I don’t typically post arbitrary Youtube videos here on the website.  I had all but decided not to post it when I realized that I could not, NOT post it.  This isn’t going to become a regular occurrence, and when my wife questioned the secretly-importantness of this video all I had to do was look and realize that the video has just 225 views.  That means that only 225 people have seen the brilliance of this 18:01 minute video.  Presumably at least 200 of those views were from KittyCat5341, the screen name of the uploader.

I was writing an article and needed a refresher on a scene from 2001 A Space Odyssey, while in Youtube I stumbled across this video titled Let’s Watch 2001 A Space Odyssey Part 1: Rise of the Monkeys!!  My initial thought was that this was a fan film, or some crazy recut of 2001.  It’s not.  This is a girl with a video camera taping herself watching 2001 for the first time.  She freely admits that she basically knows nothing about the film, in fact in the video she incorrectly says that it was made in the 80’s, and while reading the credits can’t pronounce Stanley Kubrick’s name.

It’s actually a pretty genius idea, 2001 is a classic, you’ve probably heard of HAL 9000 or his infamous line “I’m sorry Dave, I can’t do that.” It’s probably an even greater guarantee that you’ve heard the films theme Also Sprach Zarathustra.  You’re probably also aware that this is an epic 161 minute marathon of a film, broken up into four parts, The Dawn of Man, TMA-1, Jupiter Mission, Jupiter and Beyond the infinite.  That here we have a person who apparently knows none of that, is a recipe for some amazing moments.  It’s like that video of those kids watching the Empire Strikes Back for the first time and learning that (spoiler alert) Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker’s father.

Having seen 2001 is not a requirement to enjoy this video, but if you have seen the film or at least know some of the aforementioned details, then you will find yourself rolling on the floor dying of laughter.  At the beginning the narrator tells us that people/the internet has told her that this is a “really good space/science fiction movie, and that it has robots in it.”  It does not have robots.

Basically from that point forward she bullheadedly narrates every moment of the films first fifteen minutes or so.  Here are some of the highlights,

-Having her mind blown to confusion during the films black screen overture, which she fast forwards through, accidentally resets to the beginning, and genuinely believes that the recording only captured the sound.

-Believing that the film is set on Mars, (The Dawn of Man) wasn’t a good hint that it’s earth.

-Naming everything in the film incorrectly.  Calling the Tapir a pig “boars to be exact” the Jaguar she calls a cougar… and so on.

-Her belief that the Man Apes were actual monkeys, it was an afterthought that it was someone wearing a costume.

-When she realizes just how long the movie is: “if it’s about space I don’t mind, if it’s about monkeys I do mind, and I’m going to skip it.”

-When the “monkeys” fight: “this scene reminds me of politics really, this is what I see every time I hear the frickin politics blow up my sound system. With their bull crap.”

-When she sees that the film is rated G: “there’s no swearing or funny parts in it then.”

-Her hatred of static landscape shots.

I could go on and on.  This video is incredible in every way, but what might be most amazing is that she stops the film before they ever get to space.  Now that I’ve seen her commentary of the first fifteen minutes all I want is to hear her talk about all the other crazy shit that happens in this film.  I would pay money to hear her interpret the films final half hour leading up to the Star Child moment.  Oh. My. God. she has no idea what she missed.

This video was posted back in August of 2012, though it’s labeled part 1, there is yet to be a part two.  Did she never finish the movie?  Did she finish it and never upload the videos?  Did 2001 melt her brain?  So many questions and so few answers.  All I know is that after watching this 18 minute video I want KittyCat5341 to narrate every film I watch.  Prometheus, I so badly want her to narrate Prometheus for me.

Before watching the video my wife asked if this was a joke, and while that crossed my mind, I’m fairly certain that this is real. Even if this video was fake, very little of it’s amazingness would be lost, because only a crazy person would fake a video of themselves watching 2001 A Space Odyssey and pretend that they were seeing it for the first time.

It’s been hours since I first watched this video and all I can think about is how badly I want to meet this person, and then hear their opinions on… everything.