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Review: Solaris
Lem's novel is a really good work of sci-fi, not light reading but worth the effort to comprehend. The new Solaris movie is only 90-odd minutes long, and at that it's too long.
Comparisons will be made to 2001 and Apocalypse Now, two other slow-moving, philosophical movies. The problem is that both of those movies actually had interesting things to say, and managed to keep the viewer's attention despite being slow-paced. Solaris is simply slow. Long sections of the movie have no dialog and no background sounds whatsoever. When there is background music, it lacks the classical majesty of 2001 and is actually a bit annoying. These flaws might be forgivable if we were truly interested in the plot, but we aren't: it's a trivial love story, told many times before. (Most of the interesting parts of Lem's book have been sliced away to leave only the love tale, and the sci-fi twist is not enough to save it, IMHO.) I found myself nodding off during parts of the movie.
A couple of the reviews I read didn't quite grasp what was going on, especially the end. I found it quite clear and straightforward: the movie gives you plenty of clues so there shouldn't be any doubt left in your mind when the credits roll. Admittedly I approached the film with substantial knowledge about the book, but... it should have been clear to anyone.
Overall: it's pretty. The effects are well-done, at least you aren't short-changed there. As far as sci-fi movies go, it isn't bad - there have been so many worse sci-fi movies that I'll take whatever I can get. And at least they had the decency to make it short; if this movie were 2.5 hours long instead of 1.5, it would be intolerable. I'd recommend it to sci-fi fans. I'm not sure I'd recommend it for non-fans, however; if you want a love story, go see Ghost or something.
This is such a hopelessly short review that I have no idea what the commenter actually thought of the film. I've really been anticipating this one, too...the 1972 solaris is one of the greatest films I think I've seen. Well, can't troll too much here...at least Katz didn't write this review. ;)
"Quoting famous computer scientists out of context is the root of all evil (or at least most of it) in programming." - K
Die Another Day has an invisible car?! I heard it was crap, but with this information, I'll definately be seeing it!
Its sad they ruined this by turning into a love story. The movie cast away Lem's real intents. The book (as are most of Lem's) is about the lack of communication, the mystery of the mind and loss. I dont think hollywood audiences have the attention span to see all that Lem encompasses, which might make them think a bit too much, but surely they can stomach a little more than this! I would highly recommend the book.
Interesting with all the cool stuff Bond uses, Solaris isn't anywhere to be found.
Maybe it's McNealy who got humped by, er, jumped over the shark.
People at least are going to paying to watch Bond. Meanwhile, all they ever say about Sun is don't look at it.
Is this truly the only Earth I can live on?
But what is the correct way to pronounce Solaris (as in Sun's OS)? I always said the 'a' like 'hair'...but on the previews for this they said it like 'car.' Just me wondering if I've been pronouncing Solaris wrong all this time. :)
We wave the flag of freedom as we conquer and invade.
another review from Micheal thatis not only completely contradictory to the status quo but also completely off-base. I think HE is the one who didn't grasp what was going on there. The movie isn't for everyone, but if you care to be engaged by a movie in several ways (either by passively just following it, or actually trying to figure it out as you go, and see the underlying meanings and goings-on) it's certainly worth the extended 1.5 hour toture you will certainly bear with this horrid piece of trash that oh I guess isn't so bad after all and beats watching Mission to Mars.... Dude, did it suck, and was it not worth the money, or was it ok, and you should go see it? Saying "ooooh it was so boring and I nearly passed out several times, and the plot was pointless and shallow" then going "yeah but its better than most sci-fi films and you should probably maybe not oughta kinda watch it" doesn't exactly give a good reccomendation one way or the other. AHHHHH I'm just pissed tomorrow is Monday.
"The saddest words of mice and men, are not those which were, but should have been."
On the other hand, most of us loved Wonder Woman's invisible plane. This goes to show that, contrarily to the series' directors' ideas, the more Bond becomes a cartoonish super-hero parody of himself, the less we like him.
We're getting movies made that are pre-edited for tv showings, now. I miss the Bond from the actual stories (remember books?), which at least pretended to have Bond barely scrape through, and which showed far more grey in the world.
Get off my launchpad!
I guess it must be hard to compete against one of the greatest filmmakers of all time.
Andrei Tarkovsky has made incredible movies that leave undeletable impressions on your mind. Here is the imdb links to Tarkovsky's Solyaris
"Well, let's see... Doctor arrives at space station orbiting planet. Strange things have happened there. People have died. Doctor finds that his once dead wife is now very much alive on this space station. Where have I heard this before? Ah yes, it was really good the first time I saw it, when it was called Event Horizon"
There is no sig, there is only Zuul.
You must have missed A Wookie Christmas.
Get off my launchpad!
Those of you waiting for the /. review of Solaris need wait no longer; it's here. I can sum it up simply: it sucked. Long-time readers will, no doubt, be hopeful for a well-though-out reasoned criticism of the movie, as it is being poorly received nearly across the boards, and so the question of "why?" is no doubt hanging on the lips of /. readers, perhaps hoping for some insight from a fellow sci-fi fan.
Unfortunately, your worst fears are realized: the review in question presents a simple viewpoint: "it's slow and boring, the Bond movie sucks too because it has an invisible car in it, and other reviewers also didn't like the film, but they're still a bunch of dummies." With fast-paced critical analysis like that, who needs well-reasoned arguments?Clearly, the reviewer had something icky in his coffee this morning, or worse, skipped the coffee altogether. On the whole, the Solaris review is uninformative and grumpy, although it does at least warn the reader away from what is supposedly a pretty awful film.
No breasts. No real info. Much whining. Joe Bob says, "Ignore it and hope it goes away." One star.
Lemme put my Solaris 8 x86 Review up.
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
yeah. the car, it's invisible
If you pay oodles for product placement, wouldn't it be nice if people could actually see the product?
"I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don't always agree with them." -- George H. W. Bush
Too many typical Bond puns. I.E. Villian: [holding sword] "I'll get to the point"
Gadgets you know Bond should allready have. Sure back in the day it was cool to see what new toy Bond was going to get, but we allready have seen it all. There were few suprises in that department.
The only cool gadget: The Invisible Car. Nice concept, cameras on each side project incoming image on the opposite pannel.
The Plot: Evil guy makes big gadget to take earth hostage...Bond shoots some guys & has lots of sex...Bond allmost dies...Bond saves world
Still some sweet explosions/gunfights.
Bond movies have allways been great, but there's just no more anticipation of whats going to happen or what Bond is going to do. Its just too predictable.
I once shot a man who posted too many, "Imagine a beowulf cluster of these"
James Bond films don't need reviewing. Everyone knows exactly what they're going to get
There is no pretension, unlike other films mentioned here, just good old-fashioned fun.
It's funny how there are more comments about Bond than Solaris.
Sorry, but shouldn't this be Sun instead of News?
I got more rhymes than Jamaica got Mangoes.
Solaris is one of those movies that tries to make a deeper-meaning point, much like American Beauty did.
American Beauty made profound statements during its 122 minutes, whereas Solaris could have had a similar impact if it were 4 minutes long.
"Mother, should I run for President? Mother, should I trust the government?"
God I'm sick of that phrase. I want to beat anyone who says it to death with a blunt instrument.
