Am I that simple-minded or does "Solaris" just suck?

jeffyboy

SPOILERS, AHOY!



Saw the movie tonight and went in knowing this was an artistic sort of Sci-fi.



That said-WTF?



I HATE it when movies are unresolved, or 'leave it up to the viewer to draw their own conclusions."



IMO, this was the worst example of that sort of film. There was a love story I wasn't really touched by, a planet (?) that seemed to be it's own living entity with the ability to read minds and create it's own humans from memories, a person who's "visitor" we never got to see, and an ending that leaves you wondering what reality the protagonist is left in.



And on top of all that, it was just boring in general!



I guess the point may be to make you ask these questions and just think in general, but I don't really care what the answers are, I'm just not happy having wasted $15 and an hour and a half of my life having them put in my head.



Sometimes I wonder if highly respected artists sometimes decide to put a bunch of meaningless crap out there and watch intellectual types line up to say "I TOTALLY got that."





Jeff

jeffyboy

[quote]Sometimes I wonder if highly respected artists sometimes decide to put a bunch of meaningless crap out there and watch intellectual types line up to say "I TOTALLY got that."

<hr></blockquote>



Actually, now that I think about it, I remember an interview where John Lennon pretty much admitted that's all "I Am The Walrus" was.



But at least we got a catchy tune out of that!





Jeff

dygysy

I saw Solaris last night, fell asleep during the first half of the movie.



The second half was better, it tried to be kind of Stanley Kubrickish but didn't make it.

giaguara

Ah, you were talking about the film... i thought about Solaris.. well. it takes ages before that film comes to Europe..

doctorgonzo

Personally, I loved it. Die Another Day made me want to throw myself into a vat of acid, though. What an insanely horrible movie.

outsider

The movie was OK, but there were long stretches with no dialogue, and not having the benefit of reading the book, I was lost not even knowing that that sphere Solaris was orbiting WAS. I mean, it was obviously in our solar system, but it wasn't a planet or moon we're familiar with. Maybe i need to read the book, this will drive me crazy until I understand.

artman @_@

Their was a <a href="http://us.imdb.com/Title?0069293"; target="_blank">Russian</a> movie ("Solyaris") directed by Andrei Tarkovsky in the '70's. Twice as long and to many twice as boring. I have never seen all of it but it is visually beautiful.



So, Hollywood again steals another idea and makes it worse. And isn't that ironic that it's Steven Soderbergh...the man who took an English mini series and made a Academy Award winning take off of that...ironic...

shawnpatrickjoyce

Considering that George Clooney starred, Steven Soderberg directed, and James Cameron produced the film, I am skeptical that the movie could be bad enough to regret ever seeing it. <img src="graemlins/bugeye.gif" border="0" alt="[Skeptical]" />

artman @_@

...oh yeah, and he re-made Ocean's 11... <img src="graemlins/hmmm.gif" border="0" alt="[Hmmm]" />

shawnpatrickjoyce

I am talking about the team, not one individual aspect of it. "Yeah and Clooney was on ER"

shawnpatrickjoyce

Anyway I'm talking about how likely that team is to produce a movie that would be totally regrettable to watch, especially since it has a <a href="http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/Solaris-1118327/"; target="_blank">65% Fresh</a>Rating at RottenTomatoes.com.

pfflam

I don't get what people don't get about this film?



The entire audience here in P-town hated the flm.

I thought it was moving and powerfull, though a touch too stylish.



Its a poetic tale about a huge mind that reads and emenates our deeper unconsciouse desires and memories. To lay out the blunt, explicit meaning.



The movie lays out enormous questions: running the gammut from what is consciousness?, what is being? how and when do you say that another consciousness is real?, are our memories of people in any way adequate to the reality of otherness? are our memories which constitute our experience adequate to experience? to the real world at all? etc



it also is a metaphore for different levels of human being: from unconsciouse to consciouse to being with Being in that darn Heideggerian sense.



You should sit through the Andry Tarkovsky version.

