In celebration of the film’s 50th anniversary, a brand-new 70mm print of Stanley Kubrick’s landmark sci-fi masterpiece, 2001: A Space Odyssey, lands at The Loft Cinema for one week only, June 22 to 28. This gorgeous new 70mm print is being struck from the original camera negative, meaning that audiences will see the film the same way moviegoers did in 1968.

Based on Arthur C. Clark’s story, The Sentinel, this mind-blowing meditation on technology and humanity thrillingly hypothesizes mankind’s evolution from ape to astronaut to celestial being, while scientists Dave Bowman and Frank Poole do battle with a snarky artificial intelligence unit named HAL and eventually try to crack the mystery of those baffling black monoliths. With assistance from special effects expert Douglas Trumbull, Kubrick spent over two years meticulously creating the most “realistic” depictions of outer space ever seen, greatly advancing cinematic technology in service of a story expressing grave doubts about technology itself.

Eschewing traditional narrative structure and embracing a tone of mythic transcendence, 2001, provocatively promoted as “the ultimate trip”, quickly caught on with the late ‘60s counterculture audience open to a contemplative viewing experience of a film carefully designed to take them on a journey they would never forget. Nominated for four Academy Awards and a winner for its landmark visual effects, 2001 stands today as one of the all-time great science fiction classics.

Location: 3233 E. Speedway Blvd., Tucson. For more information, call 520-795-0844, email [email protected] or visit LoftCinema.org. See ad, page 10.