Introduction
The movie of Stanley Kubrick: A Space Odyssey base on Clarke’s short story “The Sentinel”. The core theme of the movie was fiction and the story of Clarke reflects the same. “The Sentinel” provided the original basis for Kubrick’s film version and the story itself published after the film’s release. “A Space Odyssey” book reviews discuss the plot, characters and themes found in the story. One can learn more about the different literary elements that should be examined in the story. According to the plot of the movie the space navigators David Bowman and Frank Poole, along with three frozen hibernauts and a talkative computer named Hal, are aboard the spaceship Discovery on a mission to Saturn. They told that the purpose of the mission is to enter and explore the atmosphere of the planet. Trouble arises, however, when Hal announces that the computer's Fault Prediction Center indicates failure of one of the units within seventy-two hours (Angelo, 2003).
Although the faulty part, that is not the end of the astronauts' problems. Hal still insists there is trouble ahead. Faced with an increasingly frustrating and odd-behaving Hal, Bowman threatens to turn the computer off. Before long, navigator Poole, working outside the ship, disconnected from his safety lines and drifts off into space. The sleeping hibernauts also disconnected from the pods that maintain their bodies and die. Bowman left alone with Hal (Angelo, 2003). Realizing that the computer killed the others to protect itself, Bowman disconnects all of Hal's circuits and is truly alone in space.

Plot, Theme and Core Characters
The film's premise is that some unknown but benevolent extraterrestrial race has shepherded humanity's progress from primeval ignorance through space travel to eventual transformation into the “Star Child.” Another strong theme of 2001 is man's relationship with machines and the inherent dangers, although some commentators suggest that Clarke posits the machine as an intermediary along mankind's route to becoming entirely free of “the tyranny of matter.” In any case, both Kubrick's film and Clarke's book captured the public's imagination, and both will remain science fiction classics.
The central character in the story's first section is Moon-Watcher, the leader of a group of prehistoric man-apes chosen by the monolith to receive its knowledge (Otten, 1982). Before the arrival of the monolith, Moon-Watcher's group is close to starvation and too preoccupied with individual survival to understand the advantage of communal values. The monolith imparts information about how to survive (also, somewhat ominously, about how to kill one's fellow creatures) and thus allows Moon-Watcher and his companions to experience the benefits of quiet family living. In this way, the monolith serves as a guide and guardian to the developing human race. Clarke has been praised for his convincing portrayal of the rough but recognizably human emotions of Moon-Watcher, whose name refers to his lifelong wish to find a tree tall enough to allow him to touch the moon (Otten, 1982).
The second section of 2001 features Dr. Heywood Floyd, the chief space administrator of the United States. Floyd does not disclose to press the true purpose of his visit to the moon, which is to investigate the report of a monolith found during excavation there (Westfahl, Slusser, 2002). Contemplating the fact that the monolith has been on the moon for three million years, Floyd experiences a heightened awareness of time and of loneliness and vulnerability of the human race concepts prevalent in other parts of the story.
En route to Saturn, astronaut Frank Poole receives a recorded birthday greeting from his family on Earth, to which he reacts with a sense of remoteness, of increasing withdrawal from the rest of humanity, which he finds somewhat unnerving. Yet even as he becomes less emotional, Poole is not entirely machinelike either; he may be in a transitional state on the path to transcendence (Westfahl, Slusser, 2002). After Poole's death, Bowman consoles himself that his friend's floating body will reach Saturn before any other human being, so that even in death he will play a part in human development.
Like Poole, astronaut David Bowman is fluent in the robot-like “Technish” language in which the ship's functions performed, and his daily routine, strictly regulated (Williams, 2007). Yet he too retains some of his humanity, even as he finds himself listening to night to the eerie, inhuman hum of Jupiter's radiation on his radio. Whereas at one time Bowman enjoyed recorded plays, he now prefers the orderly music of Bach. The human problems examined in drama are too remote to interest him. He is losing his capacity for emotion, but he never loses contact with Earth until he enters the Star Gate (Williams, 2007). Rather, he broadcasts back his account of what has occurred aboard the Discovery. Bowman and Poole rely completely on Hal to communicate with Earth, to complete their mission, and to maintain life support systems, and Bowman can only dominate Hal when by donning a spacesuit he too becomes a machine.
The H.A.L. 9000 Computer known as ”Hal” is vital to the Discovery mission and its occupants' survival and is one of the most memorable mechanical characters in literature. With his cordial manner, conversational speech, and seemingly human emotions, Hal illustrates how humans interconnect with machines and how the line between the two may become blurred (Andrews, 2000). When the computer realizes that the two astronauts suspect it of having made a mistake, Hal reacts with wounded pride; when Bowman is about to deactivate its brain, the computer expresses fear. It is possible to view Bowman's victory over Hal as indicating the integrity of the human race over technology. Although this does seem to be the premise in Kubrick's film, in Clarke's story Hal is a more sympathetic character even more so, some critics say, than the Discovery's astronauts. The story explains that Hal malfunctions when Mission Control enters two conflicting commands. Not programmed to process such conflicts, Hal short-circuits and becomes “insane” (Andrews, 2000). The computer manifests a kind of likable personality in the film, and despite its killing four astronauts, it is a poignant moment when Bowman pulls Hal's plug.

Conclusion
2001: A Space Odyssey is a 1968 film directed by Stanley Kubrick based on Clarke's short story “The Sentinel.” Although some critics contend that the stunning visual images in Kubrick's film dwarf any impact the story has. Others claim that the film provides a clearer presentation of Clarke's themes. Like Clarke's other relevant work, Childhood's End, 2001 is infused with the concept of transcendence the possibility that the human race is evolving to some higher life-form. The story comprises three sections. The first, set on prehistoric Earth, involves a creature called Moon-Watcher who is apparently at some evolutionary stage between ape and man. He and his companions are slowly starving until they encounter a mysterious monolith that emits strange sounds and that singles out Moon-Watcher as the most intelligent of the band of man-apes. The monolith communicates such momentous survival knowledge as how to use a stone to kill prey and enemies. In the story's second section, Dr. Heywood Floyd travels to the moon to investigate a report of a monolith found there. With Floyd present, the monolith emits radio waves aimed at Saturn. The third section of 2001 centers on the journey of astronauts David Bowman and Frank Poole aboard the spaceship Discovery en route to Saturn.