Solaris

Rating:
Summary: Steven Soderbergh's Best Film
Review: .. And I stress 'film.' Mainsteam audiences will HATE this film. Most likely they will feel like they did upon watching Paul Thomas Anderson's Punch-Drunk Love, or Cameron Crowe's Vanilla Sky. Clooney will bring people to their seats, but it's Soderbergh who keeps film enthusiasts happy. At one point in the film, Clooney gives out a loud scream, hitting an emotional note that we've never seen from him. Gone is the calm, soft spoken "E.R." George Clooney. Steven Soderbergh's Solaris is like a sister film to Tarkovsky's Solaris. Both are works of great artists painting portraits of the same landscape. I would take Soderbergh's any day of the week though. Perhaps it hit me emotionally, but this film is just full of emotion. It's definately not a science fiction film, although it does have that element. No doubt about it though, this is like a soap opera set in space, with some very nerve wrecking scenes. I'm basically writing this review for people who are getting fooled by the advertisements. They are NOT selling you the film that you're going to see. For your consideration - Best Actor, George Clooney, Best Director, Steven Soderbergh, Best Picture, Solaris. Definately see it with your loved ones on Thanksgiving, honestly, it will bring you closer to them. How many films can say the same?

Rating:
Summary: 6 stars , but not for everyone !
Review: From director Steven Soderbergh ( "Kafka","Ocean's Eleven","Traffic","Erin Brokovich"...). Exellent adoptation of a sci-fi novel by Stanislav Lem , written few decades ago . In Russia it was adopted to the screen by one of the best - Andrey Tarkovski ( " Solaris ", 1979 - available on amazon and highly recomended ). Add to the list exellent acting by George Clooney... what else do we need ? Great visual effects ? They've got that . A very good story ?
There is a planet , covered by alife ocean . We think - it is intellegent , but we don't know for shure . We build a research lab there to find out ... And gess what - we did . The ocean takes your deep thout , your dippest lost and pain ... and bring it back to you ALIFE ...
But get ready not for a cheap sci-fi film . Get ready for a much dipper scicological drama of making a choice ( do not forget - it is Steven Soderbergh's film ). What would you do ? You lost someone in your life . Someone , you still love ... and many years later , on a strange planet she comes back . Is she real or a clone ... Watch the movie - you'll find out .
HIGHLY RECOMENDED !

Rating:
Summary: COME & GET IT
Review: If you suffer a sleeping disorder this movie will guarentee you instant relief. Come and get it! It was totally out of this world, literally. Solaris belongs in the 60's era when movies were at there worst. Don't waste your time energy or money on this masterpiece of drivel.

The only redeeming feature about this film is George Cloony's good looks and when the film ended. NUMBER ONE WINNER for the academy award for WORST FILM. It even beats the Killer Tomatoes and that's saying something.

Rating:
Summary: Your shrink would like Solaris, but it's not for normal folk
Review: On the up side, good sets and costumes. Lame special effects combo with a plot so crippled that it's wheelchair needs crutches. George Clooney, bless his handsome heart, is unable to rescue this total waste of mind with his limited acting range, although you can see him painfully trying. Unless you are really into abnormal foresnic psychology then within 15 minutes of watching Solaris you will be asking yourself if you really want to sit through the rest of it. I did, and I did sit through the rest and it wasn't worth it. Buy another movie.

Rating:
Summary: Risks are welcome but failures are noticed
Review: There's no reason why more than one strong movie version of Solaris can't exist. But they don't.

I looked forward to this version. The web site was well-done: I wonder if the budget for the web site exceeded Tarkovsky's budget for his entire movie (in the same currency and adjusted to today).

I had seen Tarkovksy's version about 5 times. I had not read Lem's novel. I didn't mind Tarkovsky''s pace but I was intrigued to see what I had heard would be a more stream-lined movie. I was surprised to find that Soderbergh's version, although an hour shorter, was painful to sit thru. The final half hour I found excruciating. Oddly, despite all the modern special effects, Tarkovsky's version towers over this one in the imaginativeness of the space station and the ocean.

