Bizarre self-indulgence frames ‘Solaris’

‘I could tell you what’s happening… but, uh, I don’t know if that would tell you what is happening.’ These are the words of Dr. Gibarian (Ulrich Tukur), commander of an expedition sent to probe the mysterious planetoid Solaris, in a video transmission to his friend, psychologist Dr. Chris Kelvin (George Clooney). Though Gibarian is speaking of the strange effects of the planetoid that have robbed his crew of their sanity, his sentiment also applies to Stephen Soderbergh’s ‘Solaris,’ the kind of film that tries smugly to defy explanation. ‘Solaris’ is a bewildering, elegant, creepy exploration of the themes of love, humanity, memory and loss… in space. Based on the novel by Stanislaw Lem, Soderbergh’s adaptation does its stylish best to give new life to the strange, slow, deeply existential story that spawned the original 1973 Russian film. With its smattering of sort-of-accessible emotion and array of near-undecipherable twists, ‘Solaris’ stops just tantalizingly short of being one of those films that’s not really supposed to be understood. As a result, it leaves you feeling that with a few more clues you just might have gotten it. After receiving the distress call from Gibarian, Kelvin goes to the ship to try and recover the crew. They all turn out to be either dead or mysteriously battling insanity and refusing to return to Earth. Soon after arriving, Kelvin begins to experience the effects of Solaris; his dead wife Rheya (Natascha McElhone) appears, and Kelvin must struggle to understand what is real along with the addled surviving crew members, Gordon (Viola Davis) and Snow (Jeremy Davies). Solaris seems to be using the memories of the humans to control them, but to what end? To what end, indeed. The love of Kelvin and Rheya quickly becomes the main story, resulting in a kind of emotional science fiction that never tires of offering interesting implications. Clooney, fresh off a collaboration with Soderbergh on the undeniably mainstream ‘Ocean’s 11′ is adequate, but seemingly in over his head in this heavy-thinking role that affords only a few opportunities to break out his trademark smirking charm. In contrast, McElhone and her otherworldly beauty are perfect for the enigmatic Rheya. Davies and Davis are both excellent with what they’re given, but this is a one-man tale: the other characters’ struggles with Solaris are unfortunately neglected in Kelvin’s person vs. self/person vs. planetoid struggle. ‘Solaris’ is reminiscent of the better sci-fi pictures of the ’60s and ’70s. Soderbergh is paying tribute to a time before the genre decided to trade never-ending close ups, thought-provokingly oblique scenes and evocative camera work for a series of underdeveloped stereotypes running down clanking spaceship corridors and hiding in endless eerie hulls. This time, the underdeveloped characters are the subjects of the eternal close-ups and evocative camera work. Though ‘Solaris’ feels eternal, yet not long enough, the ultimate lack of satisfaction probably isn’t due to time constraints; the film plods while still clocking in an hour shorter than its predecessor. ‘Solaris’ deserves credit for it’s ambition; few are the films nowadays that would even attempt to tackle its themes at its pace and in the manner in which it does. On top of that, it is visually fascinating, from the expressive camera angles to the yellow-tinted Earth scenes to Solaris itself, a breathtaking electrical storm of purple and pink. For a while, the film is able to propel itself by pulling from its endless mixed bag of intriguing ideas and its creepy, unpredictable atmosphere. After a certain point, though, it seems to shut off communication with the audience and go swirling off to its own mysterious planet of self-indulgence.