:)
Anyway I disagree about the Bond film. I suppose michael loved World is Not Enough and Denise Richards as a nuclear scientist though. (Which one was really more believable?) I thought that despite how over the top it went Bond was overall a very entertaining action film. It was pure Bond and that's all I ask. Of course, I did have some grievances with the instances of slow motion, but I can't have everything I guess.
In Solaris, Kelvin's days are spent in a futile effort to understand a planet with strange characteristics and irrational features that combine logic and chaos into an alien mixture that defies human understanding.
I have largely the same feelings whenever I port software to a Sun system.
Somehow, after reading this "review" here, I still have no idea what Solaris is about. From the theater poster, I can gather that there's a love story, and now I know it's at least somewhat "sci-fi" (the title seems to suggest that, but who knows), but beyond that, I'm clueless.
We have the technology today! Flexible LCDs are a reality. The tech used in the movie is entirely reasonable and practical: cameras shoot a picture from one side of the car and project the image on the other side.
When Q (Cleese) walked around it on that first shot, you saw his legs get huge and flash by as he walked in front of one of the cameras. That was the touch that made it beleivable.
You'd be better off making fun of some of the other stupid things in the movie, such as the entire driving-around-in-the-melting-ice-palace sequence.
DRM 'manages access' in the same way that a prison 'manages freedom'
but it's all about what existance is, and some people say it's weirder than 'The Sixth Sense' and is kind of like 'Vanilla Sky' (which I haven't seen.
the Bond franchise has definitely jumped the shark (two words: invisible car).
Right. Because the James Bond movies and his stunts have always been believable and possible. How could they go and screw it up ?? BASTARDS !!
Who is this Karma guy and why is he bad ??
He's been a robot.
He's been a carrot.
And on November 27th,
Rob Schneider is: George Clooney
Watch him try to stay sane as a killer space station tries to ruin his chances of getting the girl of his dreams.
Staring the voice of Oscar-winner Dame Judy Dench as the space station.
Rated R for partial rabbit nudity and poop jokes.
"I would say that 99 per cent of what my father has written about his own life is false." - L. Ron Hubbard Jr.
Addmittedly, I haven't seen the film yet, but it looks suspiciously like another Soderbergh-Clooney "wouldn't-it-be-cool-to-remake" vanity project like Ocean's Eleven. Soderbergh's been coasting on the goodwill from Erin Brokovich and Traffic long enough. Unless he wants to turn into Brian DePalma, he'd better start cranking out hits again, IMHO.
I agree the love story was distracting, but the movie was still good. I have no idea how the reviewer thought there were such long quiet pauses when 2001 had at least four times more lack of sound. I've seen both movies (and even 2010) within the past 3 days. Hey, HBO free preview weekend.
Even with the distracting love story, the end really resolves well and doesn't play too hard on the leads' relationship. I guess it should have been used more as a device.
Overall, it was a good "theme" movie (as opposed to 99.5% of movies, which fall into the "plot/action" category) along the lines of Magnolia or American Beauty. I walked away with a few interesting questions and mixed feelings.
-Vic If you can't figure out my email, then don't.
Bond movies are known for their fancy opening scenes. I wasn't particularly impressed with this opening scene. It wasn't awful. But it wasn't memorable either.
At the start of the movie, Bond is detained in a camp in North Korea. Since he is detained for a while, he looks skanky. WTF!!! Bond is not supposed to look skanky, Bond is supposed to be slutty.
Speaking of slutty, Bond is not slutty enough in this movie. He only sleeps with two women in the whole movie. That is well below standard. I could even pull that off.
The "invisible" Aston Martin was definitly a cool special effect. The entire theatre "wowed" in unison when it made it's first appearance. The Ford Thunderbird was pretty kick ass too.
In general, Die Another Day was a decent Bond movie, but not one of the best. And Pierce Brosnan is definitely getting too old to be Bond.
What is the point of a new Solaris movie? You wouldn't want to make one if you didn't think you can improve on the old movie. Sadly, I don't see anything worth improving in the 1972 Solaris movie... You can't even improve on the graphics - where would you inserd any computer animation?
I saw the Tarkovsky film a few years ago, I'm afraid to see the remake because I don't want to obliterate my feelings about this great film with an overblown James ("Terminator" "Titanic") Cameron production. And Solaris is one of my favorite Lem novels, I even used to run a BBS with the name Solaris, long before Sun or anyone else latched on to that name.
I'll never forget going to see Solaris. I took my girlfriend and I had previously lectured her that this was a really long film, and that was part of the "Aesthetics of Boredom" that was part of both the book and the movie. So we went to the movie, and I'll never forget what happened. In the row in front of me, at about the 1 hour point, some guy started hassling his friends that the film was boring. Well of COURSE it was boring, they were just getting that established as a plot element. He griped and griped and then he finally got up and left. What a relief. We watched the whole film in peace, and my girlfriend and I went to a nearby diner to grab a bite to eat. And who the hell should sit down at the table next to us, that damn whiny guy and his friends. I got to hear him gripe about how boring the film was for ANOTHER half hour. My girlfriend and I cracked up with laughter.
I'm wondering did they cut out the first 30 very slow paced minutes from the original Solyaris. I'd especially like to know if the car ride from Solyaris where you see a car driving through tunnels for 10 minutes without anything happening.
But knowing the attention span of the regular hollywood movie viewer it was probably cut to 10 seconds.
After Vanilla Sky, The Ring (and surely many more i've forgotten) yet another hollywood remake. They surely run out of ideas don't they?
keep it simple.
I must have been the only person in the audience that liked the movie, and so what? I think this movie is one of the the greatest. It is slow on purpose: it wants to make you think about what is happening on the screen: A man has lost his wife and after being sent to space, thinks she is being returned to him in the form of a real person, not just in dreams. He is forced to choose between parting ways *again* with his wife or staying in space on the ship but possibly going mad as the situation is not as simple as it may seem: this 'new' creature might have really been sent out there to destroy him. It's a movie about death, identity, guilt, longing for a lost one. I think it's quite remarkable and I'm glad Steven Soderberg & James Cameron had the courage to take a chance by making a movie that goes so much against the usual Hollywood mold.
So what it's slow? The cinematography combined with the music create truly eerie moments. It is nice to be able this kind of stuff at the Cineplex and not just at the small art theater once in a while!
So there it is folks: if you like Blade Runner, Gattaca, music like Brian Eno's or simply want to take a chance, go see this movie! I think you'll like it.
there's no place like ~
> Something tells me thought that there will be less splattered body matter in Solaris, and less people pulling their eyes out of their sockets.
Clearly Solaris is the loser of those two, then. I mean really, _less_ splattered body matter?! _Less_ people pulling their eyes out of their sockets?! WTF?!
Unforgivable.
On a more serious vein (couldn't resist), I know everybody hates Event Horizon, but I rather liked it. I'll say this for it - it has by far the most effective use of sound for a horror movie that I've ever experienced. Great special effects, and more realistic depiction of technology than the vast, _vast_ majority of sci-fi films. The acting was fine, and the idea for the story was interesting. The execution was certainly off, but c'mon, there are FAR worse movies out there, even if you narrow it down to that year, than Event Horizon. Maybe people complain so bitterly about it because they had higher hopes? I dunno, but people saying this is the worst movie they've ever seen makes me wonder if they've seen more than a dozen movies. Gimme a break.
