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Solaris (2002 film)
Encyclopedia
Solaris is a 2002 science fiction film
and psychological drama directed by Steven Soderbergh
and starring George Clooney
and Natascha McElhone
. It is based on the science fiction novel
by Polish
writer Stanisław Lem, which also inspired Andrei Tarkovsky
's critically acclaimed 1972 film of the same name
and a 1968 Soviet TV film
.
Borrowing heavily from Tarkovsky's film, Soderbergh's version is a meditative psychodrama
set almost entirely on a space station
orbiting Solaris, adding flashbacks to the previous experiences of its main characters on Earth. Chris (Clooney) struggles with the questions of Solaris' motivation, his beliefs and memories, and reconciling what was lost with an opportunity for a second chance.
) is approached by emissaries for DBA, a corporation operating a space station orbiting the planet Solaris, who relay a message sent from his scientist friend Dr. Gibarian (Ulrich Tukur
). Gibarian requests Chris come to the station to help understand an unusual phenomenon, but is unwilling to explain the exact nature. DBA is unsure how to proceed, as the mission to study Solaris has been sidetracked and none of the astronauts want to return home. In addition, DBA has lost contact with the security patrol recently dispatched to the station. Chris agrees to a solo mission to go to Solaris as a last attempt to recover the crew.
Upon arriving at the space station, Chris learns that Gibarian has committed suicide and most of the crew have either died or disappeared under bizarre circumstances. Both surviving crew members, Snow (Jeremy Davies
) and Dr. Gordon (Viola Davis
), are reluctant to explain the situation at hand. Alone in his crew quarters, Chris dreams about his dead wife Rheya (Natascha McElhone
)—reliving when they first met and some of their most romantic and intimate moments. He awakens shocked and terrified to encounter Rheya alive again beside him in bed and leads her into an escape pod and jettisons it into space. Chris confides his actions to Snow and comes to understand that replicas of the crew's loved ones have been mysteriously appearing. When Rheya manifests a second time Chris lets her stay, but she admits she doesn't feel human; her memories feel artificial, in that she lacks the emotional attachment that comes with actually having lived them.
Chris, Rheya, Snow and Gordon meet to discuss the situation and Gordon informs Rheya what Chris did to her previous replica. Rheya leaves the meeting horrified and Chris confronts Gordon, who in turn chastises him for getting emotionally involved with something that isn't real and may pose a threat to human beings. Later, during a dream, Chris questions a replica of Gibarian as to what Solaris' motives are for providing the manifestations, but is told "there are no answers, only choices." Chris wakes to find Rheya dead, having committed suicide by drinking liquid oxygen
and, in front of Gordon and Snow, Chris wills her back to a restored state. Gordon reveals that she has an apparatus which can permanently destroy a replica but Chris objects to using it on Rheya. He begins ingesting a chemical stimulant to stay awake in order to monitor Rheya. Chris eventually falls asleep and Rheya approaches Gordon who destroys her with the apparatus as she has done for all replicas who have requested her to do so. Chris confronts Gordon who maintains she merely facilitated in assisted suicide
and in her xenophobia
she only wants the preservation of the humans.
Chris and Gordon then discover the body of Snow stashed away in a ceiling vent and realize that the Snow they have been interacting with is a replica. Snow admits to being a replica and explains that upon being dreamed into existence, he was attacked by his creator and thus killed the 'original Snow' in self-defense. The Snow replica tells them that repeat usage of the apparatus has drained the ship's fuel cell reactor, making a return trip to Earth impossible. Furthermore, Solaris has reacted to the behavior of the humans by increasing its mass, thereby gravitationally pulling the space station toward the planet. Gordon and Chris begin prepping a smaller space vehicle called Athena to escape.
Chris is shown pondering his experiences from the space station back on Earth, discontentedly concluding that the reason Rheya's replica wanted to die was because he "remembered her wrong"—as suicidal. One day he cuts his finger while chopping vegetables in his kitchen, but the wound immediately regenerates, just as Rheya's replica once did. Then Rheya appears, declaring that they transcend life and death and that all they've done to each other is forgiven. This suggests that Chris isn't really on Earth, or that what's on Earth isn't really Chris. Chris never actually leaves the space station with Gordon: he sends her off alone and stays behind to plummet into Solaris.
depicted a science fiction love story (or thriller) that may have raised expectations among potential film-goers that were not met. The film grossed $14,973,382 at the North American box office and $15,029,376 in other territories, against an estimated $47 million budget.
