|
I
think we might be asking too much of our moviegoing audience.
After a summer full of arthouse films disguised as
blockbusters, Hollywood thought they could sneak Punch-Drunk
Love in the back door without anyone noticing Adam
Sandler didn't do any of his crazy voices OR sing "The
Chanukah Song" in it.
I had the distinct displeasure of standing near the exit
of a theatre showing Love and was treated to the moronic
comments of mouthbreathers who thought they were going to see The
Waterboy 2:
"Dude,
what the fuck was that?"
"I
don't know. The
only good part was when he smashed that
glass
door thing."
Now
we're asking the very same dunderheads to swallow Solaris,
which re-teams the creative talent that brought us Ocean's
11 (namely, director Steven Soderbergh and star George
Clooney):
"Hey,
Jeff – those Ocean's 11 guys
made a new movie."
"Mmmm...Ocean's
11 good."
"We
get meat first."
"Mmmm...meat
good."
<This
is most likely followed by a high-five or possibly a chest
bumping.>
But
don't expect Ocean's
11.
Don't expect a sci-fi thriller.
Don't expect Solaris to be like anything
Soderbergh has ever done. And,
thankfully, don't expect it to be nearly three hours long, which
was the running time of the first screen version of Stanislaw
Lem's novel when the Russians made it back in 1972 (it won two
awards at Cannes and is one of the oldest cult hits you've never
heard of). Soderbergh,
who gets the first screenwriting credit he's received on a film
he's directed since 1983's King of the Hill, whittles the
essence of Lem's story down to a running time that's much more
ass-friendly.
Solaris,
which might sound a little like Ghost Ship in a brief
synopsis, begins at an unspecified time in the distant future,
where Chris Kelvin (Clooney) attends support group meetings to
deal with the grief of losing his wife Rheya (Natascha McElhone,
fear dot com). He
looks sad, mentally beaten and, with his quickly graying
temples, more than a little like Robert Forster.
One day, Chris gets a crazy message from an acquaintance
named Gibarian (Ulrich Tukur) who is running a mission to
explore a distant planet called Solaris from the spacecraft
Prometheus. Gibarian
says he wants Chris to join him on the Prometheus, but never
really says why. "Amazing
things are happening here," he crows.
When Chris concludes
the long journey to the Prometheus, he discovers a bunch of
bloody handprints and two corpses as soon as he boards the ship.
One of the stiffs is the decidedly less enthusiastic Gibarian.
The only two remaining members of the crew – Snow
(Jeremy Davies, Secretary)
and Gordon (Viola Davis, Far From Heaven) – talk in the
same kind of spooky riddles Gibarian used in his message to
Chris. Hoping
things might make more sense after some quality shut-eye, Chris
hits the sheets and has a dream about his late wife.
When he wakes up, she's right there in bed with him - as
alive as she can be.
This
all happens within the first half-hour, and telling you any more
of the plot might ruin the story.
I will warn you that you'll need to bring your brain.
There's a lot more going on in Solaris than
Clooney baring his ass (it looks like he's wearing a black thong
– he's one hairy fella).
That whole flap over the MPAA and Clooney's posterior
seemed like it was drummed up just to get the film some
publicity. Since
the word of mouth(breathing) won't be strong, Fox wants as many
people as possible to see Solaris during its first
weekend. It's too
bad some people won't take a chance on the film, which features
Clooney's best performance to date (by far) and a turn by
McElhone that I like better and better the more I think about it
(she's really playing four different roles here).
For
Jeff and his buddy, the beautiful and beautifully made Solaris
will put the "mal" in minimalism.
With long stretches containing no dialogue, it's a slow,
sterile, thought-provoking film that will leave many unanswered
questions rattling around in your head (other than "Dude,
you wanna go to Taco Bell?").
It will make you think about your own existence.
It will make you re-examine The Big Picture.
It will make you beg for a second chance.
Or, if you're just not into films with non-linear
narratives that don't spell everything out, maybe it will make
you want to kick in a glass door thing.
| 1:31
- |
 |
for
sexuality/nudity, brief language and thematic elements |
|