When there is background music, it lacks the classical majesty of 2001 and is actually a bit annoying.
Classical majesty? Wow, we think differently. Because of this movie, 2001, I can't stand to listen to that Blue Danube waltz anymore. Playing the same thing, over and over again, and then playing a different section of the same piece, over and over again. I felt like I couldn't breath when watching it.
Anyway, Solaris was a bad movie. The story was really, really, cool, but the movie was not good. Not at all. The sequences where we stared at Natasha McElhone were too long and too frequent-- it seemed they were more space fillers (in a short movie?) than an attempt at displaying George Clooney's memories of her. The guy playing the spaced-out California surfer dude was funny, but that was the high point of the movie for me. I haven't read the book, but I KNOW it gives a really interesting story that the movie Solaris doesn't know how to explain. You can say the movie was good if you're afraid that some "intellectual" can better explain its virtues, but the truth is, it sucked. Don't be afraid to say it. It sucked.
A more enlightening review can be found here.
The filthy critic hasn't let me down yet... see review for DAD
"Tension is the great integrity" -- R. Buckminster Fuller
In a recent UK documentary on the making of Die Another Day the producer of the film explained that the Invisible Vanquish was an extrusion of the idea of adaptive camoflage systems that both America and Britain are developing.
The Car in the bond film is a bit of fantasy loosely based on reality.
Adaptive Camoflage is designed to be fitted to the Reactive Armour plates on modern tanks using liquid crystal or simmilar technology. The system can be used in the case of a prepared position where the tank commander walks say 100 feet downrange prior to the tank being positioned, takes a digital photo of the position and then moves the tank into place.
The picture is then used to 'paint' the plates on the vehicle to resemble the area the vehicle was moved into so an enemy unit approaching from a distance will find it hard to visually aquire the tank.
This system can also be used to 'best-guess' the colours required when stopping in the battlefield (albeit without jumping out for the snapshot). For example; a tank could stop half in front of a building and hedge and be 'painted' in the colours of the building & hedge.
This only works against an enemy unit approaching from one direction and even then would only work from several hundred meters away (unless the enemy approached in a straight line directly toward the tank).
This system will likely be implemented and refined over time but a vehicle which could appear 'invisible' under close inspection is rather far-fetched and something very much based in Science-Fiction
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
I had not heard "Die Another Day" called DAD before. I was confused at first.
Round these parts we have a wacky furniture store with entertainment gimmicks, such as the Motion Odyssey Movie (MOM) and an IMAX theater.
So potentially you could see DAD on MOM.
Ew.
This review won't change Sci-Fi fans minds, most of us will see anything sci-fi related (unless it starts rap stars or dicaprio).
Just look at us, we watched Star Trek Voyager for years even though it was terrible.
Nuts! It was a great movie!
There was a lot in the book that couldn't be put into the movie without making it rival LOTR in length. So they decided to focus in on just one aspect of it: Rhea. So what? Try to imagine every theme, idea and philosophical rumination of the book translated into cinema. It would have been horribly dense, dry and exhausting, rivaling all three parts of LOTR in length. But by focusing in on just one part, and a major part at that, they managed to create a workable film. I wished they would have removed the back story, but overall it was a great film.
And at least they put some pacing (and an ending) in it. The book had a beginning then an extended discussion on philosophy punctuated only by changes in the topics being discussed. Reading Solaris is almost like reading a graduate dissertation on the themes of Solaris...
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
I must respectfully disagree with Michael on this one.
James Bond films have always reflected the times in which they were made, for better (1960's) or worse (1970s-80s).
Right now, an invisible car is just what you'd expect from a Bond picture, IMHO.
If we needed a reason to dislike DAD, look no further than the TERRIBLE visual effects.
I'd like to jump her shark ....
XML causes global warming.
- James Bond films don't need reviewing. Everyone knows exactly what they're going to get
... explosions, nasty baddies, Bond being cool, gadgets and girls.
What you say ?40 years of cinematic history down the toilet in favor of bright flashes and loud bangs. Since XXX is a Bond wannabe, that makes Die Another Day a second generation knock-off. What's missing from this movie? Any real sense that we're watching 007 rather than a generic spy in a tuxedo.
For Die Another Day, some elements of the Bond formula are intact: the cool gadgets (including an invisible car, a glass-shattering ring, and an ice speeder), the attractive women (although, at least in the case of Jinx, she's more of a partner/rival than a mere love interest), the globe-trotting (from North Korea to Hong Kong to Havana to London to Iceland), and the martinis (shaken, not stirred). The villain, Graves, and his henchman, Zao, are unmemorable, and their inevitable comeuppances are hardly the kind of moments to get audiences cheering.
The opening theme is dreadful. It's a Madonna pop tune, not a Bond song, and its lack of musical consistency strikes a dissonant chord. (And, as "payment" for providing such an awful piece of music, Madonna gets to "act" in a cameo, which, unfortunately, allows her to speak a few lines of dialogue.) David Arnold's score, which makes liberal use of the "James Bond Theme," seems okay, although most of it is drowned out by the explosions.
Director Lee Tamahori (Once Were Warriors, The Edge) may be to blame. Even though this anniversary movie supposedly contains something from each of the previous 19 outings (many of which appear as props in Q's lab), one gets the sense that Tamahori either doesn't understand Bond or has miscalculated the nature of his appeal. It's not enough to throw all of the Bond elements together and hope that they somehow work. A little more precision and craftsmanship are necessary (and a better script wouldn't have hurt things). Let's hope this represents an aberrance, not a trend.
If there's one thing to recognize, it's that a single bad outing will not succeed where Blofeld and dozens of other maniacs have failed. Whether played by Pierce Brosnan or someone else, James Bond will return. Let's just hope that when he does, he's the 007 we have come to love and admire, not the impostor that inhabits Die Another Day.
© 2002 James Berardinelli
Bad Things:
Overall: 5/10 Watch it when you are in the mood for a SLOW thinker flick.
nuclear presidential echelon assassination encryption virulent strain
Whizzmo
Really simple: my opinion is always the exact opposite of theirs. Once again my point is proven.
Derek Greene
A couple of the reviews I read didn't quite grasp what was going on, especially the end. I found it quite clear and straightforward: the movie gives you plenty of clues so there shouldn't be any doubt left in your mind when the credits roll. Admittedly I approached the film with substantial knowledge about the book, but... it should have been clear to anyone.
Are you calling those revewers idiots, or what? Obviously they wern't able to tell what what was going on. Unless they were robots, it couldn't possibly 'be clear to anyone'. Moron.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
I liked it a lot. I think it's totally worth watching, for fans of complex movies from all genres. It has a number of shortcomings, and you might not decide that it's a great movie, but it's worth seeing just to watch where they fail.
There are a number of aspects that are absolutely fantastic. The exposition is very very well done. Stanislaw Lem fans, Soderberg fans, and hell, even Clooney fans will be happy with the exposition, even though it's the slowest part of the movie. That's my biggest confusion w/ this review - the slow parts were the best parts of the movie. I almost wished they just skipped the plot. Clooney 'n' the scientists' acting were so excellent that I wish they just played with character all movie long.