Critical reception was mixed to positive. The Time Out Film Guide describes the film as superior to the Tarkovsky version. The film was a New York Times Critics' Pick, with Stephen Holden
saying "the movie aspires to fuse the mystical intellectual gamesmanship of 2001: A Space Odyssey
with the love-beyond-the-grave romantic schmaltz of Titanic
, without losing its cool...a tricky balancing act that doesn't quite come off." As Holden notes, "Solaris is a science-fiction film lacking action-adventure sequences. The absence of boyish friskiness, kineticism and pyrotechnics makes it a film that offers no vicarious physical release. Its insistence on remaining cerebral and somber to the end may be a sign of integrity, but it should cost it dearly at the box office." Roger Ebert
gave the film (3½ out of four stars) and called it "the kind of smart film that has people arguing about it on their way out of the theater"; while it "needs science fiction to supply the planet and the space station
, which furnish the premise and concentrate the action,... it is essentially a psychological drama." Ebert concludes "When I saw Tarkovsky's original film, I felt absorbed in it, as if it were a sponge. It was slow, mysterious, confusing, and I have never forgotten it. Soderbergh's version is more clean and spare, more easily readable, but it pays full attention to the ideas and doesn't compromise. Tarkovsky was a genius, but one who demanded great patience from his audience as he ponderously marched toward his goals. The Soderbergh version is like the same story freed from the weight of Tarkovsky's solemnity. And it evokes one of the rarest of movie emotions, ironic regret."
With 132 "fresh" reviews among 202 critics, Rotten Tomatoes
gave the film a 65% fresh rating,, while Tarkovsky's adaptation received 43 "fresh" reviews among 45 critics, a 97% fresh rating.
Soderbergh "said that he didn't intend Solaris to be a remake of Tarkovsky's film but rather a new version of Stanislaw Lem's novel"; Lem called Soderbergh's film a "remake of the Tarkovsky movie
" and criticized it as departing far from his original intentions in writing the novel by focusing almost exclusively on the psychological relationship between the two main characters, while reducing the vast and alien ocean to a mere "mirror" of humanity:
In 2010, Solaris made Time magazine's "Top 10 Hollywood Remakes" list, saying it was "expertly and exquisitely executed" and "manages to extract that all too rare achievement from a sci-fi film: emotion. Both George Clooney...and Natasha McElhone ... give real gravitas
to Solaris.
Science fiction film
Science fiction film is a film genre that uses science fiction: speculative, science-based depictions of phenomena that are not necessarily accepted by mainstream science, such as extraterrestrial life forms, alien worlds, extrasensory perception, and time travel, often along with futuristic...
and psychological drama directed by Steven Soderbergh
Steven Soderbergh
Steven Andrew Soderbergh is an American film producer, screenwriter, cinematographer, editor, and an Academy Award-winning film director. He is best known for directing commercial Hollywood films like Erin Brockovich, Traffic, and the remake of Ocean's Eleven, but he has also directed smaller less...
and starring George Clooney
George Clooney
George Timothy Clooney is an American actor, film director, producer, and screenwriter. For his work as an actor, he has received two Golden Globe Awards and an Academy Award...
and Natascha McElhone
Natascha McElhone
Natascha McElhone is an English actress of stage, screen and television, best known for her roles in Ronin, The Truman Show and Solaris. McElhone also plays a leading role in the Showtime series Californication....
. It is based on the science fiction novel
Solaris (novel)
Solaris is a 1961 Polish science fiction novel by Stanisław Lem. It is about the ultimate inadequacy of communication between human and non-human species....
by Polish
Poles
thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...
writer Stanisław Lem, which also inspired Andrei Tarkovsky
Andrei Tarkovsky
Andrei Arsenyevich Tarkovsky was a Soviet and Russian filmmaker, writer, film editor, film theorist, theatre and opera director, widely regarded as one of the finest filmmakers of the 20th century....
