Solaris

Clooney's Butt-Baring Battle

Josh Grossberg

11/6/02

Steven Soderbergh's willing to go to war to save George Clooney's ass...And we're talking literally.

Sources tell E! Online that the Oscar-winning Traffic director plans to petition the Motion Picture Association of America to overturn the R rating the board slapped on the filmmaker's upcoming sci-fi drama Solaris. The source of contention: Clooney's exposed posterior.

Soderbergh and distributor 20th Century Fox have already taken scissors to film, snipping certain scenes for the notoriously finnicky MPAA, in order to secure a more audience-friendly (and commercially viable) PG-13.

"We trimmed down most of the sex scenes," a Solaris insider tells E! Online columnist Ted Casablanca, "and we are not taking out George's butt, which is basically all that remains--and which is actually pretty nice."

"You can show women's breasts and butts and still get a PG-13; why can't we?"

Soderbergh himself says the offending shots in two scenes are hardly graphic. "We've seen scenes like this on network television," he tells the Los Angeles Times. "Believe me, there is nothing here that is worse than what has been on NYPD Blue on ABC."

There are two scenes the MPAA has problems with. One takes place as Clooney's partially naked character slow-dances with his wife, played by actress Natasha McElhone, in a low-lit room ("shot from 70 feet away," says Soderbergh).

The other is a shot of the couple lying in bed on their stomachs, talking.

"Again, it's night and very dark," Soderbergh tells the Times.

He says the MPAA is wildly inconsistent when it comes to rating films, frequently lumping vastly different movies together. For example, he says the critically hailed, coming-of-age dramas Almost Famous and Billy Elliot both wound up with R ratings, just like the graphically violent Fight Club or Total Recall.

The director, who's currently in New Orleans finishing the mix on the film's soundtrack, plans on making his presentation to the group in the coming days. He hopes to convince the dozen or so members on the appeals board that the scenes won't forever ruin young eyes. To overturn the rating, two-thirds of the board must approve the change.

Solaris is Soderbergh's ambitious Hollywood remake of Russian filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky's little-seen 1972 picture (adapted from the Polish novel by Stanislaw Lem), which some critics hailed as the Soviet Union's answer to Stanley Kubrick's 2001.

The original film focuses on a scientist who travels to an outpost orbiting the planet Solaris to investigate the fate of an earlier crew. When his long-dead wife appears on the space station, he realizes that the planet has the power to perceive human desires and grant them, only the price he pays for such visions is his sanity.

"It's a love story," explains Soderbergh, who describes his film as a romantically charged ghost tale.

Solaris is due out November 27.

Aside from worrying about the MPAA, Soderbergh is also lining up more work that will likely annoy the ratings czars. He has agreed to helm one episode of a three-part anthology film about human love and sexuality titled Eros, that will also feature segments from Italian filmmaker Michelangelo Antonioni and Hong Kong-based auteur Wong Kar-Wai.

Soderbergh will substitute for Spain's Pedro Almodóvar, and he is due to segue into that film sometime early next year.

Solaris: First Look on HBO

George Clooney stars in a remake of a Russian sci-fi classic. Behind the scenes of Steven Soderbergh's remake of the Russian sci-fi classic about a psychologist who encounters an eerie series of events upon his arrival at a space station. George Clooney, Natascha McElhone and Jeremy Davies star.

15 minutes- (CC),

Solaris Schedule

Fri Nov 15 09:45P HBOE- Home Box Office

Sat Nov 16 10:45P HBOE3- HBO Signature

Sun Nov 17 04:45P HBOE2- HBO Plus

Mon Nov 18 11:15A HBOE3- HBO Signature

Wed Nov 20 03:00P HBOE- Home Box Office

Wed Nov 20 11:00P HBOE- Home Box Office

Sat Nov 23 12:00P HBOE- Home Box Office

Sun Nov 24 01:45P HBOE3- HBO Signature

Mon Nov 25 04:30P HBOE- Home Box Office

Tue Nov 26 07:30A HBOE- Home Box Office

Wed Nov 27 05:45A HBOE- Home Box Office

Wed Nov 27 11:15A HBOE2- HBO Plus

Thu Nov 28 03:30P HBOE- Home Box Office

Thu Nov 28 10:30P HBOE- Home Box Office

Fri Nov 29 08:00A HBOE2- HBO Plus

Sat Nov 30 12:10A HBOE2- HBO Plus

Sat Nov 30 10:45P HBOE3- HBO Signature

All times are EST, Check local listing for the showtimes in your area.

Two Completely Different Reviews Of SOLARIS From Last Night’s Test Screening!! Brilliant Or Bloody Awful?!

Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab.

Mr. Beaks is currently sedated, resting comfortably, and trying desperately to get over the fact that he missed last night’s test screening of Steven Soderbergh’s SOLARIS. This is absolutely the film he is most eager to see right now, and he told me that he hates both of today’s spies with “the burning intensity of a million suns.”

Of course, it’s not nice to hate.

That didn’t stop this first reviewer, though, and I want to warn you... there are pretty much non-stop spoilers in his take on things. He has almost nothing good to say about the film, but I’ll tell you this: the things that bother him are some of the same things that I thought made the script so great. And calling SOLARIS a “ripoff” of EVENT HORIZON is... well... I’ll let the Talk Backers come up with a name for that sort of chronologically challenged brainfart. Check this out:

Hey Harry,

Little Bill here. First time writer, long time reader. I got a chance to see SOLARIS tonight. The latest from Mr.Soderberg and Mr.Cameron and both of them were at the screening. I'll admit it, I was star struck. I saw them both out in the lobby and I just stood their and stared at them for just a little to long. I think I was starting to worry their security.

Anyways, on to the review. It pains me to say this but in a word Solaris SUCKED. It was horribly bad. I was shocked at how bad it was. Let me tell you first off, I like Soderberg and several of his movies are in my top one hundred. Secondly, I went into this movie very interested in it. I knew it was a sci-fi love story and I thought it would make for an interesting story given the talent involved. How can you go wrong with Soderberg, Cameron, and Clooney? With all of their heads put together something at least average has to come from it. IT DIDN'T.

The story is about Chris Kelvin (George Clooney) who is a space engineer of some sort. It never really specifies exactly what he does. Its set in the future, the exact date I can't really pin down, another thing that was very annoying. The movie starts out with Kelvin in his futuristic apartment when two men knock at his door, one of them is dress somewhat like Alex DeLarge (clockwork orange) with a bowler hat and all. They bring him a videodisc with a message from a friend. The friend is the captain of this troubled spaceship. He tells Kelvin he needs his help and the video quickly cuts out. The two men then explain to Kelvin they received this message and sent an assault team to land on the space station and that they lost contact with them. It was now left up to Kelvin to go and find out what is really going on at the space station. Suddenly the next scene is Kelvin docking with the space station. Up to this point the film seemed interesting and I though it was pretty good. Then suddenly a huge TURD appeared over the horizon.

From this point on in the script things go south. First off, the production design of the space station is an exact photocopy of 2001. In every way. In fact the space station that is featured on the old 2001 video cover is copied almost exactly in the design of the exterior of the space station. I guess this is the best time to point out one of many major problems with this film. I felt the whole feel of the film was copied from 2001. They even used some minor score from 2001. It also ripped off from blade runner, aliens 2, event horizon and countless other sci-fi films. Its like Soderberg being new to Sci-fi production watched every major sci-fi movie in the past 30 years and just mixed and matched their script, production design, and cinematography. It did not work. There were also problem with the costume design. It looked like it was done by a designer that thought shinny nylon and turtlenecks equates to futuristic look.