Soderbergh's Solaris is one of the worst movies I've seen. Bad casting, poor acting, awful flow, mangled vision: it's the kind of film that makes one appreciate how good a job most filmmakers do. Most films may not interest me, they may not be well-acted, but most seem to have some flow and basic sense. I don't think this one did.

I paid $1 to see this film: it had made its way quickly to a more than half-empty discount theater. Much more than a usual number of viewers walked out early.

If you do want to see this film, first read Lem's novel "Solaris". I did recently and loved it. It makes sense so it may help make up for this lack of sense in Soiderbergh's movie. After reading the book, if you don't like it, I'd still recommend seeing Tartovsky's movie. You may not like it but its visually so compelling that it may realize Lem's vision (and Tarktovsky's) for you. If after experiencing Lem's Solaris and Tarkoveky's Solaris, you're still curious, by all means see Soderbergh's take if it still intigues you. But if you see Soderbergh's Solaris first, you may decide that any Solaris is rubbish and fail to experience what Lem and/or Tarkovsky have in store for you.

Risks are welcome. But having made an awful movie, it would have been better, if not short-term financially then certainly for artistic integrity and even future commerical respect, to have never released this movie. Or at least to have reworked it heavily before releasing it. Not because of how good Lem's work is, not because of how good Tarkovsky's work is, but because if failures, espeically big failures like this one, are not acknowledged and learned from, one is apt to repeat them.

What do I know? Just how much I enjoyed and will continue to enjoy Lem's Solaris and Tarkovsky's Solaris. And what a waste Soderbergh's film was. An insult. Not to have made but to have released. I remained silent about this film, even in spite of how weak it is next to Tarkovsky. But when I read Lem, it's too much.

If you want to understand Solaris, go read the reviews for Lem's book, go read the reviews for Tarkovsky's movie. Don't lose time here. This is a story about the most extraordinary intelligence, but this film seems devoid of intelligence.

Rating:
Summary: sad but true
Review: I nearly fell asleep in the first 20 minutes, and frankly I could not get past those first 20. I wanted very much to like this film because it seemed like an interesting premise/idea. The Russian original was certainly to my liking. Unfortunately, though, this was just very dry and difficult to follow.

Rating:
Summary: This movie is cinematically beautiful
Review: Ignore the story, ignore the dialogue; this is one of the most beautiful and cinematic films I have ever seen. The score (by minimalist, synth-loving Cliff Martinez, now well-known for his score to Wicker Park) carries the film and is so well edited and meshed with the scenes and cuts, it is unforgettable. The cinematography in this film is some of the best I have ever seen, lighting, perspective, angles, all rendered near-perfect. Just a gorgeous movie to watch. A great feature on the DVD: isolated music score--watch this film on a widescreen, flat panel tv, music only (draw the curtains, close the doors; be sure to have your surround system placed correctly)...it will draw tears. After you've really 'watched' the film, go back and listen to the story; this is NOT a 'I'm bored on Friday night, let's rent a flick' kind of film. you have to take your time with it, but it's worth it in the end.

Rating:
Summary: Solaris, the great teacher
Review:
The movie Solaris based on the book is not a great movie but it is brilliant for the questions it raises when one stops to consider the implications. What is Solaris trying to communicate to us? Is it just trying to please us, toy with us or is it trying to teach us something? Each is searching for the truth as a scientist and a human being. One of the themes portrayed in this story is the search for truth. The two main methods of searching for it are outwardly through science and inwardly through inner enquiry. Further more each character in the story is forced to face a conflict within themselves and with each other about what is real and what is not.

Let's start with the question, "What is love?" Kelvin is in love with Rheya (again) but not the real Rheya... Rheya is in every detail exactly taken from Kelvin's memory. Although he knows that she is not the same person the love he feels for her is real because it is based on a real person in his past.