's critically acclaimed 1972 film of the same name
Solaris (1972 film)
Solaris is a 1972 film adaptation of the novel Solaris , directed by Andrei Tarkovsky. The film is a meditative psychological drama occurring mostly aboard a space station orbiting the fictional planet Solaris. The scientific mission has stalled, because the scientist crew have fallen to...
and a 1968 Soviet TV film
Solaris (1968 film)
Solaris is a 1968 TV film based on the 1961 novel Solaris by Stanisław Lem. It was written by Nikolay Kemarsky, directed by Boris Nirenburg and was a Central Television production.-Cast:* Vasily Lanovoy as Dr. Kris Kelvin...
.
Borrowing heavily from Tarkovsky's film, Soderbergh's version is a meditative psychodrama
Psychodrama
Psychodrama is a method of psychotherapy in which clients utilize spontaneous dramatization, role playing and dramatic self-presentation to investigate and gain insight into their lives. Developed by Jacob L. Moreno, M.D. psychodrama includes elements of theater, often conducted on a stage where...
set almost entirely on a space station
Space station
A space station is a spacecraft capable of supporting a crew which is designed to remain in space for an extended period of time, and to which other spacecraft can dock. A space station is distinguished from other spacecraft used for human spaceflight by its lack of major propulsion or landing...
orbiting Solaris, adding flashbacks to the previous experiences of its main characters on Earth. Chris (Clooney) struggles with the questions of Solaris' motivation, his beliefs and memories, and reconciling what was lost with an opportunity for a second chance.
Plot
Clinical psychologist Dr. Chris Kelvin (George ClooneyGeorge Clooney
George Timothy Clooney is an American actor, film director, producer, and screenwriter. For his work as an actor, he has received two Golden Globe Awards and an Academy Award...
) is approached by emissaries for DBA, a corporation operating a space station orbiting the planet Solaris, who relay a message sent from his scientist friend Dr. Gibarian (Ulrich Tukur
Ulrich Tukur
Ulrich Tukur is a German actor and musician.-Biography:Tukur spent his youth near Hanover where he finished his final secondary-school examinations in 1977. He also achieved a high school degree in Boston during an exchange of students where he met his first wife, Amber Wood. With her, he had two...
). Gibarian requests Chris come to the station to help understand an unusual phenomenon, but is unwilling to explain the exact nature. DBA is unsure how to proceed, as the mission to study Solaris has been sidetracked and none of the astronauts want to return home. In addition, DBA has lost contact with the security patrol recently dispatched to the station. Chris agrees to a solo mission to go to Solaris as a last attempt to recover the crew.
Upon arriving at the space station, Chris learns that Gibarian has committed suicide and most of the crew have either died or disappeared under bizarre circumstances. Both surviving crew members, Snow (Jeremy Davies
Jeremy Davies
Father Jeremy Davies , an English Roman Catholic priest whose parish is based around Old Hall Green, is a former doctor and also a leading exorcist....
) and Dr. Gordon (Viola Davis
Viola Davis
Viola Davis is an American actress.Known primarily as a stage actress, Davis won a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play and a Drama Desk Award for her role in King Hedley II . She won a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play for her role in the...
), are reluctant to explain the situation at hand. Alone in his crew quarters, Chris dreams about his dead wife Rheya (Natascha McElhone
Natascha McElhone
Natascha McElhone is an English actress of stage, screen and television, best known for her roles in Ronin, The Truman Show and Solaris. McElhone also plays a leading role in the Showtime series Californication....
)—reliving when they first met and some of their most romantic and intimate moments. He awakens shocked and terrified to encounter Rheya alive again beside him in bed and leads her into an escape pod and jettisons it into space. Chris confides his actions to Snow and comes to understand that replicas of the crew's loved ones have been mysteriously appearing. When Rheya manifests a second time Chris lets her stay, but she admits she doesn't feel human; her memories feel artificial, in that she lacks the emotional attachment that comes with actually having lived them.
