Top left: From the analysis of Michael Mann's Thief (on this blog), the third level down from the top of the Bank of California building (shown), represents the fourth circle of Dante's Inferno (Hell), in which the greedy are punished, if we consider the first circle (Limbo) to be represented by the world outside the building, i.e., the world occupied by Frank, Leo, and the other characters. The point as far as our analysis of 2001, is that Mann is drawing a connection between tall buildings and the levels of Dante's Hell.[a] Top right: Vacuum tubes in an electronic device, in serial killer Francis Dollarhyde's house in Manhunter. In the audio commentary for the "Director's Cut" version of the movie DVD, Mann says that the real-life serial killer on whom he based the Dollarhyde character, Dennis Wayne Wallace, believed that the spark in a vacuum tube held a clue to his identity, and he also believed that within each tube was his "own little Empire State Building." Note that the small black wafers inside each tube look similar to miniature monoliths. The point is that Mann is drawing a correspondence between the monolith and tall buildings, and by inference, between the monolith and the circles of Hell. Above left: From Mann's Collateral: Vincent (at right-hand side of screencap) momentarily pauses in a subway station while pursuing Annie and Max. In the audio commentary for Collateral, Mann says he intentionally shot this scene so as to show a lot of metal, as if the characters are "in a tube." Above right: Vincent has now boarded the same subway train that Annie and Max are on. In the audio commentary, Mann says he purposely intended for the lights as seen through the subway car windows here, to consist of rectangular arrays. The rectangles represent small monoliths, and Mann is using the movement of the subway car through a tunnel to represent Discovery One's movement through the stargate, i.e., 'through' the monolith while it floats near Jupiter; we are then supposed to derive the idea from the connections made above (monoliths/tubes/tall buildings/circles of Hell) that when Bowman moves through the stargate, this represents his movement through the circles of Hell.
Above left and right: As Bowman moves through the stargate, he sees various patterns of colored light. As will be explained later in the analysis, the stargate is a wormhole that connects Jupiter space with Earth space. A wormhole can be thought of as a kind of tunnel.
In this view of the stargate, the red area 'flowing' under the diamond-shaped objects represents the Styx, a river in the fifth circle of Dante's Hell.
a. In Inferno, the circles of Hell lie on successive below-ground levels.