First let's look at the differences between he two Rheya's. We know that physically there are two Rheya's, we know one is real from earth and one is 'real' as in recreated living functioning human (but not the same person) in Solaris. We also could suggest that there may also be at some point behavioural differences between the two Rheya's. The Solaris Rheya's is programmed by Kelvin's memory and the Earth Rheya is not allowing the Earth Rheya more freedom of choice of behaviour.

Now let's explore Rheya from Kelvin's point of view. Kelvin is plagued by the fact that Rheya on the space station is not real. He knows she is not the same women. The Rheya on earth was real, the Solaris Rheya is just a copy based on his memory (his stored perception of her). At this point begin to realise that there is actually no difference, from Kelvin's point of view, between the Earth Rheya and the Solaris Rheya. The Rheya on earth was never anything more than Kelvin's perception of her.

Going further we realise that this is actually exactly how it works for all of us in our relationships on earth. So we ask ourselves, "What is love?" and we realise that our love is actually based not on the real person but on our perception of that person. Our feelings for another person are based on an inner relationship between ourselves and the mental image we have created of that person in our minds. This mental image is constantly updated by our perception of that person. Our perception is individual and biased, modified by our life's experience and many other factors. None of this is reality; none of this is truth and can never be argued as truth. However there is no other way to experience the world. We live in this fantasy, we have no choice. The only thing we can choose is be aware (in thought and action) that we live in a fantasy (a mental representation that is different from physical reality) or we can pretend that our fantasy it is real.

Let's not stop there; we can go further, if it is like this with Kelvin (Subject) and Rheya (object) in relationship then is it true for all subject object relationships? Between Kelvin and everything he perceives? We know that there is a physical reality, that there is an ultimate truth but we also know that it is impossible to reach using our same object subject based experience of reality. So the question remains what is left. "How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?" - Arthur Conan Doyle

The story reveals that in essence the scientist and the spiritual human are the same... both seekers of the truth albeit with different approaches. The scientist searches for the Truth externally through subject object observation of the world. He seeks a way to study the world without his bias of perception so he devises methods to do this validation 'mental concepts' using instruments, methodology and peer review.

A spiritual human searches for the Truth internally. His search begins realising (consciously or unconsciously) that he is living in his own fantasy (a mentally constructed world). Deciding it is impossible to move beyond subject object relationships by looking externally he seeks internally. He seeks to examine the cause of this and then to see if he can move beyond it. He seeks to wake from this fantasy but finds nothing but his own seeking. It may take him a long time to realise that the answer is obvious. He thinks he has found nothing but he has found the looking. So this is where he turns his attention.

The subject object mind creates separation between the two. Separation will always cause an indirect experience and thus no experience or understanding of truth (reality). In order to experience the truth (reality) there can be no separation from it. He decides to turn his attention away from examining objects (the observed) towards examining the subject (the observer; his awareness; his consciousness). Who is looking? Who is being aware? Is it possible to exist in a state of awareness without object? Is that reality (truth)? Solaris raises the possibility that in order to understand the universe we must first understand ourselves.

"Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes." - C. G. Jung


Rating:
Summary: ONE OF THE WORST FILMS OF ALL TIME!!!
Review: TERRIBLE!!! UNBELIEVABLY BORING!!! DESERVES "ZERO STARS"!!!!

Rating:
Summary: Clooney gives one of his best...Solaris is a great movie
Review: George Clooney (Oceans 11 and 12, From Dusk Till Dawn) brings you into the life of Chris Kelvin who ventures up to a space station called Solaris where he finds that there are only two people left on the ship and the rest of the crew has vanished, so he interrogates the 2 to find out what happened and also in the process he starts to see his dead wife, Natascha McElhone (Laurel Canyon, Truman Show) and then he finds out the real truth of what happened on that ship. A powerfully hypnotic and tense movie with Clooney at the top of his game giving one of his best performances and McElhone has never been more beautiful. Also starring Jeremy Davies (Spanking The Monkey, Going All The Way) and Viola Davis. Directed by Steven Soderbergh and produced by James Cameron.