The whole movie deviates from the novel in big ways. In the beginning, Lem fans will accept those changes, because they were good decisions. The end, unfortunately, is full of bad decisions.
The end of the movie was very disappointing for me. I'm not the kind of person that feels a movie needs some Usual Suspects style reversal in order to be interesting or witty. If it's well orchestrated, and the movie is lightweight in the first place, then it can be nice. Here, it felt cheap. I wanted a hard answer. They didn't deliver. Still, scenes like Clooney sitting in the library leaving a message to coordinate a meeting... that made it all worth while.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
I can understand to have a duplicate here and there, or to have a story posted a few days after it was first posted, nobody is perfect, but posting a dupe with only two stories in between the original and the dupe, what are the editors thinking???
;)
"The obvious mathematical breakthrough would be development of an easy way to factor large prime numbers." Bill Gates,
I watched this movie, I read the book a few times, I saw the Russian version a couple of times as well. My sig. says it all.
:)
I think this movie was misrepresented by the ads, it was presented as a space science fiction thriller. Sci-fi fans expected to see another Star Wars or another Alien movie, the women were bought off by G.C.'s naked rear-end. I was there hoping to see a different point of view that should have been different in a Hollywood way, in a way that commercializes any idea and delivers it for the masses to consume in large volumes, however I was surprised how poorly they did what they were supposed to do - make this movie into something that would awaken interest of the above mentioned consumers. They took a mindless road of rephrasing what the Russian movie has delivered. This was not the road this Hollywood movie should have taken. The Russian movie was doomed to success, this new movie is simply doomed. The new movie took a simple approach - they adopted the Russian movie (not the book, now I know that for sure) and took out all the parts that actually had to do with science at all.
There was no good explanation on nature of Solaris, there was no attempt on the part of the crew to try and communicate with the ocean by sending Kelvin's encephalograms to it through X-Rays. The movie could have been better if only it had at least some of that. At least Kelvin should have taken his wife's blood and compared it to his own blood under an electronic microscope to see that her blood cells did not consist of atoms. In the new movie Kelvin's wife did not even attempt to brake the door when Kelvin left, she did not rock the rocket before she was launched into the orbit, and Kelvin's face was not burned by the launching rocket.
Oh, sure, there were some Hollywood tricks of the trade in place - like poor attempts to confuse the viewers who were trying to understand who is a clone and who is real, but it did not help much. Snaut (in the book he was an old man with gray hair who killed his clone) was too obvious and looked ridiculous in his attempts to misrepresent reality of the situation (watch the movie, I am not going to spoil it for you.)]
The Russian movie ended with some closure, this new adoptation ended with a usual Hollywood trick that did not help making this movie any more attractive to the general public. It is true, many of the people in the theater left before the end of the movie and most of the rest were confused and left out of the plot, many of them did not understand what was going on! That is not the way to treat a great book like Solaris! I am not saying that the producer should have gone completely by the book but this is Hollywood, and he should have made it more watchable to the lowest common denominator, the people who do not have patience and lack imagination (thank you Hollywood and the Fox channel) to complete the untold story.
Now I hope that there will be another release of Solaris by Wachowski brothers, that should show a different point of view
I still say - go and watch it, but also read the book and watch the original. If nothing else, this should give you a perspective on different approaches and styles that exist, maybe you can come up with your own representation of the story, test your own imagination.
Cheers
You can't handle the truth.
Lem's story was first, though. Event Horizon, The Sphere, and this movie are only cheap Hollywood imitations.
The next movie in SOLARIS sequel will be: CmdrTaco installing Sun Solaris to run /.
The first 2 hours of the movie we'll see Rob looking at the installation progress bar and second 2 hours we'll experience the thrill of the configuration manager.
You can't handle the truth.
but on the previews for this they said it like 'car.'
The "Forsaken" video game, for PC, N64, and PSX, pronounces heat-seeking missile as "Soh-LAR-is" as in car, like on the TV commercial for the movie.
I pronounce the Sun operating systems' name as "Sun Oh Ess".
Will I retire or break 10K?
Hey, I thought Die Another Day was a very respectable addition to the Bond franchise. I enjoyed it and may go see it again. Pierce does a great job as Bond, not as good as Sean The Ultimate, but much better than the rest of the pack of wanna-bes. The plot, the locales, the bad guys, the set pieces, the girls - all great. A little weak on the gizmos, too much reliance on just the invisible car to cover the gizmo angle, but hey, that was cool too. The sword fight and the fight on the jet as it's falling apart were especially good. Maybe I was enjoying the popcorn too much and not thinking it through as the movie unfolded, but I was actually surprised by the resolution of the traitor angle as well as the true ID of the main bad guy, so I gotta say there was a pretty good surprise factor in it for me, too. Nice to see Bond behind the power curve and on his own for a while, too - that was actually the one angle of Bond that Timothy did well in one of his films. They're trying to set Halley up with her own franchise as Jinx and considering how commercial and crass such a thing COULD have been, they did a pretty good job of that too. Overall, I give DAD an 8 out of 10. If ytou haven't seen it, you should.
PS - The theme song and the nude credits on the opening were kinds sub-par this time around, I thought...Oh well.
- short answer answer.
..... but wait, I am not going to tell you. Read the book.
Long answer - Kelvin is sent to a station (not a space station, but rather a station that float above the planet named Solaris by using antigravity... Now, he enters the station where there supposed to be 3 people. Finds one of them who talks all crazy and tells Kelvin to wait a little to understand what is going on. Apparently one of the 3 people is dead (suicide). Kelvin waits, reads notes etc. goes to sleep, wakes up and sees his long dead wife (10 years ago commited suicide because of Kelvin leaving her...) He is scared, tries to escape her, she goes through a steel plate not to be left behind, and, oh, btw., her wounds heal very quickly. He jettisons her into an orbit in a small rocket (which she almost dismantles before it leaves the station.) Now, he thinks he's crazy and with some complicated scientific calculations proves to himself that he is not. It is all about Solaris - a planet covered with some bio-mass ocean that can be anything and is very powerfull (for example it stabilizes its own planet's orbit in a binary star system.) The ocean apparently is studying people or maybe just toing with them, in any case we do not know what it is doing, if it means to do it or if it just happens to do it without even realizing anything.
Kelvin's dead wife comes back the next morning (binary star system btw.) So he tries to approach this logically but remembers his love to her and doesn't know what to think to do whatever. Another scientist on the station finds out how to destabilize the field that holds neutrinoes that the clones are made of, and by doing so how to destroy the clones. Anyway, at the end
You can't handle the truth.
I just came home from watching Solaris, and here's what I have to say about it.
To me, it seemed like the kind of movie that humanity will appreiciate more a long time from now, when we're much more mature as a race. This movie is deep, it stimulates us to think about what we really are as humans. Most of the people I know aren't used to anything beyond the depth of "Die Another Day." Maybe that's why the reviewer mentioned that movie as a contrast. There's some deep intellectual stuff going on in this movie, and all the quiet times are there for the viewer to reflect and think.
If you're not used to thinking, then this movie definately will suck for you. I thought it was well worth the price. Go, make up your own mind, and if it sucks for you, ask for your money back. They'll usually give it.