Chris, Rheya, Snow and Gordon meet to discuss the situation and Gordon informs Rheya what Chris did to her previous replica. Rheya leaves the meeting horrified and Chris confronts Gordon, who in turn chastises him for getting emotionally involved with something that isn't real and may pose a threat to human beings. Later, during a dream, Chris questions a replica of Gibarian as to what Solaris' motives are for providing the manifestations, but is told "there are no answers, only choices." Chris wakes to find Rheya dead, having committed suicide by drinking liquid oxygen
Liquid oxygen
Liquid oxygen — abbreviated LOx, LOX or Lox in the aerospace, submarine and gas industries — is one of the physical forms of elemental oxygen.-Physical properties:...
and, in front of Gordon and Snow, Chris wills her back to a restored state. Gordon reveals that she has an apparatus which can permanently destroy a replica but Chris objects to using it on Rheya. He begins ingesting a chemical stimulant to stay awake in order to monitor Rheya. Chris eventually falls asleep and Rheya approaches Gordon who destroys her with the apparatus as she has done for all replicas who have requested her to do so. Chris confronts Gordon who maintains she merely facilitated in assisted suicide
Assisted suicide
Assisted suicide is the common term for actions by which an individual helps another person voluntarily bring about his or her own death. "Assistance" may mean providing one with the means to end one's own life, but may extend to other actions. It differs to euthanasia where another person ends...
and in her xenophobia
Xenophobia
Xenophobia is defined as "an unreasonable fear of foreigners or strangers or of that which is foreign or strange". It comes from the Greek words ξένος , meaning "stranger," "foreigner" and φόβος , meaning "fear."...
she only wants the preservation of the humans.
Chris and Gordon then discover the body of Snow stashed away in a ceiling vent and realize that the Snow they have been interacting with is a replica. Snow admits to being a replica and explains that upon being dreamed into existence, he was attacked by his creator and thus killed the 'original Snow' in self-defense. The Snow replica tells them that repeat usage of the apparatus has drained the ship's fuel cell reactor, making a return trip to Earth impossible. Furthermore, Solaris has reacted to the behavior of the humans by increasing its mass, thereby gravitationally pulling the space station toward the planet. Gordon and Chris begin prepping a smaller space vehicle called Athena to escape.
Chris is shown pondering his experiences from the space station back on Earth, discontentedly concluding that the reason Rheya's replica wanted to die was because he "remembered her wrong"—as suicidal. One day he cuts his finger while chopping vegetables in his kitchen, but the wound immediately regenerates, just as Rheya's replica once did. Then Rheya appears, declaring that they transcend life and death and that all they've done to each other is forgiven. This suggests that Chris isn't really on Earth, or that what's on Earth isn't really Chris. Chris never actually leaves the space station with Gordon: he sends her off alone and stays behind to plummet into Solaris.
Cast
- George ClooneyGeorge ClooneyGeorge Timothy Clooney is an American actor, film director, producer, and screenwriter. For his work as an actor, he has received two Golden Globe Awards and an Academy Award...
as Chris Kelvin - Natascha McElhoneNatascha McElhoneNatascha McElhone is an English actress of stage, screen and television, best known for her roles in Ronin, The Truman Show and Solaris. McElhone also plays a leading role in the Showtime series Californication....
as Rheya - Viola DavisViola DavisViola Davis is an American actress.Known primarily as a stage actress, Davis won a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play and a Drama Desk Award for her role in King Hedley II . She won a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play for her role in the...
as Gordon - Jeremy DaviesJeremy Davies (actor)Jeremy Davies is an American film and television actor. He is known for portraying the interpreter Cpl. Timothy E. Upham in the film Saving Private Ryan and the physicist Daniel Faraday on the television series Lost. He most recently appeared in the FX series, Justified, as Dickie Bennett.-Early...
as Snow - Ulrich TukurUlrich TukurUlrich Tukur is a German actor and musician.-Biography:Tukur spent his youth near Hanover where he finished his final secondary-school examinations in 1977. He also achieved a high school degree in Boston during an exchange of students where he met his first wife, Amber Wood. With her, he had two...
as Gibarian - John ChoJohn ChoJohn Yohan Cho is an American actor and musician, best known for his roles in the American Pie films and the Harold & Kumar films . He also starred in the critically acclaimed hit film Better Luck Tomorrow...
as DBA Emissary #1
Reception
Director Steven Soderbergh noted that marketing the film was a challenge. The film's trailerTrailer (film)
A trailer or preview is an advertisement or a commercial for a feature film that will be exhibited in the future at a cinema. The term "trailer" comes from their having originally been shown at the end of a feature film screening. That practice did not last long, because patrons tended to leave the...
depicted a science fiction love story (or thriller) that may have raised expectations among potential film-goers that were not met. The film grossed $14,973,382 at the North American box office and $15,029,376 in other territories, against an estimated $47 million budget.