In that version the emenations are not all nice memories and the ending is not so obviously a good-feeling religious metaphor. Tarkovskies ending is visceral and very enigmatic. The problem with the Russian version, if it can be said to be a problem, is that he didn't take his movie down a level to please an audience, so he doesn't spell it all out in a series of conversations as does Soderbergh . . . Allthough I think these scenes were important to the whole take: the dinner conversation, the two lovers talking; she mentions having to converse to her mother through psudonyms and letters . . .while Clooney only thinks about himself . . . etc . .



My problem with the American version is that it is too beautiful. Why did he use George Clooney and that beautifull actress? (I guess she looks like the actress in the Russian version) but anyway, he made this movie as if it was supposed to appeal to the people that came to see Clooney's butt . . . but clearly, a story like this is not going to appeal to people who want explosions or nakedness. . .



its where entertainment turns into something other than just going to be entertained (finally Soderbergh makes me think that he has some real artistic sensibility instead of just faking it) And since he is striving for that then why package it in the wraps of Hollywood style?



Anyway I was glad to see that Soderbergh actually dared to alienate an audience instead of merely pander to a Hollywood idea of 'Art film' even if there still is some pandering going on



Great musical and sound score!!

pfflam

let me rephrase that to answer your question:



No, Solaris does not suck, definitively not.

and perhaps, when it comes to watching film (as opposed to moovees), you are si.............?!?!



[ 12-02-2002: Message edited by: pfflam ]</p>

outsider

pfflam, have you read the book? Is it worth picking up? I liked the stylistic aspect of the movie but felt lost like someone who just installed a complex modelling software package with no help system or manual.

jeffyboy

[quote]No, Solaris does not suck, definitively not.

and perhaps, when it comes to watching film (as opposed to moovees), you are si.............?!?! <hr></blockquote>



I'm glad some people liked it. I'm more than willing to admit I'm a rube about some things.



But, I will say this:

[quote]running the gammut from what is consciousness?, what is being? how and when do you say that another consciousness is real?, are our memories of people in any way adequate to the reality of otherness? are our memories which constitute our experience adequate to experience? to the real world at all?<hr></blockquote>



I loved Vanilla Sky. To me it brought up a lot of the same sort of issues you mention here, but in a way that kept me entertained, and with a satisfying ending that resolved the plot in a clever way.



Solaris kept me lost as to what was happening in much the same way VS did, but never let me in on the secret. It played to me like a whodunnit where you never find out who.



Maybe I'm too conditioned to the "beginning, middle, and end" formula of storytelling?



Jeff



[ 12-02-2002: Message edited by: jeffyboy ]</p>

jeffyboy

ShawnPatrickJoyce:



I think you can get a good idea what someone will like if they post in AO a lot, and I'd be surprised if this was your cup of tea.



Just a guess, though.



Jeff

_ alliance _

i read the book twice. damn good story. Lem is a genius. however, the movie just sucked. plain and simple. they cut out all but maybe 50 pages of the book and only put in the "happy" parts, leaving the story incomplete and meaningless. i read the book and yet still had no idea what the hell they were trying to accomplish in the movie. they tried too hard to make it artsy and failed miserably. what a waste of time and money. and i'm usually the type who enjoys movies that make u think. this had no thinking involved. just impatience...

a10t2

So how is it different from Sphere? (yet another good book that didn't quite work as a movie IMHO)

quick

[quote]Originally posted by _ alliance _:

<strong>...they cut out all but maybe 50 pages of the book and only put in the "happy" parts, leaving the story incomplete and meaningless...</strong><hr></blockquote>



Has Hollywood ever done better?

pfflam

Vanilla Sky was also a very good 'Foriegn film section' before it was remade with big Hollywood stars. But in the Hollywood version there were still some very very good scenes . . . like when the blonde flipps out in the car . . . great acting and really moving scene.



As for Solaris . . I think it helps not to think about how it relates to the book but rather how it relates to the other movie . . . it seemed to me that they were specically working with tha as a point of departure.



But yeah, leave it to Americans to take all the 'unhappy' or hard to take emotional aspects out of a movie . . and make it about a fantasy land of absolute 'forgivenness'.

_ alliance _

[quote]Originally posted by a10t2:

<strong>So how is it different from Sphere? (yet another good book that didn't quite work as a movie IMHO)</strong><hr></blockquote>





completely different. sphere is incredible compared to the terrible attempt at a movie that was solaris...