(my $0.03 CDN)
Actually, the name was simply "Galactica 1980" since there was no Battlestar. It was an effort to make use of the popularity of the show from the previous season without incurring the expense of it. Pretty stupid stuff.
Lasers Controlled Games!
In my opinion, appreciation of this movie is directy proportional to intellectual capacity.
The thing that really irritated me about Die Another Day was the villain with diamonds stuck in his face... I mean, come on. The scabs would just fall out on their own.
The whole time I saw the movie I was sitting there wondering to myself, "WHY ARE THE FREAKING DIAMONDS STUCK IN YOUR FACE? HERE'S A DAMN TOOTHPICK, PRY THEM OUT!"
Talk about trying to make a "memorable" villain and failing horribly.
We can neither love nor pity nor forgive. If you make a slip in handling us you die!
... Ok, that got your attention :)
Seirously though, the invisibility cloak in the movie is based off of the REAL life research being done into this area by the US army. See here for the slashdot piece on it from a few months ago. While the capabilities of the cloak in the movie are of course exaggerated (hello, it is a BOND film), the explanation they give for how it works in the movie is basiclly line for line what the real life model does.
Sphere was based off of a Michael Chrighton book, and was HORRIBLY adapted ot the big screen. It was a very good book when I first read it, and years later when I heard about the screen adaptation I was thrilled... until I saw it. It isn't even true to the book at all. Huge plot elements are left out, I feel sorry for anyone who saw it without first reading the book. And in fact, I wish I had never seen it, since it now tarnishes my whole memory of the proper story.
I dont think hollywood audiences have the attention span to see all that Lem encompasses, which might make them think a bit too much, but surely they can stomach a little more than this!
You're wrong.
During the screening I went to, dozens of people walked out. More than one person said "That Sucked" right at the end. I didn't hear anyone say anything good about it.
I thought it was good, but it wasn't nearly as complete as I had hoped (as, I think you're saying).
.sig last updated Jan. 14, 2000
What was the deal with the door knob?
It establishes Chris and Rhea's relationship. The first thing he noticed about her wasn't that she was a pretty girl, but that she was carrying, of all things, a doorknob. This demonstrates that their relationship will be unconventional.
What was the physicist-girl's creation that kept knocking around in her room?
That's not important to the story, so it was deliberately left to your imagination. Note, also, her line, "I never get used to these... resurrections." She's definitely got some serious issues.
Why did Chris' wife always have this creepy-ish plastic grin through the first half of the movie?
Because she's flirting with Chris. Women-- and men, for that matter-- who are attracted to you often smile for no apparent reason. It's possible that you might not be aware of this if you've never seen it in real life.
What the hell happened to the security detail that was sent in before Chris got there?
They disappeared.
The guy that was there said the security detail got there and killed one guy, but... where did the security detail go after that??
They disappeared. Any more time spent wondering about this will be classified under "missing the point."
And what about the guy they said just disappeared? that he simply wasn't on the ship anymore? what happened to him?
He also disappeared. This is what I meant by "missing the point."
I write in my journal
Yes, Seth, you did.
Event Horison was a fun movie, which tried to touch on the themes Solaris covers; fear, loss, lack of communication, regret, and perception versus reality. The science is hokey but Solaris was no better and Event Horizon moved at a good pace, had plenty of great lines and excellent effects. How could you forget other lines like, "You don't need eyes to see where we are going."? Awsome. To make things really good, it had gotten dark, and the sky was full of heat lightning when we came out. God has the best shows.
Please do rent Event Horizon and record the lines you like and post them.
In any case, I expect great things from Sodenberg. His insight is penetrating and he's not afraid to amuse his audience with it.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
My opinion is that the Cyberiad, done in a light-hearted, animated way, would have been a better choice, if you wanted to make a film from Lem's work.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
Is it really that hard to believe that something is so overused that someone might get tired of it?
So was he (Clooney) a visitor or not?
No. At the end of the movie, Kelvin stayed aboard the Prometheus as Solaris engulfed it. The child was symbolic not of Solaris itself, but of only one aspect of Solaris. Everything that took place after that happened in a non-literal place-- inside the mind of Solaris, inside Kelvin's mind, whatever.
But the most important part of the ending is Kelvin's last line before the closing apartment scene. "I was haunted by the thought: what if I'd remembered her wrong."
Spend five minutes wondering whether Kelvin will ever be happy spending eternity with only his imperfect and superficial memories of Rhea. It'll really bake your noodle.
I write in my journal
The US military are looking at the precise technology that Q's
invisible car is supposed to use.
I don't think it would ever be as effective as the invisible car in Bond -
but as more of a cameleon-like camoflage that takes on the general
colouration of the background, it might work. Heck, it works for
cameleons.
www.sjbaker.org
Plan 9 from Outer Space.
I thought *everyone* knew that!
www.sjbaker.org
To call Solaris disappointing would be an understatement. The truth is, the movie is awful. Lem's novel had a science fiction emphasis that revolved around a living "sentient ocean" on the planet Solaris. The focus was on how man would react to a nonanthropomorphic being whose nature and behavior man was unable to comprehend. A romantic (slightly) subplot served the main plot by illustrating a facet of the ocean's behavior-the planet's own reaction to humans that it, in turn, was unable to comprehend.
Tarkovsky's 1972 film version of Solaris downplayed (but kept) the science fiction, put more emphasis on the love story, and created a second subplot involving estrangement of the hero (Kris Kelvin) from his father. The new subplot required a prologue (considerable material not in the novel) that was the foundation for a plot twist at the end. Lem was appalled by the liberties Tarkovsky had taken with the novel. Lem said Tarkovsky "didn't make Solaris at all, he made Crime and Punishment." The crime is Kelvin's failure to recognize and thwart his wife's suicidal impulses; the punishment is agonizing pangs of conscience. Lem was also turned off by the film's visually clever but substantively corrupt ending, which he called "just totally awful." This ending, besides reintroducing Kelvin's father, transforms an uncomprehending ocean into one that is comprehending, sympathetic, and supposedly helpful.
Soderberg's 2001 film virtually eliminates the science fiction, keeping only the sci-fi setting. What we get is a dreary, dialogue-laden love story with a silly, sappy ending. In effect if not literally, this ending transforms Solaris into a metaphorical ghost story, complete with a metaphorical heaven.
A more detailed comparison of Lem's novel, Tarkovsky's 1972 film, and Soderberg's 2002 remake will make my points clearer. Spoiler's follow, so if you haven't seen the films you might want to cut out now.
LEM'S NOVEL
The centerpiece of Lem's novel is the planet's living, sentient ocean. This ocean not only has (a) sensory powers, it has (b) an incredibly high level of mathematical intelligence (it can control its own orbit within a binary star system that should create orbital instability, and it can perform the calculations necessary for this control), (c) the power to manipulate matter into physical forms, (d) the power to read (but not truly comprehend) human minds, (d) the aforementioned the power to alter its orbit in ways that defy natural gravitational and centrifugal forces (a power analogous to mobility), and (e) apparently consciousness.