Anyways, back to the story. Once Kelvin docs with the space station he enters the docking area. Which again looks like its was taken from 2001. He sees blood on the floor and follows the trail. It brings him to a room with two dead bodies. One of the men is Kelvin's friend that sent him the video message. Kelvin wanders around the ship and come across a spaced out guy named Snow (Jeremy Davies). In my opinion Davies is the only redeeming factor in this whole movie. He is the comic relief and he is really crazy. It seems that Clooney is very bored through out this whole movie. Its like he is doing Soderberg a favor by acting in the movie, but he knows it's a big TURD and he is trying to fake it.

Once Kelvin meets Snow the script really starts to fall apart. Kevin asks Snow what went on in the ship and where everybody is. Snow tells him that some of the people killed themselves other just disappeared. It's very vague and is a major rip off of event horizon in the set up. Snow really does not give Kelvin any real answers about what has gone on aboard the space station, but he seems traumatized. Snow tells Kelvin that there is one other person still alive on the ship, her name is Gordon (don't ask me)? Snow tells Kelvin that she wont come out of her room and that she has been in their for along time. In reply Kelvin says "well you will have to help me get her out of their" and the very next scene is of Kelvin, Snow and Gordon at a table. It does not explain how they got Gordon out of her room or anything. This is another major problem with the script. It just skips over things that are built up in the script. It does this type of thing several times.

It has Gordon (Viola Davis), Snow, and Kelvin sitting at a table talking. Once again Kelvin starts asking them questions and they give nothing but vague answers. Which he just takes, he does not investigate or try to get more out of them he just takes their cryptic words and moves along. In the conversation Gordon tells Kelvin the problem with the ship is that the planet is intelligent and it is messing with all of their minds. She tells him to be careful and not to fall asleep. After this he goes into his room and lies down and goes to sleep. He has dreams about his dead wife, they make love in his dreams and when he wakes up his dead wife is there. He immediately puts her in an escape pod and launches her out into space. He knows that he is being messed with. Then he talks with Gordon and Snow again. They have a conversation that really goes nowhere. This is another big problem with the script. Gordon and Snows characters seem to be after thoughts in the script. They are very two-dimensional. They try as hard as they can to bring in a good performance; they just have nothing to work with. Its like Kelvin is on this space station alone and occasionally he will bump into the other two people still alive. They will talk for a minute and then the script forgets about them till their needed for some other plot point or lull in the action. After the go nowhere conversation, Kelvin goes back to sleep. Once again he dreams of his dead wife and once again when he wakes up and she is there in the flesh, in his room. This time though he does not jettison her from the space station. This time for some reason he falls in love with her. From this point on its seems to really drag. For the next thirty minutes its one big blur, consisting of Kelvin and His dead wife Rheya (Natascha McElhone) reliving the time in their lives when they fell in love. There were endless shoots of Clooney's ass.

Which I didn't care too much for and all kinds of unnecessary footage. This brings me to another big problem with the movie. There is ZERO chemistry between Clooney and McElhone and you can really feel it. That's a huge problem when your movie is supposed to be a love story. This brings up another problem; it is not an effective love story because Kelvin falls in love with basically a Blow up doll. It's explained that Rheya is not a real person, she is simply a collection of Kelvin's memories. He knows this and really does not care. That makes for a pretty fucked up love story. The theme is basically "hey she looks like my wife, she fucks like my wife, what do I care if it's really her".

After the endless flashbacks to of Kelvin's and his dead wife, Snow and Gordon drift back into the movie and tell Kelvin that he has to get rid of Rheya. He refuses and then goes back into the room with his Rheya for another session of flashbacks and Clooney's ass. AAAHHH. Finally, Rheya kills herself and Kelvin goes crazy. He picks her up and puts her on the bed and suddenly she is resurrected again.

Kelvin tells Gordon and Snow that they are taking Rheya back with them. They refused to will let him do it. Rheya then commits suicide again. But this time she does it with some special laser that will vaporize her and she dies for good this time. This is the real story folks I'm not making it up!

This was another strange thing in noticed about this film. Gordon also had a clone of a dead loved one that was in her room but it never showed who her visitor was. I found this strange because Rheya freely walked around the ship and talks with Snow and Gordon, but we never see what Gordon loved one looked like. It turns out in the end that Snow was actually a clone himself. Apparently Snow had dreamed about himself and this created a clone of himself and the clone killed off the real Snow. Wow that was so hard to verbalize. This story has more holes then Swiss cheese.

Anyways, so once they realize Snow is a clone they decide finally that they want to leave and go home to earth. I personally can't figure out why they didn't just leave in the first place. Nothing was holding them back they just seemed to stay for no real reason? Anyways Gordon and Kelvin decide to desert the space station and they get in the escape pod and leave.

It them abruptly cuts to Kelvin back on earth. He is chopping vegetable and cuts his finger and it starts to bleed. He runs it under water and the wound quickly heals. Early in the film it establishes that clones wounds heal at light speed. So, it turns out he is a clone.

Then suddenly, he is back again on the spaceship just as he is about to get in the escape pod with Gordon, but this time he does not get in the pod and the pod blasts off. He ends up staying on the ship as it crash lands on to Solaris.

Once again, it cuts to him cutting vegetables in his kitchen and he cuts his finger. As he is running it under water. His dead wife walks into the room. They hug and THAT'S THE END OF THE MOVIE.

I'm not making this up. They actually filmed this movie. It is one of the worst I have ever seen. It ranks right up their with Battlefield earth, Ishtar, and Glitter. This is a major set back for everyone involved. I actually fell sorry for Soderberg. He can't sweep this under the carpet. With all of the elaborate sets and CGI work it probably ran them 90 million. So he has to live and breathe this TURD for another year. It's so bad that you know dam well Soderberg, Cameron, and Clooney all know it sucks.

Well that's all for now. Sorry for any grammar and punctuation errors. It's very, very late and I wanted to get this out as soon as possible, so bare with me.

Little BILL

I’m guessing Little Bill likes the word “TURD”.

And everything I’ve heard from inside Lightstorm and Fox suggests that not only does James Cameron love the film that Soderbergh made, but he also didn’t really have any suggestions for what to change or tweak or fix. He seems to be deeply impressed with the film that Soderbergh turned in.

This next reader was impressed by what he saw, and he has experience with the source material. I’m curious to see which of these reactions is the more typical one, or if either one of them is on the mark at all:

Hello, long time reader, first time writer.

There are spoilers in this review

I just got back from a test screening of Solaris at the Edwards Anaheim Hills Theater, and Steven Soderbergh was present (At least I think I saw him). They said that it was the first test screening of the movie, that it was a work print, that many of the effects were not finalized, that I shouldn't talk about it, etc. I also believe that they said the music was temporary, which is a shame because some of the music is outstanding. I haven't seen the original film version of Solaris, but I have read Stanislaw Lem's novel, which I enjoyed a great deal. So I went into the movie as a fan of the book, expecting a fairly close adaptation.

