Amazon.com: The Russian answer to 2001, and very nearly as memorable a movie. The legendary Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky made this extremely deliberate science-fiction epic, an adaptation of a novel by Stanislaw Lem. The story follows a cosmonaut (Donatas Banionis) on an eerie trip to a planet where haunting memories can take physical form. Its bare outline makes it sound like a routine space-flight picture, an elongated Twilight Zone episode; but the further into its mysteries we travel, the less familiar anything seems. Even though Tarkovsky's meanings and methods are sometimes mystifying, Solaris has a way of crawling inside your head, especially given the slow pace and general lack of forward momentum. By the time the final images cross the screen, Tarkovsky has gone way beyond SF conventions into a moving, unsettling vision of memory and home. Well worthy of cult status, Solaris is both challenging art-house fare and a whacked-out head trip. --Robert Horton
Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
Rating: - Sci Fi Art Film
This film would probably be out of print if it was not selected for the Criterion Edition treatment. They cleaned up the old print as usual and added a whole 'nother disk of extras. You need the commentary ... Read More
Rating: - "Hey! I can see Russia from here!" ``Sara Palin, geografer
Lil' Sara should see this film, maybe her opinions about the 'evil Russian terroristas ' of gulag, block housing, vodka drunks and all other stereotypes that the crazylouco wing of terrans residing within the ... Read More
Rating: - SOLARIS The ultimate space trip into the inner mind
Tarkovsky's SOLARIS got a bit of a resurgance in popularity, due no doubt to the remake of the film with George Clooney. The "Hollywood USA" Solaris, when compared to the "USSR" SOLYARIS, tells more about the ... Read More
Rating: - One of the best movies eve made.
The director is brilliant, and works with a brilliant cast. Thanks to the great Stanislaw Lem for writing this story.
Rating: - Ponderous, dull, pretentious
Dull, ponderous, pretentious, and visually unappealing to boot.
Read the book. It's shorter than many of the five-star reviews here. Effusive praise can't conceal the fact that Lem was a far better ... Read More
- Sci Fi Art Film
- "Hey! I can see Russia from here!" ``Sara Palin, geografer
- Ponderous, dull, pretentious