*** Official "SOLARIS" Discussion Thread (1 Viewer)

[Ted Todorov]

MAJOR Spoiler! Spoiler! Spoiler! (most of this thread is, anyway -- that's why I'm not blacking it out).

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Um, you do realize he stayed because he was a replicant himself. Because to be honest, I didn't see that coming at all. Had he been human I'm certain he had reached the point where he was able to move on and leave the ship.
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I am having a hard time understanding how this happened. When did he turn into a replicant of himself? What happened to the original? Did he come from one of the minds of the people on the station? How did he end up with a visitor himself if he was created by the Solaris ocean?

The flesh and blood Kelvin stayed on Solaris -- the visitor went back to Earth. Alternate interpretation: he stayed and died on Solaris as the station crashed into the ocean and visitors (of him and Rhea) went to Solaris' version of heaven where not just they, but their apartment on Earth was re-created.
He certainly was not a visitor until the very end of the movie on Earth or on "Earth".
Ted

 

[Marc_Sulinski]

The flesh and blood Kelvin stayed on Solaris -- the visitor went back to Earth. Alternate interpretation: he stayed and died on Solaris as the station crashed into the ocean and visitors (of him and Rhea) went to Solaris' version of heaven where not just they, but their apartment on Earth was re-created.

He certainly was not a visitor until the very end of the movie on Earth or on "Earth".

I did not consider the interpretation that one went to earth and the other stayed. My iterpretation fell more in line with the fact that he was human, decided to stay on the station, and that Solaris, as the ocean consumed the station, found him still there and created a sort of "heaven" where he could live with his wife.

 

[DaveF]

The film is NOT about them and their details. It's about generic human interaction with creation, companionship, death, and the human condition in general. In general. Therefore, no details.

To deal with the generic it's often most effective to deal with the specific. "Dead Man Walking" is a nearly perfect example of this. Solaris, however, gave me too little emotional context for Kelvin's dilemna, failed to draw me into his emotional conflict, and so failed to connect me to the larger philosophical concerns.
It seems you like Solaris for the very reasons I don't. I found the lack of details detrimental. I find "A.I." far more effective than Solaris in dealing with much the same issues; likewise "Toy Story 2". And these movies have a strong emotional position, framing the generic within the specific.
I'm glad Soderburgh and Cameron tried -- I just wish they been more successful in my esteem.

 

[DaveF]

station crashed into the ocean

Ocean? I know you mean Solaris, but why do you say "ocean"?

 

[Ted Todorov]

Ocean? I know you mean Solaris, but why do you say "ocean"?

Solaris is the name of the planet. The ocean, aside from being an ocean is Solaris' one inhabitant, an intelligent being, capable of correcting the planet's orbit as well sending visitors to investigate the humans (who have been firing probes into the ocean to investigate Solaris).
Solaris' surface is mostly, but not entirely covered by the ocean -- in Lem's novel the previous expeditions had landed (naturally enough) on Solaris' dry land and had not encountered any visitors. The current expedition is apparently the first one to actively explore the ocean, thus the visitors exploring them in return.
Ted
P.S. OK, anyone who has actually read the book, please raise your hand

 

[Rich Malloy]

As said, not me, Ted! But you don't recommend that I read the current, bastardized English incarnation, do you?

From what I'm reading here, it seems that Soderbergh's tack was more a remake of Tarkovsky's film than an adaptation of Lem's novel. I presume he left out T's additions to the story - the whole Earth prologue establishing the "nostalghia" element, as well as the relationship between Kelvin and his father - but perhaps subsumed that latter storyline into one featuring Hari/Rheya? Or is this, in fact, more reflective of Lem's finale?

(Guess I'm not caring so much about the spoilers as I thought I did!)

I must say, one think I'm most looking forward to is whether Soderbergh continues with his "fractured time" style of scene-editing, rearranging chronological elements as piecemeal reflections of a character's psychology rather than strictly hewing to the arrow of time in a particular scene (best displayed in "The Limey"). This, of course, contrasts significantly with Tarkovsky's philosophy of "inner time", allowing the rhythm of a scene and not the editing to create the reflective mood he seeks - basically the whole long-take thing with careful matches on action to conceal any necessary cuts. Understand that I don't mean that T doesn't engage in flashbacks, flashforwards, visions, dreams, remembrances - one could say that "Mirror" is entirely constructed of these - but he's mightily opposed to breaking up the audience's sense of the actual passing of an event in time through the use of editing. In a way, their approaches to cinema couldn't be more different, very nearly mirror opposites in this regard.

 

[teapot2001]

Um, you do realize he stayed because he was a replicant himself. Because to be honest, I didn't see that coming at all. Had he been human I'm certain he had reached the point where he was able to move on and leave the ship.

At which point did he become a replicant then? Remember the line: "There are no answers, only choices." Kelvin was inclined to return to Earth, but he chose to stay aboard the ship.

~T

 

[teapot2001]

Furthermore, the main theme of the movie is submitting oneself to something that is unknown. I think the real Kelvin would have to make a conscious decision to surrender himself to Solaris.

~T

 

[Hal Cyon]

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Um, you do realize he stayed because he was a replicant himself. Because to be honest, I didn't see that coming at all. Had he been human I'm certain he had reached the point where he was able to move on and leave the ship.
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My interpretation was that Kelvin was imagining what his life on Earth would be like if he went back. He concluded that he would be so detached from human life that it would be as if he was one of the visitors (hence the cut finger healing in his imagined life on Earth). So he decided to stay with Solaris instead.