If you are expecting a close adaptation of Lem's novel, you will be disappointed. Soderbergh's film focuses almost entirely on the relationship between Kris Kelvin (George Clooney) and "wife" Rheya (Natasha McElhone, who is excellent in the movie). The "character" of Solaris itself takes a backseat to Kris and Rheya's relationship. For those of you who are not familiar with the plot, Kris is called to the space station Prometheus, which orbits the "planet" Solaris, after receiving news that things have gone wrong on board. Kris arrives to find two people dead, and he eventually meets his own wife, Rheya, who died years ago. Rheya has no idea of her own death until later, and it is determined that the Rheya on the Prometheus is a copy produced by Solaris. Still with me? Good. Each of the people on the station recieves their own "visitor", although they are not featured very prominently. The other humans on the station are a scientist named Snow (Ulrich Tukur) and another scientist, a female (I can't remember her character's name, it isnt the same as the book) played by Viola Davis.

I think that the direction that Soderbergh's film takes is not what people will be expecting. Very little time is given to explanation and discussion of the planet Solaris itself, and if I hadn't read the book I think I would have been very confused throughout this whole film.

There is very little discussion on the purpose of the visitors that Solaris creates or even the idea that Solaris itself is intellegent, something which is expounded upon quite a bit in Lem's novel. Instead, the story of Kris and Rheya takes center stage, and is played out in a very interesting fashion through a series of flashbacks (in fact, parts of this movie seemed very much like Out of Sight and The Limey as opposed to Soderbergh's newer films). While the development of Kris and Rheya's relationship in the film is played out very well, at times it seems a bit slow. I can't help but feel that if Soderbergh drew more inspiration from the novel that the film would be much more entertaining. For instance, in Lem's novel, the planet forms different shapes and city-like structures out of it's intelligent ocean, something which I would very much have liked to see in the movie, and that I think would make for some excellent images. Sadly, they were nowhere to be found, as Soderbergh seems to have completely cut out the idea of the "intelligent ocean". Instead, Soderbergh's Solaris just looks like a big ball of electricity, and we are never really given a close up view of the planet.

The two scientist characters who are already on the Prometheus have also been changed drastically. Snow has become the comic relief of the movie (which is really quite necesarry, the rest of the film is quite heavy and dark), and the other scientist has been changed into a woman, and neither seem half as paranoid as their literary counterparts. We are told without hesitation who their visitors are, instead of being left to guess based on sounds and movement as in Lem's novel.

If it sounds like I hated the movie, then I'm giving the wrong impression. The film is very well directed, the acting is top notch, and the non-chronological progression of the plot is very interesting. As I said before, I enjoyed the music in the version I saw a great deal, especially the song in the scene where Kris docks with the Prometheus (a sequence which is quite similar to 2001's docking sequence). Clooney and McElhone impressed me a great deal as well, with Clooney adding the appropriate amount of grief in his performance and McElhone realistically struggling with her own existance.

Soderbergh's Solaris was not at all what I was expecting. It is far more a dramatic love story set in space than an actual science fiction movie, although there are elements of science fiction present. I would say that the film is an intellegent science fiction film, akin to Gattaca or 2001. I can also promise you that many people will absolutely hate this movie. All of the people around us in the theater gave this movie a low score and the common complaint seemed to be that it was too slow and confusing (big suprise). If you are looking for something different in a science fiction film, check out Solaris when it comes out. I highly recommend it.

Call me Doctor Gonzo

Okay. That’s it. I have no idea what to think. All I know is, I love this script, and I have faith that even if Soderbergh hasn’t made a crowd-pleaser, he’s probably made something that will inspire heated discussion among serious SF fans.

Can’t wait for December when we get to find out.

Especially since we can’t take Beaks out of his straightjacket until then.

"Moriarty" out..

An Early Look at Soderbergh's Solaris

Coming Soon

10/09/02

We recieved the following from a scooper calling himself 'platapussavenger'. There might be some possible spoilers in here you wouldn't want to know yet, so only proceed if you'd like to know...

I just came from a sneak preview of solaris. steven soderbergh was present. i was chosen to be in a talk session at the end of it, but the guy who chose me came back and said it was full. the movie was amazing, a little dry for some. the score was very eerie and had a layed back feel. i dont want to give anything away but the solaris has the ability to create a person/visitor on board for each person from their memory and once you kill them they can still come back. this makes for some pretty confusing scenes. george clooney was ok, but there wasnt much dialouge so you couldnt really feel that you knew the characters. overall though i thought it was a great movie that was very thought-provoking.

Original Solaris to Bow on DVD Tied to Box Office Remake

Enrique Rivero

News

9/21/02

Translate

The Criterion Collection will hitch a ride into space with 20th Century Fox when it releases Andrei Tarkovsky’s 1972 version of Solaris on DVD to coincide with the big-budget remake produced by James Cameron and directed by Steven Soderbergh.

Criterion’s double-disc edition of the Russian science-fiction classic will street Nov. 19, just ahead of the Nov. 27 theatrical bow of the new version that will star George Clooney, Natascha McElhone and Jeremy Davies.

Based on a novel by Polish author Stanislaw Lem, the story concerns an investigation into phenomena on a space station orbiting Solaris, a watery planet that seems to have the power to make human memories take physical form. One character’s dead wife, for instance, seems to be pulled out of a man’s consciousness and made flesh.

The Criterion edition will include a new anamorphic widescreen transfer with a Dolby Digital mono 1.0 soundtrack; an audio essay by Tarkovsky scholars Vida Johnson and Graham Petrie; nine deleted and alternate scenes; video interviews with lead actress Natalya Bondarchuk, cinematographer Vadim Yusov, art director Mikhail Romadin and composer Eduard Artemyev; and an excerpt from a documentary with author Stanislaw Lem.

A Pair Of Early Looks At Solaris!!!

AICN

8/23/02

Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab.

Nice. I knew they were going to be doing the screening last night, but I wasn’t sure if we’d be getting any feedback from the screenings. We got two reviews in so far, and if you were there, I’d love to hear from you.

First up, we’ve got Cheese Steak, pipin’ hot:

Thursday night Hollywood came to Conshohocken, PA and I was there!

This past weekend I was approached about seeing a preview of a Steven Soberer film starring George Cloony. Expecting to see a combination of OUT OF SIGHT and OCEAN’S 11, I decided to go. My expectations were wrong, what I got was much more than I could ever have imagined. It’s been five hours since the screening of SOLARIS ended and I can’t stop thinking about the film. It is unlike any movie I have seen in years. It raises questions about life and love with a style that is a testament to Soderberg's genius. While the movie is very stylized it delivers both on an intellectual and emotional level. It rocks!

Before the movie started the studio guy gave a speech about how the movie was a rough cut, that the music, sound effects and special effects were not done yet, blah blah blah. The music and sound effects seemed pretty good, the effects and there are not a lot of them were a bit cheesy but will probably be better when the movie is done. However, anyone going to see the movie just for the visual effects is going to be totally missing the point.

The movie begins with psychiatrist Chris Kelvin (Cloony) being asked to journey to a distant planet, Solaris, to try to find out what’s happened to a prior expedition that they’ve lost contact with. There’s a brief reference to a security team having already been sent: this lets us know that something’s gone seriously wrong up there. Since Chris is a friend of the mission commander’s, they think he’s got a shot at defusing the situation. Chris seems unsure - both about these guys intentions and about whether or not he can really help, but here goes:

What happens next, I can’t really tell ya. As one character says, “I could tell you what’s happenin’, but that wouldn’t really tell you what’s happenin’, if you know what I mean.” You’ve got to experience it. Chris arrives on the ship and strange shit starts happening. Is it (the planet) an alien. Is it human? What does it want?