Earth sends scientists to Solaris to study the planet; they live in a space station that orbits the planet. While they sleep the ocean reads their minds, or at least the dark areas thereof. From what it finds (apparently without comprehending), the ocean creates for each scientist a "visitor" - a living replica of a person from the scientist's past who is a source of shame or sorrow. In Kelvin's case, the visitor is his dead wife, whose suicide was facilitated by Kelvin's behavior. In the case of Gibarian case (a second scientist whose visitor drove him to suicide), the visitor is an obese, bare-breasted Negress who lies with his frozen corpse and seems to imply a sexual fetish, hence a source of profound embarrassment. The idea behind these visitors probably comes from the 1956 sci-fi film Forbidden Planet, which featured "monsters from the id."
The surviving scientists eventually find a way to get rid of the visitors. (The scientists build a "neutrino disruptor" that destabilizes the material structure of the visitors.) But by then the visitors have served their two purposes - illustrating the nature and power of the ocean and giving the plot what little life it has. The scientists then decide to return to earth. But Kelvin takes a "flitter" craft on a last-minute exploratory flight over the planet. What he finds changes his mind about leaving: he decides to stay despite the absence of any real hope of ever comprehending the ocean.
Lem's novel has a lot in common with Arthur Clarke's Rendezvous with Rama. Both novels are long on description of scientific finds and short on plot. In Clarke's novel, the long descriptive passages deal technology, the technology behind a coasting space ship that enters the solar system and loops around the sun before restarting its engines and heading back to where it came from. In Lem's novel the descriptive passages deal with Solaris' ocean and with theories of what that ocean is. The ocean is the analog of the spaceship Rama's technology. After a while, the descriptive passages in both novels become boring. Both need more plot.
TARKOVSKY'S 1972 FILM
Tarkovsky obviously recognized the plot limitations of Lem's novel and set out to spice things up a bit. He did this by shoving the science fiction into the background and focusing on the relationship (described partly in flashbacks) between Kelvin and his dead but reconstituted wife. In doing so, Tarkovsky introduces a whole lot more pathos than you find in the novel. In Lem's words, "what we get in the film is only how this abominable Kelvin has driven poor Harey [his wife] to suicide and then he has pangs of conscience which are amplified by her appearance."
These pangs of conscience are not at all entertaining, and neither are they science fiction. They are simply an abortive (in my case, at least) attempt to play on our heartstrings with a lot of emotional drivel. Tarkovsky probably realized that he could get only so far plotwise with the husband-and-wife subplot, so he created that second subplot.
The new subplot begins in the prologue, back on earth. Kris has a falling out with his elderly father. The conflict so poorly handled by Tarkovsky that I didn't realize anything serious had occurred until I read in a review that Kris and his father had become estranged. All we see in the prologue is that Kris is skeptical about a certain detail of an account by Berton, an astronaut, of Berton's experiences on Solaris. Berton is an old friend of Kris's father, so when Berton is offended the father is also offended. But this conflict didn't strike me as anything more than a run-of-the-mill disagreement. The prologue also hints that the father is terminally ill. The father says to Kelvin, "Are you jealous that he [Berton], not you, will bury me?"
Skip to the ending: SPOILER COMING UP. We see Kris preparing to leave Solaris and return to earth with the other two surviving scientists. Then we see Kris, apparently back on earth, outside his father's rural cottage. It is raining. Kris looks in through the window and sees water from a leaky roof - a roof that was not leaky during rain in the prologue - dripping into the room. (What sort of symbolism is this? Is the cottage weeping?) The father comes out. Kris falls on his knees and grasps his father. He has been given the chance to make amends with his father, a chance that he was denied with his wife. The camera then pulls slowly away from the scene, climbing higher and higher into the sky. And at last we see that the cabin, the farm, and the father are on an island on Solaris. They are creations of the sentient ocean.
Any sentimental satisfaction or esthetic appreciation evoked by this final scene disappears when you reflect on it. The father is no more real than Kris's reconstituted wife was. Kris is a prisoner, incarcerated on an island. He will be devoid of human contact, apart from contact with his artificial father, for the rest of his life. No travel, no trips to town, no friends, no entertainment, no books, no scientific work. Tarkovsky may think this ending is uplifting, but I found it depressing. And still a poor substitute for genuine plot.
SODERBERG'S 2002 FILM
Like Tarkovsky, Soderberg seems to have recognized that turning Lem's novel into a film would require more plot than Lem provided. And he wants to be original. Well, not really original, but different from Tarkovsky. MORE SPOILERS COMING UP. So Soderberg almost totally abandons the science fiction and turns the story into a three-way cross between a soap opera, a Hollywood tear-jerker, and a ghost story embellished with an analogical heaven.
The ending again finds Kris remaining on Solaris. But this isn't the real Kris. We never learn what happened to the real Kris. What we do learn is that this Kris is another of the ocean's replicants, a visitor with nobody to visit. Soderberg prepares us for this revelation by introducing a second plot twist. Just before the end we learn that Snow, one of the other two living scientists on the space station, is really a replicant. He killed the real Snow before Kris arrived. We thus know that the ocean creates replicants not only of shame-inducing persons from the scientists' pasts (those monsters from the id) but replicants of the scientists themselves.
We next see Kris with his wife. The two replicants are going to live happily ever after on Solaris in a physical replica of their apartment back on earth. Kris and his wife, as mere simulacrums, are the equivalent of ghosts. The star-crossed lovers are being given a second chance - as ghosts. They have been reunited in a metaphorical heaven. They will enjoy a happily-ever-after life beyond the grave.
I'm sorry, Mr. Soderberg, but ghost stories and images of heaven are no substitute for science fiction. A romantic subplot is not objectionable. What is unreasonable is the attempt to palm off as science fiction an idiotic love story that is totally out of touch with Lem's novel. And beyond this fault is the gaping hole in the plot: what became of the real Kris? If he went back to earth and is still alive, then that second chance is an illusion. The real Kris is not experiencing it. Indeed, the real Kris is not experiencing the second chance no matter what became of him. And if the real Kris was murdered by the murderous replicant of Snow, that's even less of a happy ending. You can't have it both ways, Mr. Soderberg; you have to think things through.
Freedom: "I won't!"
The movie looked good - but it had far to little plot.
You could have compressed it down to 20 minutes and lost nothing of
the story.
How the heck this was ever a two-and-three-quarter hour movie beats
me.
So - yes, it was good Sci-Fi, yes it made you think and yes it
was nicely acted and visually interesting - but Y-A-W-N.
www.sjbaker.org
Oh, two points: Solaris *is* worth a few more words.
Comparisons will be made to 2001 and Apocalypse Now, two other slow-moving, philosophical movies.
Such comparisons might be made by a dimwit, but not by anyone who paid attention.
[I]t's [Solaris is] a trivial love story, told many times before.
First, Solaris is not a trivial love story. Second, are there any love stories which cannot be dismissed with those words?
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, humble or otherwise, but I would hardly call a philosophical problem as profound as Lem investigated in this story to be a "twist." This is not an O.H. Henry or Ray Bradbury short story (and I am not denigrating either of those authors).
Overall: Solaris was a deeply satisfying movie with marvellous performances. Clooney I used to hate when he was a soap-opera pretty boy, but now that he is slighly long in tooth he chooses his films well. Three Kings, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, and now Solaris - he is now an actor of some merit.
Neopets - the best free game on the Int
"To me, it seemed like the kind of movie that humanity will appreiciate more a long time from now, when we're much more mature as a race."
