: David Bowman and Frank Poole live in close proximity for months but interact with a professional coldness that mirrors the machine they serve.

: Some critics argue that the film’s "romance" is actually between Man and Technology or Man and the Cosmos . The journey to Jupiter has been analyzed as a metaphorical process of "impregnation" and rebirth, with the Monolith acting as a mysterious, feminine catalyst for human evolution. HAL 9000: The Only "Emotional" Relationship

In the 1968 masterpiece, "romantic storylines" are practically non-existent. The human characters— Dr. Heywood Floyd , David Bowman , and Frank Poole —are depicted as stoic and emotionally detached.