August 25 movie: Solaris. Wow. Didn't I just say that I most enjoy science fiction about ideas? Boy howdy, did I get my wish with Solaris.
It should be no surprise that I thought it was brilliant. Best movie I've seen in ages. An extreme illustration of the principle that big special effects are not necessary for a science fiction movie. Solaris is an intense, immersive experience with almost no special effects. The set design of the space station is magnificent. A huge place, nearly empty, neglected and littered with debris. It speaks volumes about the lost aspirations of the project, and the mental unraveling of the remaining scientists.
The movie is extremely atmospheric. The set design and the soundtrack work together so well. So much so that to be honest, I wish I hadn't watched it while Georg was out of town. There was something very creepy about the space station. Cree-pee. I had to keep reminding myself that it wasn't Alien, a monster wasn't going to leap out of anyone's stomach and start eating people. Which, of course, I didn't know for sure. But I figured that if it was actually a scifi horror movie I would have heard that.
I only knew the barest plot outline going in: it takes place on a space station, and the main character's dead wife appears to him. Of course, plot isn't really the point. The movie is a complex meditation on, well on a lot of things. Identity, the subjective nature of truth, emotion vs. reason, guilt and regret, the desire to return to the past and undo past mistakes. Lots to think about. Right now I'm thinking about the irony of Kris' wife, or of her manifestation I should say. From the beginning she knows something is wrong, but at first she thinks she's has amnesia or epilepsy or something. As she spends more time "alive," she develops enough mentally and emotionally to realize what she is. The more real she becomes, the more she understands the unreality of her own existence. At first Kris is so repelled by her that he tries to kill her, and by the end he needs her more than she needs him. [Kind of a spoiler: In trying to undo a tragic loss from the past, Kris causes the same tragedy to happen all over again. This same idea shows up in the Time Machine remake, of all places, except in that movie it's a hilarious failure.]
Comparisons to 2001: A Space Odyssey are obvious of course. But while I was watching it I was reminded more of the Kore-eda movie Maborosi. The slow, meditative pace, the dreamlike unreal quality, and theme of a spouse's suicide. With very little narrative, almost no pans and almost all long shots, Maborosi was much more distancing than Solaris. It was more like viewing a series of paintings than like watching a movie. At the time I thought it boring. (I much preferred After Life by the same director.) Though I found myself thinking about it for weeks afterwards. I wonder if I would enjoy Maborosi better now.
One thing confused me: After finishing Solaris I read a few reviews, a couple of which described the ending as "ambiguous" or a "twist". To me the ending seemed to be fairly straightforward, and seemed the natural conclusion of the story. Beautiful, lyrical, and not a surprise. Was my reading of the end overly simplistic? I'd like to watch it again with the commentary on before sending it back.
I'm also wondering whether I should watch the remake of Solaris. It's by Soderbergh, so I wouldn't expect a stinker like so many science fiction remakes. I heard it was more of a love story. I wonder if anyone who has seen both can comment on the relative merits.
1 Comments
I meant to comment on your earlier sf-post, but never got around to it.
I think what I want from an sf movie, like any other movie, is good writing, good acting, good directing.
And hopefully something that will make me think, and/or emotional involvement, and/or a sense of wonder.
I've only seen the recent remake of Solaris (read the book though, ages ago) and I really liked it; very sad, but not in a horrible way.
Good acting too by George Clooney (who I tend to like in his 'weirder' roles, like in 'Oh, Brother').
Beautifully shot movie, and the atmosphere on the ship was stifling and claustrophobic.
The ending as I remember it was a bit ambiguous the first time I watched it, but quite clear the second time (or perhaps I'd just decided what I *wanted* to happen).
I think what sf can have that other movies (or books) usually don't is a sense of... strangeness, otherness, new ideas (and of course, it usually tends to be a commentary on the current culture than any kind of speculative future).
The first two sf movies that made a big impression on me were Westworld (where you see Yul Brynner's viewpoint sometimes, which was really interesting to me) and Phase IV; the latter in any case is probably more of a horror movie.
I saw them both on German tv I think, when I was about 8 or 9 years old; I think for both of them, what struck me was the idea that there were things/creatures that were *so* completely alien to us, but that at least in the movie, you could still somehow get a sense of them. It was as if I was on the outside looking in on humanity, myself.
Hm, I must have been a rather odd kid... ;-)