false; it is the antithesis of realism” (Kozlovic 358). Indeed, it is this hubris that drives him to commit his villainous murders, either to cover up the possible mistake he made about the faulty part, or as a consequence of his doubts and suspicions about the mission, in which case, his hubris extends to the idea that he, as the most powerful and knowledgeable component of the mission, is above the mission. And the tragedy of that is that this was the way he was created; he was designed to be that powerful and that knowledgeable, that perfect, and in an imperfect world, this was the most cruel thing man ever did to machine -- to give it consciousness without the natural human limitations we have that rein in our arrogances every day. Another take on this idea states that “once programmed to be ‘human,’ HAL loses the machine purity that, no doubt, his Earth twin still possesses. He becomes imbued with a consciousness of his own autonomy and denies his function as a tool,” thereby compromising his “infallibility as a machine and benevolence as a deity” (Nelson 128).
The camera also provides viewers with more subjective viewpoints that underline a certain amount of empathy for HAL. The first shot of HAL we see shows the red circular eye apparently watching
frames the two astronauts, facing each other, inside the oval window of a space pod, where they have retreated so as to discuss HAL’s irrational behavior without, they believe, having the computer overhear them. We see their lips move silently behind the armored glass. The shot is from HAL’s point of view; and we realize the computer is lip-reading Bowman and
Knowing that they are discussing what more or less comes down to HAL’s murder, the camera pans back and forth between Dave and Frank’s lips in a panicked motion, indicating HAL’s fear of being disconnected. These point of view shots from HAL’s electronic eyes are what some have called “his distorted, subjective point of view” (Nelson 127). Thus, HAL’s pre-emptive murders are a product of survival instincts and a desire for self-preservation. Indeed, when he wields the pod to cut Frank’s oxygen tube and kill him, it becomes like “his bone club, wielded against the creator who threatens his existence” (Rasmussen 89). HAL can only be blamed insofar as his creators can be blamed for his violent acts. His limitations are man’s limitations, and thus, there must be a certain level of empathy for HAL’s confusions and flaws.
When HAL is finally being dismantled, he reveals eerily human traits. His pleas for Dave to stop are chilling and pathetic as he delivers in monotone, “Stop, Dave. I’m afraid. I’m afraid, Dave.” He keeps going back to feelings and emotions, even as those programmed features are supposedly being removed one by one by Dave: “My mind is going. I can feel it. I can feel it. My mind is going. There is no question about it. I can feel it. I can feel it. I can feel it. I’m a… fraid.” He then does a very human thing near death, which is to revert back to his own infancy, in a moment much like his entire life flashing before his eyes, as he introduces himself and asks if Dave would like to hear a song his instructor taught him when he first became operational. In a sign of shared empathy or humanity, Dave significantly speaks for the first time during this gruesome operation, telling HAL to sing the song, as if to distract HAL from the pain of death. This moment is so poignant, and points to even Dave’s recognition of his own sympathy for HAL, that HAL’s death, despite his own deeds, becomes that of a truly tragic villain.
V. HAL Beyond the Infinite
Beyond just being a pivotal character in the narrative, whether human or non-human, tragic or evil, HAL also transcends these common paradigms of character to play a more cosmically important role as the stepping stone of man from dawn to maturity. This take on HAL acknowledges what is impossible to ignore: that 2001 as a whole is a film that begins before time, reveals the universe and even existence itself coming into existence, and then relates the history of man’s evolutionary development, from ape-man to some future transcendent stage as a Star Child. HAL merely represents the final step in this transformative process.
To begin with, critics commonly structure the film into four major sections, three of them subtitled by Kubrick:
- The Dawn of Man
- A primeval ape man makes a breakthrough - becoming endowed with intelligence after experiencing a mysterious black monolith
- The lunar journey in the year 2000 (untitled)
- Eons later, a similar monolith is discovered on the lunar surface in the 21st century, sending its signals to Jupiter
- Jupiter
- A futuristic, 18-month journey to Jupiter, featuring HAL 9000
- Jupiter and Beyond the Infinite
- A mystical experience in another time and dimension (Dirks)
The separation between “The Dawn of Man” section and the untitled lunar journey is often thought to be obvious, as it is marked by the famous match cut from bone to spaceship, a cut that spans eons of time and countless technological improvements and discoveries. When the audience sees the cut, the “illusion of progress encourages us to accept this shift with little resistance,” but it is more interesting (and more correct) to assume that Kubrick chose to not separate the lunar journey segment with a subtitle for a reason, that it should actually be included as a continuation of “The Dawn of Man” (Castle). The evidence for this view is strong, as this longer dawn is marked by “two signposts” on the perimeter:
the monoliths. One has been placed in the ape’s encampment; the other, buried on the moon. Man’s ‘dawn’ has occurred not in a single bound to a smarter ape but within the whole space of four million years. This time marks a prelude to the journey to Jupiter, which will change man’s relation to the technological universe (Castle).