They wouldn't give you your money back would they?
Ben
Work Safe Porn
I've read the book (first), the Russian version, and then this one. I've read just about everything you can read of Lem's that has made it into English. I'd say the current movie is, on the whole, a good movie. It does indeed have something to say, but unfortunately leaves out a lot about the planet. It thankfully cuts out a lot of crap that the Russian version had in, but the Russian version had better direction and a better editing. The best to read is the book, but even that is flawed, coming as a translation to an abridgement of the French version of the novel.
I think the movie accurately reflects Lem's theme, in fact his constant theme running through most of his works, which is about the unknowablness of certain things. In Solaris, it is both other's (Kris' wife, who only exists as a memory of his perception), and the planet itself. As all three versions had in it the statement that we search for contact, but all we really want is a mirror.
I've always thought that this is a more mature way to look at contact, as opposed to stuff like "Close Encounters" or "Contact".
You'll get nothing and like it.
XML causes global warming.
Those who say "they've turned it into a love story" are hardly true, and have only seen the piss-poor previews. Those who says that Solaris is a bad sci-fi movie -- they may be correct. It has no explosions, it has no aliens.
Solaris is a taut and trim movie that will make you think, if you care to do so. Consider this: as Rheia is a construct of Kelvin -- the ideas that you have of heaven and earth are merely constructs. Consider it.
thelocust[dot]org
Hints at spoilers, but it doesn't metter because you shouldn't watch this movie :)
First good things.
1) The portrayal of future, everything that's concerned with little details like the PDAs that people on the train use and costumes that upper-class people wear on the night out -- everything like that is superb. Creates an atmosphere quite nicely.
2) The beam generator (what's its name?) they built on the station to destroy the visitors uses some cables with BNC connectors. I think this is a great detail. They've built it out of *real* spare parts and it shows.
3) The image of the Rheya is well done for the most part. Both Rheya's actually. Natascha McElhone did a really good job and she is fit for the role.
4) Snow is great. Kudos to Jeremy Davies.
5) In case you are wondering why the hell did they move the station from the surface of the planet to the orbit -- there is an explanation to that.
Which brings us to the second part. What sucked.
1) Changes where made to the plot. Horrible changes.
1.1) See 5 above. Of course it must be on the orbit: the mass of Solaris started growing exponentially, you see. Of course it did, honey.
1.2) Was it a happy ending? Was it an attempt to make a happy end which doesn't seem so happy? It's an ending which really screwed it up. Sorry.
1.3) Anyone remembers that scene from Simpsons, when they leave Australia and a coala is flying back with them, evil grin on his face? I kind of hoped that we won't see an ending like that again.
2) Clooney doesn't work in this role. And no, I didn't like his naked butt.
3) Not a single shot of the ocean surface. Yes, Solaris is a planet covered with Ocean. It is beautiful too. But that's in book, not in the movie. The movie only shows you a plasma lamp, er, star, er... planet? from the orbit.
4) Yes, the book makes you think about God. Sometimes quite explicitly. Throwing in one conversation cut before it actually makes sense and one scene referencing Michelangelo's painting does not make sense and feels taken out of context.
I guess here is what I'm trying to say: this movie would work beautifully if it was more friendly to the book. Hero's memories of his life with Rheya on Earth a well done and are very enjoyable for someone who read the book. Unfortunately people who have read the book will be alienated by weird changes to the story which don't really make much sense.
I don't know how this film works for people who have not read the book.
I passed the Turing test.
God I'm sick of that phrase.
So what you're saying is, "Jumped the Shark" has itself Jumped the Shark?
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
Solaris was so dam boring I walked out after 45 minutes and reget I stayed that long. Bond is a known quanity and it was entertaining. Bond kept my interest, well Jinx kept my interest along with the cool gadget and such.
So Bond I got my moneys worth. Solaris was a waste of money.
I would be glad to share :) One of my absolutely favorite things ... they've been out of print for years, but you can goto amazon to read about them, there are also listings for the individual cds in the set. Basically what the cds are is the recordings made by the various instrumentation on the Voyager space probe (converted to audible sound).
Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley
The Bond franchise has in no way "jumped the shark" (a phrase that itself is allready played....to death). I just saw Die Another Day this afternoon, and while I'm not the biggest Bond fan in the world, I do like the movies as well as the books. And rather than Bond becoming too cartoonish, producers have strived over the past half-dozen films to make him a little more believable, more like the character that Ian Fleming created.
Timothy Dalton's Bond went a long way toward doing this, and Pierce Brosnan's Bond is contiuing that trend. If you've ever read the novels, Bond was not a superman, and was captured and injured quite often. There's a passage (in Casino Royale, I think) where a captured Bond is being tortured by having his genitals punched repeatedly. Quite like what really happens to prisoners in captivity, if you've ever read accounts of POWs.
(Spoiler Below)
In DAD, Bond is captured by the North Koreans and brutally tortured for 14 months. He is released via a prisoner exchange only when US/British governemts decide there's an overriding need to do so. Again, quite like the real world. I LIKED that. It reminded me a lot of what Ian Fleming would've written. (End Spoiler)
I think the franchise has only gotten better with these last half-dozen films. The character has become more what Fleming intended it to be, rather than the Roger Moore era coctail hound, fighting "jaws" in space. As for invisible cars, at least they provided a plausible explanation for the technology. And what used to be considered fanciful in the old Bond movies (miniture lasers, super-small cameras, etc) have come to pass today.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
Not classic bond, you say? That's why I liked it.
Relatively speaking, the theme song can't be that dreadful.
You must have forgotten that there have been Bond songs by the likes of A-Ha, Garbage, and ahem, Sheena Easton.
It's not as if we've had a taste of any song in Shirley Bassey's class for quite a while.
In any case, I'd rather have a Madonna song in a Bond movie than have to watch Timothy Dalton play Bond.
1. The ya in the Russian is, if I am not mistaken, not pronounced that way after an l. So it's Solaris, not Solyaris. Perhaps a native speaker could clarify this?
2. A mediocre Tarkovsky film is still 300X better than a superb Hollywood film.
3. However problematic you might think Tarkovsky's Solaris is, the film is still startling. The camera work alone is worth the 169 minutes. And the relationship with the pseudo-Haris (= Rheya) is brilliantly handled. His use of B&W in the film is well managed. etc. ad naus.
Then, in 1972 (especially for a Russian viewer), this probably could express dehumanization and solitude of the technological world. It's kind of ironic that seeing a car driving through an endless urbanistic maze makes an average modern viewer think "hey, nothing worth mentioning is going there".
Tarkovsky probably made the scene along the freeways so long to express how long and boring the flight from earth to Solaris was (iirc, Lem makes a big deal of that in the book, without describing anything that happens on the trip, and in the Tarkovsky movie, the only spaceflight shown is from orbit to the station [remember, the station is NOT in orbit, but is hovering a few miles over the Ocean]). Rather like Kubrick made the first few scenes aboard Discovery in 2001 boring and banal (the chess game).
Bond = McDonald's
Solaris = pricey ethnic restaurant you've never tried
Yeah, it's easy to see which one works for you.
Come on pal...at least give it a better try than that. A couple of measly paragraphs, half of which are dedicated to other people's reviews?