Critical reception was mixed to positive. The Time Out Film Guide describes the film as superior to the Tarkovsky version. The film was a New York Times Critics' Pick, with Stephen Holden
Stephen Holden
Stephen Holden is an American writer, music critic, film critic, and poet.Holden earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from Yale University in 1963...
saying "the movie aspires to fuse the mystical intellectual gamesmanship of 2001: A Space Odyssey
2001: A Space Odyssey (film)
2001: A Space Odyssey is a 1968 epic science fiction film produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick, and co-written by Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, partially inspired by Clarke's short story The Sentinel...
with the love-beyond-the-grave romantic schmaltz of Titanic
Titanic (1997 film)
Titanic is a 1997 American epic romance and disaster film directed, written, co-produced, and co-edited by James Cameron. A fictionalized account of the sinking of the RMS Titanic, it stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Jack Dawson, Kate Winslet as Rose DeWitt Bukater and Billy Zane as Rose's fiancé, Cal...
, without losing its cool...a tricky balancing act that doesn't quite come off." As Holden notes, "Solaris is a science-fiction film lacking action-adventure sequences. The absence of boyish friskiness, kineticism and pyrotechnics makes it a film that offers no vicarious physical release. Its insistence on remaining cerebral and somber to the end may be a sign of integrity, but it should cost it dearly at the box office." Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
gave the film (3½ out of four stars) and called it "the kind of smart film that has people arguing about it on their way out of the theater"; while it "needs science fiction to supply the planet and the space station
Space station
A space station is a spacecraft capable of supporting a crew which is designed to remain in space for an extended period of time, and to which other spacecraft can dock. A space station is distinguished from other spacecraft used for human spaceflight by its lack of major propulsion or landing...
, which furnish the premise and concentrate the action,... it is essentially a psychological drama." Ebert concludes "When I saw Tarkovsky's original film, I felt absorbed in it, as if it were a sponge. It was slow, mysterious, confusing, and I have never forgotten it. Soderbergh's version is more clean and spare, more easily readable, but it pays full attention to the ideas and doesn't compromise. Tarkovsky was a genius, but one who demanded great patience from his audience as he ponderously marched toward his goals. The Soderbergh version is like the same story freed from the weight of Tarkovsky's solemnity. And it evokes one of the rarest of movie emotions, ironic regret."
With 132 "fresh" reviews among 202 critics, Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
gave the film a 65% fresh rating,, while Tarkovsky's adaptation received 43 "fresh" reviews among 45 critics, a 97% fresh rating.
Soderbergh "said that he didn't intend Solaris to be a remake of Tarkovsky's film but rather a new version of Stanislaw Lem's novel"; Lem called Soderbergh's film a "remake of the Tarkovsky movie
Solaris (1972 film)
Solaris is a 1972 film adaptation of the novel Solaris , directed by Andrei Tarkovsky. The film is a meditative psychological drama occurring mostly aboard a space station orbiting the fictional planet Solaris. The scientific mission has stalled, because the scientist crew have fallen to...
" and criticized it as departing far from his original intentions in writing the novel by focusing almost exclusively on the psychological relationship between the two main characters, while reducing the vast and alien ocean to a mere "mirror" of humanity:
In 2010, Solaris made Time magazine's "Top 10 Hollywood Remakes" list, saying it was "expertly and exquisitely executed" and "manages to extract that all too rare achievement from a sci-fi film: emotion. Both George Clooney...and Natasha McElhone ... give real gravitas
Gravitas
Gravitas was one of the Roman virtues, along with pietas, dignitas and virtus. It may be translated variously as weight, seriousness, dignity, or importance, and connotes a certain substance or depth of personality.-See also:*Auctoritas...
to Solaris.
External links
- Comment on Soderbergh's version from Stanisław Lem's official website
- Graphic design for Solaris from graphic artist Rick Sternbach's website