 

[Ted Todorov]

November 26, 2002
Reviewer: virgil61 (see more about me)
One note readers should know beforehand is that the version of Solaris available in English is a translation from Polish to French and then translated from the French into English. For some irresponsible and bizarre reason, publishing house Faber and Faber who own the license have not authorized a direct from Polish translation of Solaris.

If anyone knows more about this miserable situation please post -- and if you know anyone who works for that publisher, give them and earful. This is the literary equivalent of Pan & Scan...

Ted

 

[Ted Todorov]

Rich,
See the darned film already -- I though only French film critics wrote so much about films they've never seen
Anyway, I need to re-read the book pronto, as it is clear I have to take on the film to book comparison questions personally.
Ted

 

[Rich Malloy]

It wasn't me who kept me from the theater last weekend... it was my wife! She said that Tarkovsky's "SOLARIS" was plenty enough "SOLARIS" for any single weekend (we'd just received the Criterion disc, and so of course had to watch it).
I'm considering taking a real, long lunch at the AMC one day this week. I've got a hankerin' for some popcorn.

 

[Patrick Sun]

That last bit did feel like "The Ghost of Christmas Future" when it's showing the 2 paths of Kelvin (if he stayed for the fall into Solaris, or if he went back with Gordon).

 

[Walter Kittel]

I must say, one think I'm most looking forward to is whether Soderbergh continues with his "fractured time" style of scene-editing, rearranging chronological elements as piecemeal reflections of a character's psychology rather than strictly hewing to the arrow of time in a particular scene (best displayed in "The Limey").

- Walter.

 

[Alex Spindler]

Rich,
I would say that the flashbacks in Solaris are closest to Out of Sight than The Limey in the terms of completeness of the scenes.

 

[Ryan Peter]

Ted, that was a little tongue-in-cheek. I'm a big fan of "Peter Andrews'" photography.

 

[Seth Paxton]

No, remember that at the point he was going to leave he reflects on Rheya's words regarding the fact that he remembered her INCORRECTLY. Earlier we think that this is just the nature of memory created creatures, which I'm sure is also true.

HOWEVER, as he is about to leave and reflects once more on her words, he then continues to remember CUTTING HIMSELF. Early in the film we do NOT see this entire moment, just the initial blood. But now at the end as he follows through the memory to it's entirety he sees that his finger healed quickly as was the manner of replicants.

AT THAT POINT, he decides to stay behind. Why? Because he has just realized that at some point, some time, he "became" a replicant. Just like Rheya he does not see the point now for him to return to Earth as a replicant, and perhaps in support of Viola Davis' point he sees a potential danger in introducing himself to Earth.


That is how the scenes unfolded, in terms of what happened when. Maybe I have interpreted those sequence of scenes incorrectly, but it seemed like standard narrative revelation to me.

1) "You remembered me wrong"
2) Why did I do that he thinks. Why was my thinking not quite right?
3) Wait a second, I remember now that I healed quickly too.
4) I can't go back to Earth now.

After all of that, we then have Kelvin's images of being in the apartment with Rheya. But this all occurs after he has decided to stay obviously.


IMO, Kelvin was someone else's creation. Specifically I strongly suspect that the revelation of Snow replicating HIMSELF was shown just before this scene to give us the info that such a thing COULD HAPPEN. So that means that Kelvin could have created himself on the way to Solaris, or it could mean that Gibarian created him before he killed himself.


Keep in mind that not every memory shared from the creating mind to the replicant mind were incidents that the creator was present at. Kelvin and Rheya have several moments of shared memory in which Kelvin actually was not present. I interpeted that to mean that those are assumption gap memories. Memories of what we assume happens when we aren't present.

That means that Giberian could have filled in some of Clooney's reaction to his message, though in fairness to SS he kept these scenes to a bare minimum which only adds to the suggestion that Kelvin never really did "travel" to Solaris, but instead was born there as a memory of a Kelvin that might have come.


Also note that replicant Snow had knowledge/memory of Kelvin. He at least knew his name. So there was quite a range of adopted memory for replicants.


Honestly, the idea of when Kelvin became a replicant is the one thing I still feel very unsure of.

 

[Seth Paxton]

Hal, I will consider your view (finger was his version of imagined detatchment), but I have to say that I find such an idea to be a pretty hard metaphor in a film that before that point had played much more literal. Vague as possible, but literal with the events.

This as opposed to 2001 or 8 1/2 which often jump into scenes that are strongly metaphorical. 8 1/2 is barely literal for example. Almost every scene represents something other than what is actually being shown.

 

[Seth Paxton]

the main theme of the movie is submitting oneself to something that is unknown.

I agree but I would say that an equally strong theme was the idea that being a replicant was not the same, nor as good as, being a human.

And in that case both themes would be upheld if a replicant Kelvin chose to not try to fake being a human, and instead submitted himself to his own unknown creator, Solaris.

 

[teapot2001]

There are quite a few possible interpretations. The way I see it is that Kelvin, the real one, makes the decision to stay on the ship as it will crash into Solaris. Based on the assumption that the planet's powers are stronger when in proximity, Kelvin is somehow recreated along with his world on Earth. Thus, we are shown the Earth scenes before it is revealed to us that Kelvin decided to remain aboard, perhaps to trick the audience into believing he really returned to Earth. Kelvin narrates that he feels as if he is going through the motions and not being there, like Hari had told him earlier. We see him cut his finger and it heals, unlike at the beginning of the movie (I believe someone asked him about the cut finger at the party where he met Hari). After we are shown what decision he made and that he crashed into Solaris, we are brought back to continue that scene where his finger healed, his life as a replicant and in a heaven.

~T