Solaris

This film is meant to be a psychological mind twisting love story. It is also listed as sci-fi but it is certainly more about psychology and melodrama than it is about science fiction. The only thing sci-fi is the venue, i.e. a manned station circling a planet far, far away from earth, although what happens to the crew is dramatic because of that distance and isolation. I also found the love story to be dark, depressing and a total bummer.

The plot does include a strange encounter, the kind of weird thing we know about from many Star Trek episodes, but it is presented in such a weird vague way and it moves so very slowly that I lost interest. And I asked myself, would I send a disturbed psychologist to handle a disturbed crew? And why send him alone when the first two security guys sent did not return. And also why would intelligent beings arbitrarily choose existence and then annihilation? Gene Roddenberry would choke at these logical holes in the storyline. It was an impressive sci-fi set, but I just couldnt believe the characters or the plot. I dont fault the acting as much as the story and its direction.

George Clooney plays Chris Kelvin, the shrink selected to solve problems on this errant space station. Clooneys career really started with a role in the television series, ER. He is the nephew of both the late Jose Ferrer and Rosemary Clooney. His recent starring roles were in O Brother, Where art Thou (2000), Perfect Storm (2000) and Ocean Eleven (2001).

Natascha McElhone plays Rheya, Chris wife. She lives in London with a plastic surgeon husband and a cat named Soup. Some recent roles were Mrs. Dalloway (1997), The Truman Show (1998) and Laurel Canyon (2002).

Steven Soderbergh wrote the screenplay and directed the film, which is based on the novel by Stanislaw Lem that was published in the U.S. in 1973. He also directed Pleasantville (1998) and Far from Heaven (2002). Both were much better efforts than this film. He received Academy award nominations for both Traffic (2000) and Erin Brockovich (2000) but Traffic won. He also received the Palme d'Or at the 1989 Cannes Film Festival for Sex, Lies and Video Tape.

Reviewed November 2, 2003