2001 is not only the best sci-fi movie ever, it is one of the best movies ever. No other movie has realistically portrayed what space travel for humans would be like.
http://www.suntimes.com/ebert/greatm...e_odyssey.html
The genius is not in how much Stanley Kubrick does in ``2001: A Space Odyssey,'' but in how little. This is the work of an artist so sublimely confident that he doesn't include a single shot simply to keep our attention. He reduces each scene to its essence, and leaves it on screen long enough for us to contemplate it, to inhabit it in our imaginations. Alone among science-fiction movies, ``2001'' is not concerned with thrilling us, but with inspiring our awe
Only a few films are transcendent, and work upon our minds and imaginations like music or prayer or a vast belittling landscape. Most movies are about characters with a goal in mind, who obtain it after difficulties either comic or dramatic. ``2001: A Space Odyssey'' is not about a goal but about a quest, a need. It does not hook its effects on specific plot points, nor does it ask us to identify with Dave Bowman or any other character. It says to us: We became men when we learned to think. Our minds have given us the tools to understand where we live and who we are. Now it is time to move on to the next step, to know that we live not on a planet but among the stars, and that we are not flesh but intelligence.
Terminator is a cartoon in comparison. All fiction, no science.