Chris goes to one of the dead scientist rooms and goes to sleep only to be awakened by a woman’s hand on his shoulder. he rolls over and has sex with this totally hot naked stranger: so we think.

Big spoiler - beware!!!!

The woman is in fact his wife Rheya, who we later learn has been dead for several years! Holy fuck!! Literally!!!!

The rest of the movie is intense. It makes you think, that’s for sure. I’m still thinking, in fact: my brain hurts. It’s definitely not something you’ve seen before. Clooney is awesome. He’s never done anything like this before. I’d never seen the girl before. Don’t remember her name... Natasha somebody - but she was good and really hot (did I already say that???)

On the way out in the lobby this totally unworthy Conshohocken cinegeek almost tripped over the KING OF THE WORLD himself standing next to Soberer: it turns out the Cameron produced the film. I almost shouted out when are going to direct again but thought better of it.

Until Hollywood comes to Conshohocken again,

Cheese Steak out!

And now, for the other end of the spectrum in terms of reaction, we have the raw response of “Drummin,” who may weigh in with a more complete review later this morning. Hope so, anyway. I’m curious what he disliked...

drummin here...

here just outside of Philly, the had what they called the FIRST screening of the movie SOLARIS starring George Clooney and directed by Steven Soderberg.

i can sum up my thoughts very easily....

"steaming cesspool of vile"

this was the first time i ever got to see an advance screening and i admit i may have been a little too excited, but the mound of crap that they showed us tonight killed any enthusiasm i had for the evening.

as far as how close to completion the movie was... it seemed pretty far along. Most of the special effects, with the exception of 2 scenes, seemed to be complete. The sound wasnt finished and the score was temporary, but the movie certainly felt 90% complete.

there was no story... there was no story... there was more story in this line than in the movie.

the... movie... was... also... very... slow.......

the basic premise of the movie... is that some disaster has befallen the prometheus(?) and george clooney is supposed to go to the ship, find out what happened and if possible, return safely with everyone. sounds like it was supposed to be a science fiction movie. its not.

what the movie wanted to be was a movie that made you question life and death and the existence of GOD or some kind of "higher intelligence."

what the movie actually was... was a kind of fantasy for george clooney's character to somehow feel reunited with his dead wife. asking us to question wether or not she was 'alive' and deserved to live because she wasn't 'really' human. the movie left the realm of science fiction for long stretches of time and seemed to turn into some kind of heart wrenching drama about how these 2 people met, fell in love, and ended there relationship. i felt like i was watching a really bad version of 'eyes wide shut' several times. and yes, soderberg is definitely trying to be kubrick in this one, but fails horribly.

take the mansion sex party scene from eyes wide shut. remember how slow it was. yes, it was a good scene, because while slow there was still much going on and it continued the movie on its course. but remember how slow and deliberate it was. stretch that scene over 2 hours and thats how SOLARIS felt. without the interesting parts.

these are my first thoughts, ill write something more like a review in the morning after some sleep. when i can get away from this movie a bit.

I know that our own Mr. Beaks is literally rabid about this script, which I read and adored. It’s an astoundingly dense piece of writing, filled with subtext and character sketches. I’m sure of one thing... this movie’s going to cause wildly different reactions. It’s one of those films, like THE THIN RED LINE or EYES WIDE SHUT or FIGHT CLUB, a film to polarize audiences.

Come on... more of you than two must have seen it...

Thanks to Libby

Entertainment Weekly Fall Preview...Solaris

Click for larger image

8/23/02

Starring: George Clooney, Natascha McElhone,

Jeremy Davies, Viola Davis, Ulrich Tukur

Written and directed by: Steven Soderbergh

The Pitch: "It's about a man coming to terms with

the death of his wife. In space." Clooney

What's the biggest difference between Soderbergh's adaptation of the 1961 cult novel by Stanislaw Lem and the 1972 version directed by Russian master Andrei Tarkovsky? "Well, it's not nine hours long," jokes Clooney. Tarkovsky's cineast-adored sci-fi epic -- which actually clocks in at 2 hours and 45 minutes -- only feels nine hours long, given the late auteur's penchant for long, lingering shots of pond water, snorting horses, and highway traffic. Soderbergh's remake is ... well, we wish we knew; the director declined to be interviewed.

"Steven always described it as 2001: A Space Odyssey meets Last Tango in Paris," says Jim Gianopulos, chairman of Fox Film Entertainment. (You mean, lots of zero-gravity sex involving sticks of butter? "Well," laughs Gianopulos, " I think he meant that euphemistically.") But here's the basic plot: Strange and deadly things are happening aboard a space station orbiting Solaris, a possibly sentient planet that may be playing mind games with its observers. Clooney plays a widower psychologist sent to check things out ... and incredibly gets a second chance at love with his late wife, McElhone.

James Cameron had long considered directing but stepped aside when Soderbergh expressed interest. (He remains as a producer.) The Traffic Oscar winner finished his screenplay as he was wrapping last year's Ocean's Eleven and sent it out to a number of actors, including Daniel Day Lewis, but not to his Ocean's star Clooney. So the actor wrote him a letter. "He's my partner and I had write him a letter," says Clooney, who, with Soderbergh, runs the Warner Bros.-based production company Section Eight (also responsible for October's smaller-scale Welcome to Collinwood). "I said, 'Look: I would love to take a crack at it, but only if you think I can do it.' And he basically said: 'What the f---? Let's try.' "

The film was shot over the summer in just two months -- pretty quick for a sci-fi flick. "We have huge sets, but very few special effects shots. Anybody going into this wanting to see Alien 3 is going to be surprised," says Clooney. "It's not an art film. But it is a film for everyone in that it's a well-made, well-told story."

The Lowdown: "Not an art film" will be good news for those turned off by Soderbergh's Full Frontal. Then again, brainy sci-fi doesn't always play well with audiences (see: A.I.)

Premiere Magazine...September 2002

The first item in their 'Ultimate Fall Movie Preview'

SOLARIS, starring George Clooney, Natascha McElhone, and Jeremy Davies; directed by Steven Soderbergh (Twentieth Century Fox)

When something goes wrong aboard the Prometheus, a space station orbiting the titular planet, astronaut-psychologist Chris Kelvin (Clooney) investigates, discovering that one crew member has killed himself, and two others (Davies and Ulrich Tukur) are haunted by lifelike visions. Soon Kelvin starts seeing visions, too -- in the form of his wife (McElhone), who committed suicide years before. "This is by far the hardest acting job I have ever had to do," says Clooney. "Every single scene is like, 'Okay, this scene may be the last moment of your life'. " In 1972, Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky converted Stanislaw Lem's sci-fi novel

into a nearly three-hour tract on Communism and inhumanity (" ... not his best film," cautions Clooney); now Soderbergh refashions the material into a kind of psychosexual search for God. Or, as the director himself has said, "a combination of 2001 and Last Tango in Paris."

COY GEORGE: "It's (not an easy) thing to do when you're 41," Clooney says of his first nude scene. "I not only had to clear the entire set, I had to clear the director out."

SOLARIS...

