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Ted Mahar Analyzes The Director 287
not know — and disregard for his personal safety is nothing less
than superhuman (and with superhuman results). That there is
no love and no sex in 2001 has irritated many critics, who then
clutch at straws by trying to find significance in HAL's asexual
voice ("androgynous," says Mahar, who goes on to remind us
that Kubrick actually emphasizes the lack of human sexual" contact
in many details: Floyd cannot even speak to his wife, the
female Russian scientist admits that her husband is always
away somewhere exploring the ocean floor, etc., and, as if that
were not enough, it is only the apes who are seen in family
groups). 2001 abounds in machinery of all kinds, machinery
which "smothers" the human beings ("machines are kind of
sexy," Mahar quotes Kubrick as saying), and as for unconventional
themes —2001 sets a new landmark.
Mahar' s development of these themes in other Kubrick films
is revealing. The failure of the man in control is illustrated by
Kirk Douglas in both Spartacus and Paths of Glory (noble fail-
ings, says Mahar). Indeed, Paths of Glory is a study of failures
of men in control, ending with the failure of the last instrument
of justice, the court-martial. Humbert Humbert (James Mason)
in Lolita became unable to control his love affair with a teenage
girl, and ends up a pathetic figure. Dr. Strangelove is about
little else but the failure of men charged with maintaining a failsafe
system.
The uselessness of words when one party to a dialogue is beyond
reach shows up throughout Kubrick films. In Paths of
Glory, Mahar points out, not all the words in the world could
"carry the simple message: the men on trial are innocent . . . be-
cause the court's mind had been made up for it before it had
even been convened."
In Lolita, Quilty (Peter Sellers) argues for his life with Humbert,
"but Humbert had gone beyond words, and he shot Quilty
down as calmly as if he were turning off the cold water." In
Dr. Strangelove, Peter Sellers as the U.S. President tries desperately
to talk to the Russian premier, but the premier is drunk.
The call of duty calls many Kubrick characters beyond the
point at which most men would follow. (Mahar also says that,
with the exception of Lolita. Kubrick favors quasi-military situations
where duty is of central importance.) Paths of Glory and
Spartacus focus on this kind of obedience to a higher valor: in
Lolita Humbert remains "loyal to his obsession." and Sterling
Hayden as General Ripper in Dr. Strangelove "was being
loyal to a personal obsession and felt that he was pushing the
system to its logical end anyway." (Slim Pickens as Major