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I have a burning need to know stuff and I love asking awkward questions.

Monday, January 13, 2014


My Favourite Movies: Solaris

I’ve attempted to watch the original 1972 Russian version of this movie several times and failed. Possibly because they usually show it after midnight and for an almost 3 hour film in Russian you really need to be wide awake! So I was rather intrigued when Hollywood decided to make an English language version with George Clooney starring. The fact that it was only 94 minutes rather than 167 was just icing on the cake at this point. So intrigued I went along to my local multiplex (with some friends in tow I remember) and sat through what turned out to be a very strange but very interesting experience.

From what I remember of the parts of the Russian version I think that they got the tone right. The director Steven Soderbergh has managed to create a film the likes of which we rarely see these days, thoughtful, mysterious, ambiguous and, by and large, unresolved. The music and the visuals create an other-worldly and deeply claustrophobic atmosphere that pulls you into the situation and the lives of the people involved. But I’m getting ahead of myself here.


As the film opens we are dropped straight into the middle of things. Clooney plays eminent psychologist Chris Kelvin and we see him running sessions and giving advice on the phone but something is clearly missing in his life. He is like a drowning man desperately holding on to a piece of flotsam, a man going through the motions. When he’s contacted by a private company to help them with a problem on one of their space stations orbiting the newly discovered planet of Solaris he says yes. After all the lead scientist is a friend of his and the video message calling for his help is full of things left unsaid. On arrival he finds the station in chaos. He finds that his friend has apparently killed himself and that another scientist Gordon (played superbly by Viola Davis) refuses to leave her room. Most mysterious of all is the child he sees and chases only to lose him somewhere on the station. The boy is, so the other surviving scientists (played equally superbly by Jeremy Davies) states, is his friends son who should be on Earth light-years away. Only after he goes to sleep and dreams of his troubled past does Kelvin begin to understand exactly what’s going on here – when he wakes to find his wife (played by the striking Natascha McElhone) in bed next to him. Of course that’s impossible. Not only is Earth light-years away but Rheya has been dead for several years. So who or what exactly is she? Too traumatised to cope with the situation Kelvin talks Rheya into stepped into one of the stations shuttle craft and launches it into space. The next morning with door locked and barricaded Kelvin wakes up with Rheya next to him apparently unaware of what happened to her predecessor. Kelvin now decides to investigate exactly what’s happening to everyone on the station while Rheya has increasingly detailed flash-backs of their life together and discovers the horrible truth. Not only is she not the real, original Rheya but that her original killed himself back on Earth.


There are, as I’ve already hinted, many things to like about this film. It’s definitely out of the ordinary which is often a good thing, the music, though understated, is haunting and the cinematography (yes, that again) is a work of genius. The thing that I found most surprising, and which honestly delighted me was that nothing was truly resolved in the movie – though there is a sort of happy ending which apparently doesn’t appear in the original book version. As one of the characters (post-suicide rather oddly) says: There are no answers, only choices. It seems to be clear that the planet below them is somehow alive. It’s only really hinted at in the film by the almost brain-like activity in the world spanning ocean. It’s possible that Solaris is attempting communication with the humans in the orbital but that’s not made clear and the constructs have no idea why they are there and seem to have no real link back to the planet. What speculation that does take place goes nowhere. No one really knows what is going on or even how the frame the questions that might point them in the right direction. At the end of the film we are no closer to any kind of understanding. It’s just weird – but in a good way. I suppose that it’s all about our arrogant belief that the universe is understandable and that we are capable of understanding it. Clearly from this example we’re just not – at all. It’s good to see us come up against a problem and to be completely stumped by it. It makes you wonder what else we don’t understand and what we may never understand. I suppose that it’s humbling in a way – which, again, is good to reflect on. So many films show us humans pulling rabbits out of hats at the last moment and saving the day. Image a time when there are no rabbits and we can’t even find our hat. Thoughtful just isn’t the word for it. This is the kind of movie that will get inside your head and stay there for weeks afterwards. But expect to be frustrated and expect to be confused. Just don’t expect to be enlightened.

8 comments:

VV said...

That sounds so intriguing! I have to see it! Plus, I'll get to look at George Clooney.

CyberKitten said...

Oh, I have to warn you.... in some scenes he's naked......

VV said...

Gasp! Really? I wonder if Netflix has it on streaming NOW? ;-)

VV said...

I feel let down, betrayed! Solaris is not available for streaming on Netflix!

CyberKitten said...

...and I built your hopes up so high......

dbackdad said...

CK said, "The thing that I found most surprising, and which honestly delighted me was that nothing was truly resolved in the movie ..." -- Too true. And this is something that mainstream American films have a real problem with. They assume (perhaps rightly) that the audience are complete morons and everything needs to be explained and wrapped up in a tidy little bow.

I did like this movie ... and Lem's book. Have you read the book? I've read this and have another Lem book, Return from the Stars that I haven't read yet.

CyberKitten said...

dbackdad said: They assume (perhaps rightly) that the audience are complete morons and everything needs to be explained and wrapped up in a tidy little bow.

I think that its certainly partially the studios assuming that their audiences are basically stupid - whether or not they are is a whole other matter.In my experience very few people want to be provoked to think about things and ambiguity - especially about endings - can really confuse and anger them. People (in general) to like answers far more than questions!

dbackdad said: I did like this movie ... and Lem's book. Have you read the book?

No, I haven't read this but I read another of his decades ago. It was suitably weird and it may have put me off reading more. I did think he was a kind of Eastern European Philip K Dick... [grin] I might pick it up at some point. Not that I'm expecting it to *explain* anything [rotflmao].

Karlo said...

I`ve got to see this!