The footage... Shows George Clooney as he first arrives at the space station. He's wearing a space suit that isn't very bulky, but not form-fitting either. It's thin material that is colored with silver and dirty gold. The space station seems deserted. It's quiet, creepy... very disturbing. The walls are all cold steel blue that are lit and shot beautifully. Imagine a mixture of Cameron and Kubrick and you have an inkling as to what the look of the interior of the space station was. Clooney looks around, obviously puzzled that no one is there. He finds a bloody patch on the grid floor. It's a shocking contrast to the light steel blue and metallic silver of the rest of clean station.

Clooney then sees that the bloody spot is really the beginning of a long, thin blood trail. He follows it along the grid floor until we reach another doorway. We pan up from the floor to see a bloody hand print at the doorway. Clooney continues to slowly follow the blood trail through a hallway, until he comes into a room and finds what looked like a bloody white glove on the floor. He kneels down, picks it up, turns it over, thinks... Then looks up to see the blood trail continuing into the next room, which has 2 body bags with stiffs in them. He cautiously approaches the body bags, opens one up to reveal a dead man in it. He goes to the other one and opens it up. We don't see who's inside of the bag, but there's obviously a bloody body in there. Clooney looks at the dead body for a minute, then leaves. We stay in the room and pan up to the ceiling where we see a blood spot.

Very creepy stuff. Not one word of dialogue in that whole scene (although Cameron was quick to assure us all that there was plenty of dialogue in the movie). It was beautiful and told so much without saying anything. From my understanding of the script and from what I've seen of the movie so far, this is going to be a brilliant film. I'm dying to see the whole thing.

From AICN

Soderbergh's 'Solaris' to launch early...'Bringing it up a couple weeks is no problem'

Click here for larger image

Hollywood, California (Reuters) --Steven Soderbergh's space thriller "Solaris" is shifting its orbit, moving to an earlier launch date of November 27, Variety reports.

The Thanksgiving-frame bow for the George Clooney starrer was made possible by the picture's timely wrap three weeks ago, said Bruce Snyder, distribution president at 20th Century Fox. "Solaris" had been set for December 13..

"Solaris" thus becomes the holiday's "only adult movie," Snyder said. He added the move is firm, regardless of any additional jockeying by rival distributors over the still-fluid holiday season schedule.

"The film is in great shape so early in the post process that bringing it up a couple of weeks is no problem," said James Cameron, who is producing along with Rae Sanchini and John Landau.

"November 27 is a great date, but from what Steven has been showing me of the rough cut, 'Solaris' is going to be such a landmark of science fiction filmmaking that it doesn't really matter when it is released," Cameron added.

Clooney plays a psychologist sent to probe odd behavior by scientists aboard a space station orbiting the planet Solaris. The cast also features Natascha McElhone and Jeremy Davies.

The picture represents Soderbergh's first project since his 2001 hit "Ocean's Eleven" -- excluding his modestly budgeted and experimental "Full Frontal," which is set to bow this week.

The "Solaris" time warp out of the December 13 weekend also puts two weeks' distance between Soderbergh sci-fier and a potential direct competitor -- "Star Trek: Nemesis," the latest space adventure in Paramount's long-running feature franchise. Disney's Jackie Chan actioner "Shanghai Knights" is also set to unspool December 13.

On its new date, "Solaris" is positioned against the Sony cartoon "Adam Sandler's 8 Crazy Nights," which should skew substantially younger. It also will knock heads -- but only gently -- with Disney's family toon "Treasure Planet."

To accommodate the move to the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, Fox is bouncing its Orlando Jones-Nick Cannon comedy "Drumline" from November 27 to January 10

George Clooney to Battle Harry Potter

People Online

Stephen M. Silverman

7/30/02

George Clooney's new movie "Solaris," in which he plays a psychologist dispatched to a space station, will be released at Thanksgiving rather than Christmas, reports Variety.

The shift in dates is so that the sci-fi thriller will be an adult alternative to the next Harry Potter film, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" (scheduled to open Nov. 15), says the trade paper.

So, expect "Solaris" Nov. 27 rather than Dec. 13, as had been planned. The movie re-teams Clooney, 41, with his "Ocean's Eleven" and "Out of Sight" director Steven Soderbergh. In other holiday movie news, Jack Nicholson's movie "About Schmidt" (which earned him accolades at this year's Cannes Film Festival in May) is now set to open in the United States on Christmas Day.

Nicholson, 65, is also in talks to star in a comedy about an older man who falls for the mother of his young girlfriend, to be written and directed by Nancy Meyers ("What Women Want"). The Oscar winner will also be seen in the Adam Sandler comedy "Anger Management," scheduled to open next summer.

Thanks to Marie

20th Century Fox Announces November 27 Release

7/29/02

Business Wire

Los Angeles--(Entertainment Wire)--July 29, 2002--Twentieth Century Fox will move up its holiday release "SOLARIS," starring George Clooney, and written, directed, edited and photographed by Steven Soderbergh, to November 27, it was announced today by Fox domestic distribution president Bruce Snyder. Lightstorm Entertainment principals James Cameron, Rae Sanchini and Jon Landau are producing. The film had originally been scheduled for release on December 13.

Soderbergh, whose resume includes the Academy Award(R)-winning dramas "Traffic" and "Erin Brockovich," as well as the blockbuster caper film "Ocean's Eleven," brings his unique vision to "SOLARIS," a story of love, redemption, second chances and a space mission gone terribly wrong. "SOLARIS" reunites Soderbergh with "Ocean's Eleven" cast member George Clooney, who also starred in the director's acclaimed "Out of Sight." Co-starring are Natascha McElhone ("Ronin," "The Truman Show"), Jeremy Davies ("Saving Private Ryan"), Viola Davis ("Traffic") and Ulrich Tukur (Costa Gavras' "Amen").

Based on the classic science fiction novel by Stanislaw Lem, "SOLARIS" centers on a psychologist (Clooney) sent to investigate unexplained behavior of key scientists on a space station orbiting the planet Solaris. Once aboard he, too, falls victim to this unique world's mysteries -- as well as an erotic obsession with someone he thought he had left behind.

Commented Bruce Snyder: "`SOLARIS' is a totally fresh, original film, which brings together the formidable talents of George Clooney, Steven Soderbergh, and Jim Cameron. We look forward to giving audiences the chance to experience this remarkable work, which is unlike any other they're likely to see during the holiday period, beginning November 27th." Twentieth Century Fox is a unit of Fox Filmed Entertainment, a unit of Fox .

Thanks to Brenda

MR. BEAKS Has A Cosmic O For Soderbergh’s SOLARIS!!

AICN

6/20/02

Click pic for more images

Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab.

As I’ve mentioned here already, Mr. Beaks is just moving to Los Angeles. For the last few years, he’s been one of our “go-to” guys in NYC, but a chain of personal events has led him to migrate to my side of the continent. I couldn’t be more pleased. Beaks is a good guy. When he first got to town, I let him roam through the stacks of scripts that clutter the Labs, giant snowdrifts of paper held together with brads, picking and choosing a number of things to read. When he stumbled across one particular script, his eyes lit up and he made little girly sounds.

I had no choice but to loan him SOLARIS to read.

Man, I’m glad I did.

Here’s one of the better pieces I’ve been pleased to publish by Beaks so far, a passionate look at a script that seems to have inspired him to a sort of near-religious fervor. I’ll let him explain why:

When Stanislaw Lem pondered Solaris, he found the limits of man’s knowledge on the surface of a homeostatic ocean.

When Arndrei Tarkovsky pondered Solaris, he found a parable concerning man’s inherent isolation situated in a metaphor for Russia’s malfunctioning communist experiment.

