2001: A Space Odyssey, the groundbreaking film by Stanley Kubrick, celebrated its 50th anniversary this month, a milestone for a film that remains unlike no other.

Transcending its face value of a science fiction movie, 2001: A Space Odyssey, which polarized audiences and critics alike upon its first release in April 1968, remains a visual allegory for a multitude of complex ideas that spread social, humanistic, societal, and ultimately spiritual aspects. Birth, death, and reawakening act as common and essential threads through the entire narrative, and it acts as multitudes of tones and styles interwoven throughout, with dazzling visual spectacles that arrest and envelope sensory perception in ways almost unheard of in cinema prior to 1968. It’s a monumental film, a true epic in the greatest light possible, and it remains a cornerstone of inspiration, wonderment, and an apex of what the cinema can really do and how far it can go.