The Stanley Kubrick Exhibition

One of most iconic filmmaker in our generation was director Stanley Kubrick. His films stood out for being strange, weird and visually artistic. He did not make mainstream flicks like director Steven Spielberg or summer popcorn fluff like Michael Bay, Stanley Kubrick was unique. This was the last week of “The Stanley Kubrick Exhibition” at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco, so being cinema fans here at Retrenders, we stopped by the museum.

“The Stanley Kubrick Exhibition” is a Wikipedia of Stanley Kubrick’s history and filmography. One of the things I did not know, was he started out as a photographer. He was a talented 16-year photographer that started working for Look Magazine. This unique Kubrick gallery features many photographs he took for Look Magazine, props from his films, the camera equipment he used to film various films, and mini-replicas of sets from his movies like the War Room, the spaceship and the Huey helicopter. Kubrick was also a voracious reader when doing research for a films. A film he always wanted to make was on Napoleon which had him collecting and reading many books on him. He was meticulous in planning with detail shooting sheets, call sheets and budget sheets.

Cinema historians and Kubrick fanatics will really enjoy this Stanley Kubrick experience. His many films like Spartacus, Dr. Strangelove, A Clockwork Orange, 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Shining, Full Metal Jacket and Eyes Wide Shut will leave an impression and that was Stanley Kubrick.