Thirty years later, Steven Soderbergh is pondering Solaris, and, standing on the shoulders of the two previous explorers’ insights, he has found the most intensely personal project of his career.

He is also on the cusp of making the most provocative science-fiction film since 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY.

SOLARIS is currently set to begin production as soon as George Clooney, who will star along with Natasha McElhone and Jeremy Davies, wraps CONFESSIONS OF A DANGEROUS MIND, situating it for release sometime in 2003. Retaining the basic premise of the Lem novel, man confronts incomprehensible “living” planet with god-like powers, Soderbergh has essentially combined the book and the Tarkovsky movie, taken a machete to them, and stitched only the essential pieces back together with a heavy sensual tincture absent from its predecessors. In a very illuminating interview conducted by Chris Gore at Film Threat on the eve of the Oscars in 2001, Soderbergh tellingly stated "...if we do our jobs right it's a combination of 2001 and LAST TANGO IN PARIS". It is precisely that, hold the butter.

Imbuing the heady sci-fi chestnut with a libido is but one of many pre-production triumphs for Soderbergh, and while it may be early to declare SOLARIS a sure-thing (even though I feel it’s as close to being one as I’ve ever encountered in years of script reading), those who’ve made contact with the work in the past (which, to the reader, can seem almost as profound as discovering the planet itself) know what a powder-keg of reality-shattering ideas SOLARIS can be.

My own fascination with SOLARIS began back in 1990, when Tarkovsky’s film – incidentally, the director’s least favorite of his own work – was restored to its full 167-minute running time (the U.S. release ran 132-minutes), which led many critics to rave madly over what they considered a miraculously salvaged masterpiece existing as a Russian counter-point to Kubrick’s 2001.

Though I was a mere sixteen at the time, such plaudits made the film impossible to resist, leading me to seek out the film upon its eventual video release (hey, I lived in Northwest Ohio at the time; that was as good as I could do). I wish I could say Tarkovsky’s introspective, dirge-like examination of man’s brutally self-centered nature inspired in me an acute appreciation for Russian cinema, but as a young man high on the hyper-kinetic filmmaking of Sam Raimi, it’s safe to say the director’s thoughtful (i.e. glacial paced) rhythm was lost on me.

Several years later, however, I rediscovered SOLARIS via a brief flirtation with the novels of Lem, and responded to the solipsistic dilemma faced by its protagonist, Kris Kelvin, a cautious, logic-bound psychiatrist teetering on either the brink of madness or the edge of man’s very existence.

It’s a fascinating book stuffed-to-bursting with mind-warping, often paradoxical ideas, and the kind of bold theorizing more appealing to the science-impaired portion of the genre’s audience. What’s more, it sent me scrambling back to Tarkovsky’s once-impenetrable work with a renewed vigor; that I once again found the film more of an interesting failure than a masterwork on the level of 2001 does not negate the picture’s many captivating moments, including its unremitting somber tone, a prolonged zero-gravity embrace set to a solemn Bach prelude, and a haunting final shot that grows progressively bleaker as the camera pulls back. And though the film failed to satisfy me as a sustained piece of dramatized philosophizing, it did leave me with the notion that, in the hands of a more conventional storyteller with access to a generous budget,

SOLARIS could finally be the groundbreaking piece of science-fiction for which Tarkovsky was striving.

When I heard several years ago that the rights for SOLARIS resided with James Cameron, I wasn’t terribly thrilled; though he’d claimed the mantle of Best Popular Storyteller from Spielberg in the 1980’s, churning out an impressive string of compulsively watchable entertainments, the thematic complexity of his work was always a secondary pleasure – best appreciated when slyly integrated on the fly, but ham-fisted when confronted head-on (most notably in the badly aging T2, which had something to do with the value of human life, if I’m not mistaken). When it was announced, however, that Steven Soderbergh would be directing (with the full weight of Cameron and Lightstorm behind him as producers), the possibilities began to multiply. Having marveled at the off-handed narrative economy of 1998’s OUT OF SIGHT, I thrilled at the thought of Soderbergh’s potential to focus the story into a compelling whole, rather than a compendium of stationary discussions building to a revelatory finale.

I was hopeful. I had no idea.

As a pitch, you could say Soderbergh’s SOLARIS plays more like a cross between 2001 and THE SHINING; an astronaut/psychiatrist, Chris Kelvin, is sent via his Athena 7 space capsule to the Prometheus (the name of every thing or person in this script is of great significance), a ship orbiting the titular planet, which has seen one of its crew members, Gibarian, commit suicide, while the other two, Snow and Sartorius, are clearly well off the rails upon our protagonist’s arrival. Kelvin’s repeated attempts to ascertain what, besides common cabin fever, has caused these men to lose their bearings are met with belligerent accusations from Sartorius and an eerie warning from Snow to barricade his door while he sleeps, which he heeds.

His precautions are futile; that night, Kelvin receives a visitor in the form of his deceased ex-wife, Rheya. She is not a dream, nor a ghost, but a physical manifestation of his memory dredged up by Solaris for reasons at first incomprehensible to Kelvin, and, coincidentally, to his crewmates, who have been confronting their own visitors for several weeks, thus taking an obvious toll on their sanity.

Kelvin’s first impulse is to rid himself of Rheya by expelling her in a space pod, but as soon as he falls asleep the next night, he is met by a second manifestation of her, leaving him little choice but to deal with her inexplicable presence in his life as he attempts to assess the sanity of his colleagues and the status of the Solaris expedition, which has just been sold by the government to an anonymous private concern for a substantial sum.

As Kelvin experiences life with Rheya again, they indulge in a furious fit of sexual fervor as gratifying as the quiet moments spent dealing with Rheya’s emotional instability are excruciating.

As Soderbergh deftly drops visual clues about the nature of their relationship – encompassing their chance first encounter, Kelvin’s apparent tendency toward emotional neglect (symbolized in the pills he forces on Rheya to quell his own discomfort with her outbursts), and the tragic end of their marriage – he leaves open the possibility that perhaps Kelvin’s chemical solution for Rheya’s anxiety, while effective as a quick fix, only worsened her mental state. The dilemma is deepened by Soderbergh’s wise fleshing out of Rheya’s character, a symbol of benign neglect in the book, and brutally depicted as a kept animal in the Tarkovsky film, where all of the female characters often shared empathetic two-shots with the family dog.

By making Rheya the intellectual equal of Kelvin, their doomed life together attains a mournful heft as the thrust of the narrative shifts from the futility of understanding Solaris to our destructively casual misunderstanding of each other.

It’s a concept Lem would likely advocate, and, maybe, would’ve pursued had he not been so keen on lampooning man’s brash, unfocused desire to reach out into the cosmos without knowing his own inherent boundaries.

As a bit of a space exploration aficionado, a part of me has always resisted Lem’s thesis, which is why I’m most satisfied with Soderbergh’s slightly less cynical, much more compassionate approach (though so much of my NASA adoration is caught up with those envelope-pushing Mercury astronauts who cracked the earth’s atmosphere as an ineffable gesture of good, old-fashioned American will, I may end up agreeing with Lem one day should we continue to find bupkis out in the final frontier).