Similar to Apocalypse Now? How many movies have you seen if that's the closest comparative illustration you can come up with? Although I don't expect that he'd seen the Tarkovsky version (if you think 90 minutes is long...), it would've helped...in fact, anything would have helped, and it's a bit of a shame that no one else was able to submit their review before this one.
This wasn't just plain terrible, this was fancy terrible. This was terrible with raisins in it. - Dorothy Parker
Perhaps anybody who's ever studied Russian can clarify this. You're wrong. The 'y' is not strictly pronounced as the 'y' in English, but it indicates a palatization, or 'softening,' of the preceding sound, which sounds a lot like a 'y' after the letter. Anyway, a Russian who speaks English would typically choose to spell it 'Solyaris' rather than 'Solaris.'
But remember. Back when Sean Connery was Bond it -WAS- an overdone action flick.
Have you seen action flicks from the 60s?
The reason most people say "Bond jumped the shark" or "its not as good as the old bonds" was because they were in the 80s when they saw the 60s bonds. If you saw them in the 60s you'd realize that its the same thing, just being adjusted to the times.
I'm a long time bond fan and thought this was probably the best brosnan bond (the last one, "The World is not enough" was terrible!).
And for another person's comment about the theme song, yes, madonnas song was good, but wasn't a bond song. It was the only thing I really didn't like about the flick.
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
I'm Russian and can conform that you should use 'ya' in this case. Solaris would probably be pronounced as Soleeris by a Russian speaker.
So you're saying it should be transliterated as Solyaris?
What you say might be true, but it seemed about halfway through the movie that there wasn't going to be any real point to it except "Pointless scary stuff happens." and when you reach the end, that's what it ends up being.
Ultimately, the movie boils down to "Pointless scary stuff happens.", and to me, was like watching someone else play Doom. The sets, while very cool-looking, seemed contrived to provide an environment for "pointless scary stuff happening" than showing a real functioning space ship. And while the cast was good (Sam Neill did good "creepy", you end up with a feeling of futility because you soon realize that they only thing you're going to get for the rest of the movie is "[ointless scary stuff happening".
Still, it was better than Spawn.
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
Just because it's pricey and ethnic, doesn't mean it's good.
And there's nothing wrong with a Big Mac.
-no broken link
Insightful, WTF? /. moderating has offically jumped the shark.
-no broken link
I have not yet read the original Lem story, but I have no doubt it is far superior to this awful movie. In any case, a movie is not a book and can't be judged by the same criteria. Therefore faithfulness to the original story is irrelevant. This movie sucked on its own terms.
.1 out of 10 on the ST scale.
First, the characters were boring and totally unengaging. There was no chemistry between the two leads to make us believe they really loved each other. The plastic smile, was not as someone else implied, flirting, but more likely embarassement at being stuck in such a lousy movie. The plot was nonexistent. The screenplay childish. The worst sin is that the movie is totally humorless and took itself too seriously.
As for the "deep" philosophy, give me a break. The philosophical issues, were dealt with at high-school late night heart-to-heart level, not with any intellectual seriousness. The "message" hits you over the head and is repeated often and loudly, just in case you are too stupid to figure it out yourself the first time. There are many far superior movies to this one, that deal with the same issues of guilt, loss, death, god, love etc.
Semi-spoiler warning - a key plot prop is about to be discussed (although I'm really not giving away anything since this movie has no plot beyond what you read in the reviews):
Plus, anyone who actually bothers to read the Dylan Thomas poem Death Shall Have No Dominion, will see the whole plot laid out in the first paragraph. But the director takes Thomas literally. The ending is like Dylan Thomas meets "Touched by an Angel."
Speaking of the ending, why did we have to have the flashback to the ending before the actual ending? Does the Director think we are too stupid to figure out why the good Doctor makes the choice he does?
I resent that we had to see Clooney's ass instead of McElhone's. What a wasted opportunity! Jeremy Davies could have saved the movie by killing all the other characters.
Bad, bad, bad.
Like Bond I'm a man of the world and enjoy a burger at Mickey D's as well as a fine ethinc meal. Being open minded I have more to base my opinion on. Now you can go back to being tragically hip.
Every good review I've seen seems to add up to:
"I don't worry about things like internal consistancy, or the reasonableness of a sequence of events because the movie pays lip service to deep philosophical questions. This gets me thinking about interesting things, so I forget that I'm watching an impossibly banal and unimaginative story telling effort."
For which I have zero empathy. This movies' message: Forgiveness is salvation. Regret is a trap. Cliches are the new drama! Boredom is the new excitement! And the grownups in my audiance started laughing when they busted out, are the visitors made out of matter? Why I think there's a 50 percent chance of that! Good, this afternoon I'll rig up an anti-Higgs boson beam that we can modulate at either 90 GHz or 160 GHz and forever turn them into degenerate matter which can then be sold to mystery traders for plans to up grade parts on our ship!!! God, how I wish I was kidding about that last part.
--Jimmy has fancy plans; and pants to match.
I finally was able to stay awake through the '72 film! It's important to note that the '72 film was specifically a response to Kubrick's 2001 - the filmmakers felt it was cold and inhuman. I think that's important in understanding why the film looks and feels as it does. They filled three hours, but in a different way than Kubrick. It was odd that in michael's review he comments on the long periods without dialog in Solaris 02, when there are much longer periods without dialog in Solaris 72 and it's extraordinarily slow-paced. (Thus, it's sleep inducing nature) Solaris 02 is a bit too short, perhaps, which is surprising given the 'Titanic' producer.
There are obvious visual references in Solaris 02 to 2001. More interesting, to me, are the visual references to Blade Runner (rainy streets and crowds with umbrellas, among others). It is in comparison to Blade Runner where I see the two Solaris films lacking. In both Blade Runner and Solaris there are semi-humans through which we can ask questions about what it is to be human. Both the Replicants and the Guests are simultaneously creations of human minds and forms of simulations of humanity. I may have missed something in Solris 72, but it seemed that Solaris 02 dealt with the 'Guest's' semi-humanity more directly. The re-creation of the dead wife is aware of her limited nature and asks questions about what it is to be human. But somehow neither Solaris seemed to get deeply enough into these questions. In Solaris 02, Snow seems to address some of this near the end of the film, but again, it doesn't seem to be adequate.
I'm still unclear on what was intended with the ending of Solaris 02. Perhaps that is part of why it's getting negative reactions.
It's worth pointing out that what you see out the windows of the train near the end of the film is the Chicago "L" passing the Merchandise Mart station. (Chicagoans keep Hollywood running, BTW)
Well, the point is that one is a gamble that might pay off, but could just as well be a huge disappointment. The other is slightly bland, but at least you know beforehand what it's going to be like.
Stanislaw Lem's view of Tarkovsky's movie is also negative - he thinks that Tarkovsky totally changed the way Lem wanted to represent Space. Lem's vision was to show space as something full of wonders, and very much worth exploring, while Tarkovsky was showing it as scary and a place where humans don't belong.
:-).
In general, Lem doesn't think there is a way to make good movie adaptations of his books. He is not going to even read about the Holywood version, let alone see it (but he is happy with the $1M he got for the rights
The above was in an interview with Lem in the LOT Polish Airlines' in-flight magazine.