In other words, the entire first section introduces man as he develops pathetically through the utilization of technology, tied inextricably to the capacity for violence. The entire second section, centered around HAL, is the turning point, in which the culmination and pinnacle of what technology can achieve ultimately proves to be nothing more than a bigger, fancier expression of man’s capacity for technologically enabled violence. It is the last, final moment of apes bludgeoning themselves with levers, after which, in the third and final act, man is reborn into a higher form, beyond technology, and therefore, optimistically, beyond violence.
Exploring this grand, beginning-of-time-until-the-end-of-man narrative structure of the film would involve several papers’ worth of ideas, so this paper will focus on the middle section, HAL’s section, as a transitional “birthing period” for the emergence of this “new” man. This perspective simply underlines the point that HAL is not a mere character in this story, but, as the culmination of current man’s limitations vis-à-vis his dependence on technology vis-à-vis expressions of violence, overcoming and moving beyond HAL is an evolutionary step in the process of reaching the Star Child.
Images involving the process of birth abound in this section. The very first shot is of the Discovery 1 spaceship, which is shaped very much like a sperm cell, with a large head in front and a long, thin tail with rocket boosters in the back powering the ship’s movement. Indeed, this mission is very much like a sperm swimming through space, looking for a cosmic ovum to conceive a “new man” with. At this point, HAL is working on the ship in conjunction with, not against, this goal.
However, it is when HAL turns on humans that he actually truly propels them forward, pushing Dave to the next level, forcing him to overcome the still dawning man’s vestigial reliance on technology, to transcend that limiting human trait and evolve into a superior state. Humans “retain more immature traits longer than any other vertebrate on the planet” (Westfahl 103), and technology has simply been one of those immature traits that have endured over man’s four billion year long dawning, and now must be shed on the way to greater biological glory.
The sex-and-birth-related imagery continues to enhance the showdown between Dave and HAL, between man and his own technology. When Dave finds himself inside a pod, without a space helmet, locked outside of the spaceship by HAL, there seems to be no escape, and HAL seems to have triumphed in stifling -- suffocating -- man’s evolution. However, in a triumph of distinctly human ingenuity over mechanical logic, Dave forces his own re-entry into Discovery 1 with explosive bolts from his little pod, bolts which “were originally designed to help astronauts escape out of a malfunctioning pod, not into a malfunctioning Discovery” (Rasmussen 96). Dave sets the emergency bolts ready to explode the door open, and kneels down in front of it, crouching in a fetal-like position before shutting his eyes, looking for all the world like a baby preparing to enter the birth canal. The shots of his forced re-entry are more like a rape. His body bursts into the blood red air chamber, a womb, along with a cloud of white, semen-like smoke. After this moment, a reborn Dave stalks through the ship towards the room that houses HAL’s brain, “tracked by a hand-held camera attuned to his erratic breathing,” the film now fully taking on an unstable, but human perspective, the perspective of the victor. Before this, the camera moved in controlled, mechanical pans or simply remained stationary, implicitly assuming the perspective of a machine-dominated world. This victory, then, becomes a validation of man over machine, anointing and signaling his rebirth as he enters HAL’s
HAL’s “death” climaxes the film’s treatment of humanity as Tool-Maker and provides a necessary step toward the symbolic implications of […] the birth of the Star Child. Visually, […] the use of subjective camera devices and disorienting angles signifies the presence of an important internal struggle. Images of circles and corridors convert the interior of Discovery into a well-lit womb of death where hibernators are aborted, and one character, from the darkness of space, gains re-entry to destroy the tool […] and begin a new evolutionary cycle” (Nelson 123).
HAL, for all his humanity or inhumanity, for all his tragedy or evil, was thus a necessity, because “HAL’s ‘humanity’ (his madness) forces Bowman to rediscover his own,” ultimately “[stimulating] growth” (Nelson 142). Put another way, technology’s flaws of inherent violence thus force man to rediscover a new humanity, and a new path of higher consciousness.
VI. Conclusion
Any method of reading Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey becomes reductive or problematic in some way. As one critic put it, “Screwing with audiences’ heads was Stanley Kubrick’s favorite hobby outside of chess” and this film “remains Kubrick’s crowning, confounding achievement” (Verniere 1). HAL himself will always remain a mysterious black box filled with questions, questions about exactly what technology means to man, questions about where the lines are drawn, if any can be, between mimicking and recreating human emotions… questions about the future. In one interesting, small piece of dialogue while Frank and Dave discuss the option of disconnecting HAL, Dave says, “Well, I’m not so sure what he’d think of it.” Neither are we, but the line suggests that “at some emotional level, [he] cares about HAL’s existence” (Nofz 40). Perhaps that is all man can be expected to do -- care about, if not fully comprehend -- the existence and purpose of technology.
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