Another masterstroke is how succinctly (if differently) Soderbergh contextualizes Solaris into our universe. Gone is the book’s pre-occupation with the 100-plus year old history of Solaris and its Solarists (a branch of hard and theoretical science that becomes dominant in the wake of the planet’s discovery). Instead, Soderbergh places us only ten years into our understanding of Solaris existing in a “higher mathematical dimension superimposed on top of the Universe”, a discovery that has thrown all laws governing Space and Time into upheaval; thus, Kelvin’s inter-planetary jaunt is colored by immediacy rather than the pointlessness of the tale’s two previous incarnations. Even the facile alterations, such as placing Kelvin and his colleagues on the Prometheus, intensify the metaphorical underpinnings of the tale.

As Sartorius and Snow reach the conclusion that the destruction of the planet is the only way to preserve their sanity, and protect the Earth from what could potentially be a malevolent force, Kelvin falls in love with the new Rheya, and contrives for a way to get her off of the ship and back home, but as they grow closer, the very memories of what tore Kelvin and the Earthbound Rheya apart begin to surface, and he is faced with the awful possibility of losing her all over again.

At this point, Soderbergh’s script slams home as a cosmic tragedy, with Kelvin reaching out for that never meant to remain in his possession, and forgiveness as his only comfort.

As many times as I’ve read this script, and I’m well over twenty passes by this point, it never loses its power to pulverize in the last twenty pages. Whether or not our explorers have found God, a distinct possibility floated by more than one of the characters, the fate of Kelvin and Rheya always stands at the fore – the human predicament dwarfing the theological and scientific conundrum in ways both surprising and sobering.

On the page, Soderbergh’s SOLARIS is a monumental work of science fiction, and though I worry about the potential of humans as much as its author, I couldn’t be more confident of his own capacity to bring his potential masterpiece to fruition.

Trailer Images

Soderbergh adds Jeremy Davies to cast of sci-fi thriller!

Steven Soderbergh has added Jeremy Davies to the cast of his sci-fi thriller Solaris. Davies will join George Clooney and Natascha McElhone in the adaptation of a Russian sci-fi novel. Production will begin in April, with the film due to be released in the US in December.

The film is about a psychologist sent to investigate the baffling behaviour of scientists on a space station orbiting the planet Solaris, according to www.hollywoodreporter.com. Davies played Corporal Timothy Upham in Saving Private Ryan.

2001: A SEX ODYSSEY

CHUD

3/8/02

Brit actress Natascha (The Truman Show) McElhone has just hopped aboard 20th Century Fox's Solaris to be directed by Steven (Traffic) Soderbergh. She will join George Clooney on the sci-fi film, who is starring and is also producing along with Soderbergh, through their Section Eight production banner.

Solaris, based on the book by Stanislaw Lem, tells the story of a psychologist who is sent to investigate the weird of important scientists on a space station that is orbiting a water-based planet called Solaris.

Once he arrives on the space station, the psychologist gets drawn into the unexplained mystery of the planet, which includes visions of his deceased wife and others, as well as his erotic obsessions.

The book was previously adapted to film in 1972 by Russian director Andrei Tartovsky. It won the Grand Jury prize that year at the Cannes Film Festival. Production on the film is expected to begin in May and a release date of December 13, 2002 is already set.

According to Film Threat, Soderbergh said in an interview that Solaris is "a combination of 2001: A Space Odyssey and Last Tango in Paris. McElhone will soon be seen in the Warner Bros. mystery suspense thriller Fear.com, arriving in theaters on May 10. She will also make an appearnce in Sony Pictures Classics Laurel Canyon and United Artists City of Ghosts, both arriving in theaters sometime in the 3rd quarter of 2002.

McElhone Joining Clooney in Solaris

3/07/02

British actress Natascha McElhone ("The Truman Show") has been cast to star alongside George Clooney in the Steven Soderbergh-helmed sci-fi thriller "Solaris" for 20th Century Fox, says The Hollywood Reporter.

An adaptation of the Russian sci-fi novel by Stanislaw Lem, "Solaris" centers on a psychologist sent to investigate the unexplained behavior of key scientists on a space station orbiting the planet Solaris.

Once aboard, the psychologist falls victim to the unique world's mysteries -- as well as an erotic obsession with someone he thought he had left behind.

'Solaris' on Cinesite VFX slate

Sheigh Crabtree

Hollywood Reporter

2/28/02

Cinesite is in negotiations for the visual effects package on writer-director Steven Soderbergh's upcoming sci-fi feature "Solaris," the 20th Century Fox update of the classic Stanislaw Lem novel that is to star George Clooney.

The VFX work on the project will include 2-D and 3-D effects. Shots will include spaceship exteriors, CG waterscapes, the creation and healing of CG wounds and greenscreen-composited planetscapes.

"We always look forward to working with Steven because he understands the possibilities of today's digital technology," said Tom Smith, Cinesite's "Solaris" VFX supervisor. "Working with him on a project like 'Solaris' creates ideal conditions for excellent effects."

It would be the sixth project â” preceded by "Ocean's Eleven," "Traffic," "Erin Brockovich," "The Limey" and "Out of Sight" â” that the director has posted at the Hollywood-based VFX and digital mastering facility, though a Fox spokesperson has confirmed that "Solaris" will not be digitally mastered.

West End: George Clooney movie may be shot around Forks

Roger Harnack

02/06/02

Forks -- The next movie to be filmed on the North Olympic Peninsula could be a science-fiction thriller.20th Century Fox officials are considering a rural West End location as the setting for the upcoming film, ``Solaris,'' starring George Clooney. Free-lance location scout Michael Allison confirmed Tuesday that the major studio is considering the Forks area because of the frequent rain and overcast skies. Allison would not comment on when a final shooting site will be selected or discuss other locations currently under consideration.

Forks Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Diane Schostak said Tuesday the community hopes to learn if the movie crew is coming in the next few weeks. ``They've been climbing all over out there,'' she said. ``They've been looking since October.''

Solaris...Clooney and Soderbergh's Soviet Space program!

Total Film magazine

Feb 2002 issue

The George and Steven career love-in continues apace, with the pair forming a production company, working together twice and buying matching bathrobes. Er, maybe not the last one. But Soderbergh is about to cast Clooney in another remake, following their reworking of Rat Pack caper Ocean's Eleven.

This time Soviet space epic Solaris is getting a makeover. Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky, it's one of those films that "serious" critics love to bang on about, largely because they know they'll never have to sit through it again. So slow it makes 2001 look like a Tex Avery cartoon, the original drags a whopping 165 minutes out it's convoluted plot.

It starts simply enough - a cosmonaut is sent to a remote space base to replace a dead colleague. On arrival, he finds the late spaceman's co-workers driven insane by spooky visions, plus evidence of alien life. And then it slooows right down for some deep psychological subplots.

Like Event Horizon on sleeping tablets, this intergalactic plotboiler isn't an obvious remixing choice. However, if anyone can turn it from an interesting but interminable tale into a tight, compelling piece of sci-fi then surely Soderbergh is the man for the job - hey, if he can bag Julia Roberts an Oscar, he can do anything.

And if the talent in front and behind the camera isn't impressive enough, the fact that James Cameron's production company, Lightstorm Entertainment, is footing the bill means that the US version will at least have an impressive bang-to-buck ratio.

Not only does the project sound like a definite must-see, it's also in danger of making Tarkovsky's original look about as space-worthy as that other obselete Russian nuisance, Mir...

