netflixed

I enjoyed the first half of Andrei Tarkovsky's original Solaris, but the second five hours started to drag a bit. If you're not up to the challenge of visually driven Soviet era sci-fi allegory with glacial pacing, then you can watch S. Soderbergh's update with George Clooney and a hot chick. Thankfully the script has been re-written to include voice-overs which explain what the fuck is going on, and some of the dialogue between characters is helpful in the same way ("Can't you see? I only know what you remember!" might be spoken to Clooney in the picture, but it's obviously directed at the audience). Without this Cliffnotes to exasperating art films version, I never could have figured out the moral and philosophical implications of the original film.

I'm being too catty. Solaris the remake is actually pretty good, if you liked the Robert Wise Star Trek film about Voyager becoming God.