Thanks to Libby for the above pic and article

First Look: Soderbergh's Solaris Remake

Smilin' Jack Ruby

13th Street

12/16/01

My God, now this is an interesting next project. Yes, so right now George Clooney is set to direct Confessions of a Dangerous Mind and Steven Soderbergh is helming Full Frontal for a limited release next year, but they're also set to work together in the future on a remake of Soviet writer/director Andrei Tarkovsky's rather insane film, Solaris, based on the book by Stanislaw Lem.

Honestly, I'm not even sure where to begin talking about this piece of work, but when George Clooney described it as "2001 meets Last Tango in Paris," I have to say that that's not too far off.

Yes, there's a lot more to it than that - a LOT more - but I'll get to that in a second. Though the original film, made in 1972, did win a Grand Jury Prize at Cannes, it hasn't been seen by all that many Americans (what with the running time of 165 minutes and all) and isn't the most readily available, on-your-Blockbuster's-shelves kind of tape in the first place.

The script, labeled "by Donald Gould" is curious as I thought it was widely accepted that Soderbergh was adapting the piece himself. However, for a man who uses the name "Peter Andrews" once he started being his own cine-matographer and "Sam Lowry" as the name of the screenwriter who wrote his only other own-directed screenplay of a remake, Underneath, perhaps this is another pseudonym.

It certainly read like a Soderbergh script and clocking it at a mere seventy-five pages, it's an odd, yet quite thrilling screenplay (I am, of course, leaving the door open for there to be an actual scripter named Donald Gould who took this on for Soderbergh some time this year, but whatev - if anyone knows the answer, feel free to e-mail in). There are changes from the meditative Tarkovsky version, but when it comes to addressing the "big" issues brought on by what's quietly considered one of the greatest science fiction films of all time, Soderbergh's version will be handling the same with care.

Humorously enough, it's the little differences that made me laugh at the beginning of the script, most notably the fact that it's now "Chris Kelvin," not "Kris Kelvin" as the main character, which was kind of the way the whole piece went. Yes, it's a Westernized version, but not entirely. If this had been a Village Roadshow remake, it would've likely been "Connor 'Blastwell' Borchardt," but it's obvious that's not what they're going for here.

We meet Chris Kelvin (likely to be played by Clooney) at the beginning as a group of "bureaucrats" need him to head into space to the planet Solaris where a group of scientists have been in orbit while studying this mysterious place. A troubling video message from their leader - Gibarian - has prompted the scientists on Earth to send Kelvin, but when he arrives there, Gibarian has already died, an apparent suicide.

There are only two scientists on the Prometheus, the ship orbiting Solaris - Snow and Sartorius - and they aren't much help to Kelvin at first as whatever's been going on, whatever drove Gibarian to suicide, is not something they feel they should tell Kelvin about - rather he should find out on his own.

As Kelvin extends his stay on his own ship, the Athena 7, and on the Prometheus, he begins to see what they mean when his own dreams bring forth a person from his past into the present reality - his wife, Rheya.

Hopefully you'll understand from the above description that though it sounds a little like 2010, it is told in a sedate way with little dialogue. Though some will even want to compare this to Event Horizon, it won't be that kind of movie at all. Imagine if you will, some of the way the dialogue played out in sex, lies and videotape - they were trying to get to the bottom of something, but a lot of it was the dialogue-journey to get there.

This version of Solaris is a lot like that, in a way.

The story basically becomes, what is Rheya? I don't want to give too much away (though almost every minute seems to suggest that a great deal of the movie will be up to the audiences' own interpretation), but the question is, as she has all of Kelvin's wife's memories and is extremely self-aware and appears to be completely human, what is she really?

Yes, ground like this has been covered before in science fiction with the person turning out to be a giant bug-monster at the end or something, but we get past that with the first way Kelvin decides to deal with her. The story doesn't let us off so easy and really forces the audience to confront a lot of issues that science fiction texts have been asking in parables for years, though few with so much to say have made an easy transition to film.

In fact, Solaris is written with a real sense towards reality that may startle some in the way 2001 was at times - very matter-of-fact. Based on that alone, I'm very much looking forward to this movie.

With Solaris, Steven Soderbergh gets to step up to the plate and create his space movie and that's going to be interesting. Soderbergh's films, though some are completely surreal, for the most part are Earth-bound and whole new worlds haven't had to be created (I will say that there are parts of Kafka that are rather other-worldly - still my favorite Soderbergh movie, though don't ask me why). With Solaris, it will have to be just that with the acclaimed director going into Red Planet territory for a change and coming back with a visually interesting movie. Like 2010, a lot of the movie just takes place within the ship(s), but the planet Solaris will likely be an interesting bit of design work - though it won't have to be on a scale of something like the upcoming Rendezvous With Rama film (can't wait for that one).. The question of Soderbergh Vs. Stanley Kubrick is likely one that's going to come up with Solaris, but I don't think it's wise to put Soderbergh in that box. Soderbergh is cranking two movies a year and is working well within the studio system at this point, though he has proved that he's not one that lets himself get sloppy.

Though Kubrick was the same way, Solaris is a much quieter film than 2001 and won't likely be so much about design, look and feel so much as character. I don't know if Solaris is the type of movie that's going to set the kind of box office records Ocean's Eleven just did, but handled well, it just might be an Oscar pic.

So, in conclusion, Solaris was a mind-blower of a script and sets up the film to be something of a stunner.

Yes, there are changes from the book and the Tarkovsky version, but they are subtle and it's obvious that Soderbergh is going for the same kind of exploratory/questioning tone that the Russian director went for and isn't just going to turn it into a movie "about a planet full of apes." I have no idea when this will actually lens, likely in late 2002 and not before, but it's certainly one to keep on your radar as it casts up and moves towards production.

Solaris

11/26/01

AICN

George Clooney will star in the sci-fi thriller SOLARIS for director Steven Soderbergh, James Cameron's Lightstorm Entertainment and 20th Century Fox. It's based on the Russian novel by Stanislaw Lem and centers on an astronaut sent to rescue scientists on a space station. He finds the commander dead and the two survivors driven mad by visions that soon appear to him as well. Shooting may begin in April.

Clooney, Soderbergh Orbit Sci-Fi Thriller

11/20/01

Cathy Dunkley

Hollywood (Variety) - Actor George Clooney and director Steven Soderbergh are planning to work together for a third time on "Solaris," a sci-fi thriller based on a Russian novel.

"Solaris" revolves around an astronaut sent to rescue scientists on a space station. He finds the commander dead and the two survivors driven mad by visions that soon appear to him as well. Based on a novel by Stanislaw Lem, it was first shot in 1972 as a Russian production directed by Andrei Tarkovsky.

The duo previously teamed on the Elmore Leonard adaptation "Out of Sight" in 1998 and on Warner Bros.' "Ocean's Eleven," which will be released Stateside Dec. 7. They are also partnered in their WB-based production entity Section Eight.

As yet no deal is in place for either Clooney or Soderbergh on the picture -- which is being produced by James Cameron's Lightstorm Entertainment and 20th Century Fox -- though both have confirmed their interest. Shooting is expected to begin next April. Section Eight will not take a producing role.

Clooney is filming his directorial debut "Confessions of a Dangerous Mind," the Chuck Barris biopic starring Sam Rockwell, Julia Roberts and Drew Barry-more, for Miramax Films. He will next reteam with the Coen brothers on their feature "Intolerable Cruelty," co-starring Catherine Zeta-Jones.

Soderbergh is shooting the low-budget feature "Full Frontal" for Miramax Films; the ensemble drama features Roberts, David Duchovny and Catherine Keener.